Women must rise against sexual harassment

Women should rise up and protest sexual harassment of females, said speakers at an event of Brac University yesterday.

They also urged women to come out in public places instead of staying at home for fears of assault.

"We women must assert our presence in public places," said Prof Firdous Azim, chairperson of Brac University's English and humanities department, at the programme titled "Sexual harassment and the rights of women in public spaces".

Hoping that more women would join Pahela Baishakh celebrations next year defying this year's mass molestation of women, Azim said public places would be safer for females if more of them are present.

Advocate Fahima Nasrin of the Supreme Court spoke of her work on public interest litigation, which resulted in a landmark judgement by the High Court in 2010 that defined sexual harassment and stalking and issued directives to the government to prevent such crimes.       

"Had the directives been implemented, the April 14 incident where 50 women were sexually assaulted would not have taken place," she said, adding that instead of enacting new laws and creating confusion with existing ones, the current laws should be implemented properly.

Samia Islam, programme officer at rights body Odhikar, presented statistics on stalking and its impact on women. 

According to her research based on data from 12 national dailies, 24 women who were victims of stalking were killed, 268 injured, 141 assaulted, 46 abducted and 99 committed suicide during the period from 2010 to 2014.