In less than seven days West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Thursday shot off a second letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, in the backdrop of the horrific RG Kar incident, demanding “central legislation” ensuring exemplary punishment in cases of rapes. The chief minister began her letter expressing disappointment that her first letter dated August 22 on a serious and “sensitive issue” like crimes against women didn’t fetch her a direct response from him.

No reply was received from your, end on such a sensitive issue. However, a reply has been received from the Minister of Women and Child Development, Government of India, which barely attends the gravity of the issue raised in my letter. I am of the thought that the seriousness of the subject and its relevance to the society have not been adequately appreciated while sending out the generic reply”, Mamata Banerjee wrote in her letter dated August 29.

Union minister Annapurna Devi on Sunday wrote to Mamata Banerjee as response to her letter to the Prime Minister asking her to speed up work on women safety schemes and projects. The Union Minister had alleged the Bengal government hadn’t established emergency helplines such as the Women Helpline (WHL), Emergency Response Support System (ERSS) and the Child Helpline, and not taken any step to start over 11 pending fast track special courts in spite of a pendency of 48,600 rape and POCSO cases. Devi’s letter blamed the state government of inadequacy in implementing measures to ensure women safety, this while seeking central legislation afresh after the brutal rape and murder of the RG Kar doctor on August 9. “The State of West Bengal was allocated a total of 123 FTSCs, which included 20 exclusive POCSO Courts and 103 combined FTSCs dealing with both rape and POCSO Act cases. However, none of these courts had been operationalized till mid-June, 2023,” Annapurna Devi wrote in her letter.

Clarifying those allegations, Mamata Banerjee in her second letter to the prime minister clarified that there are 88 Fast Track Special Courts (FTSCs) and 62 POCSO designated courts functional in the state on “complete state funding”. This contested the claim of Annapurna Devi as she highlighted in her letter that FTSCs were established through centrally Sponsored Scheme on a 60:40 sharing basis. The chief minister also added that there are designated helpline numbers like 112,1098 and 100 are functional and “extensively used in emergency situations”.

In her first letter dated August 22, Banerjee had stressed that almost 90 cases of rapes occur daily throughout the country “shaking the conscience of the society”. She had urged for the intervention of the Central government in bringing central law that will ensure stringent punishment against people committing such heinous crimes through the process of quick justice through fast track courts. On Thursday, she reiterated the demand and urged yet again for a law that will ensure justice and swift disposal of cases of rapes and rapes and murder in a time bound manner.
Since the brutal crime, the opposition had been gunning for Mamata Banerjee’s government, demanding accountability. While blaming BJP and the Left for trying to play politics over the tragedy, she had harped on social and legal reforms to deal with the malice called rape or other crimes against women. “I hope this matter would receive a very considered attention at your kind end in the interest of our society at large”, Banerjee’s letter to PM signed off.