to apprehend the culprit, the brother of the victim, and to monitor the progress of treatment of
the victim. The Commission also directed the SMS hospital to contlnue to provide medical
assistance to the victim and report to the Commission.
Oisprrlthr In YaQsmkyLnave to the Employeas of Private Schools:Weat Bengal
(Casm No.1B 2 9 W 7 )
A complaint was received by the Commission alleging that management of certain
private s c h d s in West Bengal had not been prwiding maternity have benefis to the teaching
and non-teaching women employees. The Secretary, Department af Education, Govt. of West
Bengal on notice from the Commission submitted a report based on inquires made by the
Departmentwith regard to the three specific categories of private schools, where the provisions
of maternity leave allegedly were not enforced, The report =id that different provisions were
made for diflerent categories of schools and that the schools were strictly following the rules
which were applicable to each of these categories. On consideration of the report from the
Secretary, Department of Education and examining the report of the Ministry of Labour on the
subject of maternity leave, the Commission observed that there was no uniformity in the rulesl
4 8 framed by different boards like the ICSE and the West Bengal Board of Secondary
Education with regard to maternity leave and that they were at variance with the maternity
leave mles framed by the Government. It was noted that, in some cases, the existing rulesl
codes had not been followed. The Commlssion directed the Government of West Bengal to
undertake a review of the existing rules / codes and to bring about uniformity and also to
incorporatethe provision of grant of 120 days maternity leave to the teaching and non-teaching
women employees of various educational institutions. The Commission further stated that it
was up to the euthorities of the State Government to restrict the facility of maternity leave to
?WO child births, if it thought necessary and appropriate.
Though women mstitute half the world's population, there is still no society in which
they enjoy full equality with men. Patriarchal attitudes and consequent power imbalances
have adversely affacted women culturally, socially, politically and economically. The Universal
Declaration of Human Righta, reaffirming faith in the dlgnlty and worth of the human person
and in the equal rights of men and women, envisaged the enjoyment d such rights without
any distinction of any kind, including discrimination on the basis of sex (Preamble, Article 2).
However, gender discrlrnination constitutes one of the most pervasive forms of violation of
human rights. In the llght of this fact, the Vienna Oeclaratlon of 1993, explicitly asserted that
the human rights of women are an inalienable, integral and indivisible part of universal human
rights and eradication of all discrimination on grounds of sex are priority objectives of the
internationalcommunity. State Parties have thus undertaken to eradicate this evil under various