“ Life holds more happiness when you let go your past and work on your present”
Crime victim is an invisible entity in the Indian Criminal Justice System, that gets bare minimum services/ assistance and is expected to silently accept ‘Justice’ done by the system. This ‘Justice’ offered (often late) fails to heal the pain and trauma suffered by the victims. This deprives the victim from an opportunity to rise up above the victimization and attain a crime-impact-free life.
In today’s time we need good-hearted samaritans who would kindle that hope in the hearts of such tormented souls and provide them support to tread forward. DISHA has been working as the guiding force with this philosophy to provide the rights and restore the victims of violent crimes.
DISHA was founded in 2008 with a prior realization that the current Indian Criminal Justice System lacks in addressing the plights and rehabilitative rights of the victim. Though the criminal justice system is centuries old, and devised to protect the rights of the innocents, equality in access to justice is still a distant dream in the system.
While on one hand the rights of the accused are well defined in the article 21 of the constitution and some landmark judgments and case-laws provide the guidelines for protecting the rights of the accused, sadly on the other hand there is no such acknowledgment of the victim and their rights of rehabilitation in our constitution and there are no legal guidelines on protection of victim’s rights till now. It is only in 2008 that the word ‘Victim’ was first defined in the CrPC. Till then, there was no definition and mention of ‘victim’, and ‘victim rights’. Hence, there was no implementation.
This unfortunate ignorance further deteriorates victim’s life post the crime incidence; as they are deprived of their rights and support that is needed in their struggle of restoring back to a ‘normal’ life.
Initiatives undertaken by DISHA:
To bring this dream into reality, DISHA has designed its programs to work with victims/people affected with violence, the criminal justice system, community / society and government on multiple fronts. These have been segmented into ‘Crime Prevention & Awareness’ and ‘Victim Rehabilitation / Assistance’ programmes. The uniqueness of the programs is that these programs are adhering to the UN Convention on Justice and Support for Victims of Crime and Abuse of Power, and UN Declaration of Basic Principles of Justice for Victims of Crime and Abuse of Power.
The Victim Rehabilitation / Assistance Program is based on four basic components ratified by the United Nations and India as part of the UN declaration. The components are:
- Access to Justice and Fair Treatment
- Assistance
- Compensation
- Creating responsive Criminal Justice System
Adhering to this, outreach is provided to victim with Socio-legal guidance through:
- Helpdesk at Police station (Now expanded into a separate project)
- Telephone Helpline (DISHA Helpline)
- Outreach to Victim through police / community referral
By deciding these points of contact, DISHA creates possibilities of reaching the victim before / while filing the police complaint and thus prior entering into the justice delivery system (through telephone helpline), or just at the door-step of the criminal justice system (through help-desk at police station) and reaching the victim’s home post the crime incidence. The aim is to empower the victim by means of providing :
- with their basic right
- information about the unknown criminal justice system
- how to seek justice
- whom to reach for what
- what are the legal processes to be followed to access justice and rights
- what could be a timeline for those processes.
Other than that, keeping in view the holistic rehabilitation of victim, a personalized action plan is made in participation with victim through which the following services are provided
- Individual and Family counselling
- Educational and vocational support
- Legal intervention/aid
- Support for livelihood opportunities
- Family Support Services
- Support Group / Group Sessions
- Sensitization, Awareness and training of Village-level bodies
- Helping the victim to avail government scheme/s
- Networking, Collaboration and Advocacy
DISHA’s Helpline 7666102103 :
As DISHA started working for victims, it realized that the access to justice also depends a lot on access to ‘outreach’, and ‘authentic information’. It was observed that many a times several victims / people at risk suffer silently because of fear, unawareness about the support services available and ways of seeking support and justice. Additionally, misguidance by local people leads to perceiving the system as very insensitive, inefficient and more harming than serving.
It was realized that DISHA must have more accessible channels of communication and outreach to victims. With this intent, DISHA’s victim helpline was started in November 2014.
Further, as the time passed it was realized that there are more beneficiaries of this helpline along with the victims. These are the stakeholders of the criminal justice systems such as police, judiciary, village level agencies such as police patils, Gramsevak, and other information seekers who are either acting as support person to victim or are living in risk zone, seeking information before occurrence of crime incidence, and also the victims DISHA is already doing casework with.
Till date DISHA Helpline has reached to 2854 beneficiaries till date.
DISHA also works for crime prevention and building safer communities by empowering several sections of society. Through other programs like :
Safe Childhood :
This is a Sensitization and Awareness session for school children wherein vulnerable children aged 8 to 14 are given information about personal boundaries, safe touch – unsafe touch, safe and unsafe behaviors of them and others, tips on safety and how to respond to risks, contact information for help and important help-lines etc. They also make sure to make the institution staff aware about their role in maintaining child safety at institute level in accordance with the POCSO Act 2012.
‘Tarunyachya Umbarthyawr’(‘तारुण्याच्या उंबरठ्यावर’):
This is a sensitization and awareness session for youth, college students. Through this activity adolescents and youth aged between 15 to 22 in colleges, university, are made aware of the challenges they face being a youth – relationship-violence, peer pressure, unhealthy attractions that may pull them in risk or in crime, and how to transit smoothly from this phase without indulging in risky activities, how to stay safe and develop oneself.
DISHA Community Centre:
DISHA’s Community Centre was started in 2012 in Wadali, Amravati in the heart of 10 slum pockets. The idea behind the Community Centre was to create a space of safety, social support, learning and skill building, and all-round development and strengthening of the children from vulnerable backgrounds.
This Community Centre is run by the former beneficiaries residing in the same area. In these centres, children aged between 6 to 14 years are enrolled free of cost for basic computer training, life skills, individual guidance, awareness sessions on issues like child rights, right to education, protection from child sexual abuse, safety measures against any kind of abuse of self or family member etc.
The Community Centre has benefitted 1120 children till date.
DISHA has established its work in Pune, Amravati & Yavatmal – the districts having yearly incidences of I.P.C. crime above 6000 (Crime in Maharashtra report – 2016). You can reach out to DISHA at :
| Name | DISHA (Developing Intervention for Social Human Action) |
| Address | Teacher’s Colony, Near LIC Colony, Post- Rukhmini Nagar, Amravati, Pin code-444606, Maharashtra, India |
| Telephone | 0721-2541055, Mob- 09766698496 |
| Helpline | 7666102103 |
| disha.amravati@gmail.com | |
| Website | www.dishaforvictim.org |
| Facebook Page | Disha (Developing Intervention for Social Human Action) @dishaforvictim |
| Youtube Channel | DISHA for Victim NGO |