GoMs on lynchings, harassment on hold
- With the announcement of general elections on March 10, at least two important Groups of Ministers (GoMs) constituted by the Centre last year to suggest measures on anti-lynching and prevention of sexual harassment of women at workplace have been put in the cold storage.
- The GoM is headed by Home Minister Rajnath Singh and includes Union Ministers Nitin Gadkari, Maneka Gandhi and Nirmala Sitharaman. It, however, met only once and tasked another sub-panel to submit a report.
- While the Ministry of Women and Child Development submitted its inputs in January, the sub-committee couldn’t compile a report to place it before the GoM.
- The sub-committee includes officials from the Ministry of Home Affairs, Ministry of Women and Child Development and Ministry of Law & Justice.
- . A high-level committee headed by Union Home Secretary Rajiv Gauba submitted its report to the GoM in September, but it was yet to finalise the recommendations.
- Among the measures suggested by the panel was tightening of law by inserting clauses in the Indian Penal Code and the Code of Criminal Procedure through parliamentary approval.
- The members of the GoM are External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj, Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari, Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad and Social Justice and Empowerment Minister Thawar Chand Gehlot.
- Another significant legislation that proposed that critical personal data of Indian citizens be processed in centres located within the country and also proposed financial penalties for data processor for violations of the data protection law have also been put on the back-burner.
