CURFEW CHAOS

The Kerala High Court asked the state government to ensure women get the same freedom as men and not to “lock” them up in hostels. Such curbs are often pegged to concerns over their safety

- Dr Swati Jindal Garg 

WE have come a long way in rendering equality of opportunity to both sexes and more and more is being done to ensure that no woman is left out of the race. Recently, the Kerala High Court questioned why only girls and women need to be “controlled” or “locked up” at night and asked the state government to ensure they get the same freedom as given to boys and men.

Justice Devan Ramachandran said it was the job of the government to ensure that it was safe for girls to go out at night. These observations were made while hearing a plea by five women students of Kozhikode Medical College challenging a 2019 government order which restricted movement of hostel inmates of higher education institutions after 9.30 pm.

The Court further questioned why only women or girls need control and not boys or men and why a curfew of 9.30 pm was fixed for women in hostels of the medical college. It said: “Girls also have to live in this society. Will heads fall off after 9.30 pm? Will mountains collapse? The government has an obligation to keep the campus safe.” The Court asked if there was any hostel in the state where boys had a curfew.

It said that rather, it was problematic men who deserved to be locked up and not the other way round. Justice Ramachandran was candid enough to state that some people were blaming the fact that he had no daughters himself and that is why he was questioning the restrictions placed on women. He replied that he had relatives who were girls and lived in hostels in Delhi and such res trictions were not present there.