There are allegations that most petitions are not registered and are "settled" by other means by the women police and the cases are treated as closed.

The number of petitions received during 1997 in Madurai district alone was 706 and those registered were only 10. This year, 396 cases were reported till date and only seven were registered. There are two AWPS in the city located at Tallakulam and Thideer Nagar. Of the two, Tallakulam station registered more petitions, according to police sources.

Some of the officials in the judiciary department feel that the introduction of AWPS has not brought any remarkable change to alleviate injustice to women. The only change is that earlier the cases were filed by the respective police stations and now they are taken up by the women police. Most of the cases pertain to dowry harassment. Such cases, being an internalaffair, have to be dealt with using circumstantial evidence, they noted.

There are speculations about how genuine the dowry harassment complaints are, particularly the ones lodged by educated women. A cross-section of advocates who spoke to The Indian Express say that women are normally viewed with sympathy by the law. With many sections of the IPC giving the woman weightage against her husband and in-laws, some of the complainants (women) have indeed taken advantage of the laws to harass their in-laws, they claimed.

A case in Virudhunagar district was reported recently wherein, a girl lodged a complaint with the police that her in-laws were harassing her for more dowry. The aged in-laws were pushed behind bars and a case of dowry harassment among others was registered against them. In due course, police suspected foul play and on proper investigation, found that the charge was false and dropped action.

A top brass in the police department admitted that the AWPS was not performing up to the mark andmany petitioners were not really happy with the system. He attributed the cause to lack of professionalism and physical fitness among the AWPS personnel. The officer pointed out that the very purpose of separate police stations was to help women.

Referring to the `out of court settlements', he said that by avoiding a case, both the petitioners are happy because, arrests, lawyer fees, and conviction are avoided. In fact, the petitioner would not like a case to be registered in most cases and she would normally insist that her husband or in-laws just be warned. Most of the petitioners belong to lower middle-class families residing in urban areas.