The GNLU Centre for Women and Child Rights is a congregation of legal minds with an aim of channeling the power of law to champion the cause of Women and Child Rights by encouraging and facilitating active discourse and deliberation in the field of women and child rights and development. With this vision, Gujarat National Law University established the Centre for Women and Child Rights on the 15th of September, 2020. The Centre was inaugurated in the gracious presence of Shri Priyank Kanoongo, Chairperson NCPCR. The Centre integrates research, direct field action, and teaching on child rights law; and uses law and socio-legal strategies as tools for transformative social change in order to enable children to live with dignity. The specific aim of the GCWCR is to ensure social justice, human rights, and quality of life for all children and women in India, with a special focus on equitable quality education, care, protection, and justice for marginalized and excluded women and children.
The National Health Family Survey suggests that 30% of women in the 15-49 age group have experienced physical violence and 6% of the same have experienced sexual violence and abuse and the latest NCRB data shows a 16% increase in the crimes against women. The NCRB reports that the country saw a 500% increase in crimes against children in the past decade. The high prevalence of malnutrition, the high neonatal mortality rate, poor coverage of full immunization, the declining sex ratio, and child marriage pose a challenge to improving human development outcomes for every child in Gujarat and it is pertinent that more time, research, and resources are allocated to make sure children have a safe, healthy and flourishing childhood. All these highlight the need for research and policy analysis in such areas to make sure that ironclad policies are implemented to progress gender equality in Gujarat and the in-country and to also assure that these policies are being rightly implemented.
Keeping this in mind, Gujarat National Law University has established the Centre for Women and Child Rights. The center is divided into two wings; one dedicated to research while the other for capacity building. While research division will be engaged in empirical and legal analysis to produce publications, reports, and policy briefs, and the capacity building division will organize field-driven activities with the key stakeholders (women and children) to improve their status and condition in society.
