New Delhi: The Ministry of Women and Child Development dedicated an email (complaint-mwcd@gov.in) solely to address and resolve the issues of hateful conduct and stalking on Social Media platforms such as Twitter, Facebook etc w.e.f. July 2016.
As per Standard Operating Procedure (SOP), the complainants are enquired whether they have filed any FIR or have reported the offense to the concerned Social Media platform, if not, then they are advised to report to Twitter at https://support.twitter.com/articles/15789 and https://www.facebook.com/help/263149623790594/. Subsequently, in most cases, an auto-generated complaint reference number is sent to the complainant’s registered e-mail address by the Social Media platform, which the complainant is suggested to share with the Ministry for future reference. Both the Social Media Platform and local Cyber cell are enquired about the complaint by the Ministry. If the Social Media platform or the concerned Police fail to respond to the complaint within seven to ten days, then the Ministry intervenes, asking for an update/ Action Taken Report in the matter with the concerned authorities. After forwarding the complaint/reminders to the concerned authorities, the Ministry follows up the status of the complaint through continuous phone calls and reminder emails.
The total grievances received in the Ministry during the period 06/07/2016 to 02/02/2018 are as under:
| Social Media Platforms | Total number of complaints |
| 57 | |
| 24 | |
| 16 | |
| Other Platforms (WhatsApp/Mail/Text Message) | 88 |
| Total | 185 |
The general nature of above grievances is dowry demand, domestic violence, sexual harassment at workplace, rape cases, acid attack, maternity related issues, NRI marriages, stalking (online and offline), child abuse, trafficking of women and children, cybercrime, pension and adoption related issues etc. This is intended to curtail online abuse against women and children by addressing every complaint that is received on the e-mail of the Ministry which is forwarded either to the concerned Social Media platform or to the Cyber Crime Cell for necessary action. The Ministry intercedes in order to expedite the grievance and to resolve the matter of the complainant at the earliest.
This information was given by Minister of State for Women and Child Development, Dr. Virendra Kumar in reply to a question in Rajya Sabha today.
