H. G. Jayalaxmi, General Secretary, All India Mahila Sanskritik Sangathan issued the following statement on 18 May 2005 :

Since the passing of an order permitting the police to arrest women at any time of the day or night even without the presence of a lady constable, by a Division Bench of the Supreme Court, AIMSS has been organizing movements against it all over the country and on 1st December 2004 (last year) launched a massive protest demonstration before the Parliament and submitted a memorandum to the Prime Minister and another to the Chief Justice of India along with lakhs of signatures demanding total ban on arrest of women at night time on any plea.

Recently, both the houses of the Parliament have amended the Section 46 of the Code of the Criminal Procedure 1973 prohibiting arrest of women after sunset and before sunrise save in “exceptional circumstances”. We welcome the main contention of the amendment to the extent it negates the aforesaid dangerous judgement of the Division Bench of the Supreme Court. At the same time we cannot but strongly criticize and condemn the scope left in the amendment for gross misinterpretation and above all the expression ‘save in exceptional circumstances’, though some so-called safeguards are laid down like seeking permission from a superior officer before arrest or reporting immediately after arrest. In case permission can not be obtained beforehand, a provision is left for reporting to the Magistrate within whose jurisdiction the arrest has been made. Considering the present attitude and behaviour of the police administration as such, there is every possibility of abusing this provision of the amendment.

So, we strongly urge upon the government to immediately remove the above-mentioned part of the Amendment and ensure that no woman is arrested on any plea during night time. We are sorry to note that left parties like CPI(M) and CPI did not raise a single point in the Parliament against this negative portion of the proposed Amendment Bill .

It is also to be noted that when the Division Bench of the Supreme Court passed the dangerous order in 2003 neither these parties nor their women wings protested against it, let alone develop movement.

We call upon all right-thinking democratic-minded people, particularly womenfolk, to come forward and continue movements throughout the country till the disputed portion is removed, especially when atrocities on women, particularly by the men, in uniform are alarmingly on the rise in the country.