The Lok Sabha today unanimously passed a bill to protect women from all forms of domestic violence and abuse. But even before the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Bill, 2005 was passed by a voice vote, Minister of State for HRD Kanti Singh said the government would also bring a new legislation to check sexual exploitation of women at the workplace. The latter bill will also cover women hired as domestic help. While the domestic violence bill would check harassment and exploitation at the hands of family members or relatives, it also included, in its ambit, unmarried women in live-in relationships. Singh said the government would instruct all women-related departments to adhere to ‘‘gender budgeting’’ to boost activities meant to empower women, economically, educationally and socially. The minister also allayed fears that the legislation would create a rift in the family or between husband and wife. The rising graph of domestic atrocities showed that women seldom liked going to court on trivial issues; they favoured a settlement in the interest of the family, she added. ‘‘There were about 1.5 lakh cases of domestic violence registered till 2003, and there was 9.2 per cent increase every year, though most such cases went unreported,’’ she said. The new bill, she said, also covered harassment by way of unlawful dowry demands. Even ‘‘sisters, widows, mothers’’ living with the ‘‘abuser’’ would be entitled to legal protection under the proposed legislation, the minister said. Kiran Maheshwari of the BJP, Krishna Tirath of Congress, CPI’s C.K. Chandrappan, NCP’s Nivedita Mane and SP’s Jaya Prada spoke on the bill before the vote. 1984 compensation NEW DELHI: Congress MPs from Punjab on Wednesday called for uniform compensation for victims of the 1984 anti-Sikh riots across the country. MPs Ambika Soni, Preneet Kaur, Sukhbans Kaur Bhinder, M.S. Gill, Ashwani Kumar and D.P. Sabharwal met PM Manmohan Singh and conveyed their demand.
