Even as West Bengal has appointed 39 protection officers (authorised under the Act to protect women from domestic violence) across its districts, the lack of training and inadequate funds for infrastructure have led to incomplete action.

The findings of an evaluation by Lawyers Collective Women’s Rights Initiative and International Centre for Research on Women show that compared to Bengal, Punjab has 148 protection officers (PO) for its 17 districts, Jharkhand has 204 POs for 18 districts while Himachal Pradesh has 377 POs stationed across 12 blocks.

“At a time when incidents of domestic violence can be tackled through civil law, the state lacks in the basics needed to implement the law. There are many places where the POs have not yet been appointed. Also, those appointed receive only Rs 300 to 800 as monthly allowance and there is no guarantee of their three-year tenure being renewed,” said retired Justice of Calcutta High Court Malaya Sengupta. Sengupta was part of the workshop organised by the Delhi-based NGO — Centre for Social Research along with Communicators India, a media advocacy organisation.

Even as the number of cases received by the POs in West Bengal from April 2008 to July 2009 is 1462, experts claim that poor budgetary allocation for carrying forward the cases has proved to be an impediment. Only 14 states have separate budget allocation while Bengal has minimal.

“The service providers are mostly NGOs who do not get any money from the state to work under the Act. Service providers compulsorily have family counselling officers, but they are not trained in the job. Also, while the notice period is two days form the time of the complaint, the PO very rarely manage to get them across to the respondent because of lack of coordination,” said Sengupta.