December is the follow-up month at TNM where we go back to headlines of the past for a status update. In this series, we strive to bring focus back to promises made by governments, revisit official investigations that should have been completed by now and exhume issues of public interest that lost steam over time.
Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister YS Jaganmohan Reddy unveiled the Disha mobile app and inaugurated the first Disha police station at Rajamahendravaram in East Godavari on February 10, 2020, to combat crime against women. The mobile app was launched to assist women in need and alert the closest police patrol car by prompting the SOS button or simply by shaking the phone five times. The police department from time to time has encouraged not only women but also men to download it on their smartphones.
The Andhra Pradesh government passed the Disha Act on December 19, 2019, following the rape and murder of a 26-year-old veterinarian in Hyderabad. According to the Act, investigation into a sexual offence must be completed within seven working days of the time of record, and the trial must be finished within 14 working days of the date the charge sheet was filed. Further, the Act envisages the formation of special police teams at the district level headed by a Deputy Superintendent of Police for investigation of offences related to women and children. The law is not yet in force as it has still not received the approval of the Union government. While the states are allowed to pass amendments to the Indian Penal Code and Code of Criminal Procedure as they fall under the concurrent list, they have to be approved by the Union government after ensuring they are not in conflict with existing laws.
CM Jagan Mohan Reddy lauched Disha App on February 8, 2020 at Rajamahendravaram. Twitter/ Mekothoti Sucharitha
Recently, Nellore police rescued a woman after receiving a late-night SOS through the Disha app. One of the accused who had befriended the victim brought her to a beach resort where they were to spend the night together. But he also invited his two friends to the resort without telling her. They attacked her and warned her that they would kill her if she failed to cooperate. The woman pressed the SOS button, but could not answer the call from the call control room. She was traced by the police with the help of the alternate number the woman had provided at the time of downloading the app.
But not all calls from the app have had satisfactory resolutions. Take the case of Snehalatha, a 19-year-old Dalit woman from Anantapur, who was allegedly killed by Rajesh on December 22, 2020, in a dispute over her friendship with a classmate. Snehalatha had obtained a temporary job at the State Bank of India in Dharmavaram, while Rajesh worked as a mason. Rajesh contacted Snehalatha for a meeting, picked her up on his bike, strangled her, and then set her ablaze. Lakshmi Devi, Snehalatha's mother claimed that the person who received the call on the Disha app was unresponsive and told her to file a complaint at the local police station. Lakshmi went to the I Town police in the middle of the night, where the police refused to take her seriously and told her it was a love affair and that Snehalatha would return.
Dalit organisations demanded the police be held accountable for their alleged inaction. Media outlets cited police statements inferring that Rajesh and Snehalatha were indeed dating based on the number of calls they made to one another. For his alleged remarks on Snehalatha and for disclosing her phone calls and messages to Rajesh, activists demanded the immediate suspension of I Town Circle Inspector Prathap Reddy. The officer was shifted to the Anti-Corruption Bureau unit in Tirupati after facing heat from the activists.
According to the information provided by Andhra Pradesh police, 22,508 SOS calls were received through the Disha app between February 8, 2020, and December 3, 2022. Out of these, First Information Reports (FIRs) were registered in 2,485 cases. The highest number of cases were registered for dowry harassment with 481 calls reported under section 498A (harassment by husband) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). There were 412 calls registered under section 354 (outraging of modesty) and 191 calls that were registered as cases under section 509 (insult the modesty of a woman).
But the data provided by National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) show that the calls received through the Disha app still form a small percentage of cases registered. NCRB data of 2021 for Andhra Pradesh reveals that 7,092 cases registered under section 498A; 2,370 cases under section 509 and 5,018 cases have been registered under section 354.
Explaining the difference between calls received and cases registered, Deputy Inspector General of police (DIG), PHD Ramakrishna spoke to TNM and said, “There are nearly 1.5 crore downloads and 1.15 crore registrations on the Disha App while the population of the state is little less than 5 crore. The high number of calls can be attributed to the situations when women call us when their husbands hit them or call us when they are in doubt-someone is following them. We do not register cases in fights between couples and try to compromise it in the station through family counselling.”
Pointing out the disparity in cases, Ramakrishna said, “One thing to be understood is that calls through Disha are made in emergencies. The high number of cases can be viewed as the cases in which people sometimes register complaints after the incident or after consistent trouble by the accused. The Disha app contributes to the NCRB data in terms of numbers, but the intensity of crime is reduced and many lives are saved.” He added that the crime rate would indirectly go down as it has a psychological effect on the offenders in the area where the victim was rescued.
There are 904 police stations and 18 Disha police stations in the state. When an SOS is prompted, depending upon the seriousness of the call, three units will be alerted – to the nearest patrol vehicle, the nearest police station and the office of the Superintendent of Police (SP) – and the control room is updated with the progress every five minutes. The rescue time in cities and towns is five to seven minutes and in the case of an emergency in an interior place, the rescue time stretches beyond ten minutes. Hence, the locals are alerted immediately. In case of police inaction, as in Snehalatha’s case, the police will be held accountable and action will be taken depending upon the seriousness of the crime. The conviction rate depends on the speed of the trials as the Disha act which ensures speedy trial, is not in force.