“Gender equality for a sustainable tomorrow” was a series of lectures organized by the Centre for Women Child Rights and Gender Justices of Maharashtra National Law University, Mumbai in collaboration with Public Concern for Governance Trust on the dates 5th, 6th, 7th and 8th of March. The second event of this lecture series was graced by the presence of D. Sivanandhan, former Director General of police of the state of Maharashtra.
The session was surrounding the topic of "Safety of Women in 2022: Online and Offline". The session which was scheduled to begin at 5 pm commenced with a welcome address by Advocate Sonali Shelar who heads the POSCO department of PCGT, where she highlighted the tremendous efforts taken for the social initiatives put forward by the chief guest. Following that she discussed the range of activities that PCGT was involved in and gave the  audience an idea of how an organisation undertakes and carries out operations on such a large scale.

The esteemed chief guest D. Sivanandhan was then invited to commence his much-awaited lecture through a short introduction of the dignitary to the attendees. Mr Sivanandhan started the session by providing his insights on the organisation of the lecture series and that of the celebration of International women’s day. A presentation was presented alongside the lecture which gave detailed descriptions for better knowledge of the viewers. The first point of discussion in the session was that of the atrocities that the female and child population of the world endured in their daily lives. These included physical and sexual harassment, workplace harassment, various professional challenges faced by women, and a plethora of others. He listed out specific cases that shocked the world on happening to point out the horrifying nature of these issues. Further, he drew attention to the lack of justice received for most of the victims of such harassment. The next point of discussion was that of the root problem, where all of these gender-based issues are rooted from. The former DGP emphasized that all
of these gender-based atrocities can be attributed to the age-old deep-rooted discrimination shown to the entire female gender. He discussed the various incidents of internalized misogyny and normalized patriarchy that eventually lead to such happenings. He highlighted with the help of numeric how the normalization of child marriage and dowry death has caused the number of crimes against women to rise tremendously. Subsequently, he
expounded on the workplace harassment faced by women. He explained the zero-tolerance policy that corporates need to adopt in their functioning and also explained and discussed the notable Vishakha judgement. He then suggested various measures that women could follow to help themselves in such situations focusing on the various legal discourses made available to them. He emphasised the various safety awareness programmes that have been
launched in major cities. He further highlighted the importance of general awareness of the person’s surroundings giving specific importance to the different scenarios like public transport, hotel rooms and at home. Following this, he discussed the different sections of the Indian Penal Code and specific acts along with their respective amendments relevant to the topics discussed in the session. The next point of discussion was that of cybercrime. In this, he listed out the various crimes that women face in the cyber world. He quoted the infamous Bulli bai case which was the latest example of the harassment that women face online. He then gave a comprehensive explanation of each of the harassments that women face online. He concluded the lecture by giving insights on how to avoid cybercrimes on a personal level while also listing out its various legal discourses. Next, he elaborated on the initiative called Roti Bank which provides meals to the underprivileged parts of the society, which was
established under the mentorship of Mr D. Sivanandhan himself. He urged the attendees to help support this very noble cause.

Following the lecture was where a question-answer session was arranged. During this part the attendees raised their queries cleared their doubts and gained further knowledge from the esteemed guest. The questions were mostly centred around the topics discussed during the oration. The Q & A proved to be very interactive and highly informative to all present. The event culminated with a note of gratitude to Mr D. Sivanandhan, Ms Sonali Shelar,
Vice-Chancellor Dr Dilip Ukey, Registrar Dr Anil Variath and all the other organizers and attendees. The event was a huge success as the attendees had a lot of knowledgeable insights to derive and benefit from.