The men poured petrol on her and set her ablaze. When police reached the spot they found her in a severely burned condition. The men, out of which two of them were accused of raping her, had already fled. 

This is the story of a rape survivor from Uttar Pradesh. 

This is also the story of fear that every rape survivor, their families and witnesses live with every day. 

The pain seems never ending. If we are able to survive and report, then we have to survive due process of court and police stations which is no less traumatic. With it we also have to live in constant fear of threats and being attacked by our rapists. There is no mechanism that protects us. 

We now have stronger laws for dealing with rape and sexual violence in India. However, lack of survivor and witness protection acts as a huge barrier to obtain justice. It deters victims from cooperating with investigations and testifying in court. A lot of times, they even withdraw their cases! 

It is worse when the criminals are rich and influential. 

Police protection should be provided to the survivors. 

India has no formal Witness protection law. The Supreme Court has a manual but it doesn’t include rape survivors. 

Please sign my petition asking the NCW to - 
- Ensure rape survivors, witnesses and their families get police protection
-  Ensure that the dates and court appearance timings of the witnesses and rape survivors is not put out in the public domain or by Media. 

Please sign my petition because we might have many strong laws and due processes in place, but without the absence of fear, no woman will be able to use them.