National Human Rights Commission shifts to a new building<br> <br>

The National Human Rights Commission has shifted from Faridkot House and started functioning from its new building - Manav Adhikar Bhawan, near INA, in New Delhi, from the 9th September, 2013. Inaugurating the new premises, Mr. Justice K.G. Balakrishnan, Chairperson, NHRC expressed satisfaction over having NHRC's own space nearly 20 years after its inception. However, he said that the Commission would continue to make efforts to have an independent building as Manav Adhikar Bhawan is part of an inter-linked group of identical buildings having various Government offices, which may cause confusion and needless aspersions about its independent status. He said that the Paris Principles require financial and operational independence for every NHRI, including an independent building, which should be easily accessible to the public.

Giving an overview of the Commission's functioning and vast area of interventions on issues of human rights violations, Justice Balakrishnan said that the Commission has so far received nearly 12 lakh 80 thousand complaints and disposed of more than 12 lakh 50 thousand by giving relief to several people.

Lauding the media's contribution in bringing to the Commission's notice so many issues of human rights violations in far-flung areas, Justice Balakrishnan said it was an equal partner with the Commission in the protection and promotion of human rights. There was a need to develop an NHRC media beat, which has the widest scope for reporting on different rights-based issues coming under various ministries.

He referred to various issues of human rights con-cern, which included, among others, the large number of undertrial prisoners in jails, hurdles in the way of an effective criminal justice system, the large number of complaints against police personnel at Thana and Chowki level, the continued prevalence of bonded and child labour, increasing incidents of sexual assault and crime against women, the poor implementation of social welfare schemes, challenges in the mental health care system, clinical drug trials, corporate social responsibility etc.

Referring to the rising cost of living, he described the enactment of the Food Security Bill as a milestone towards achieving social security cover for all. He added that sufficient storage capacity needs to be built to ensure that the produce of hard-working farmers do not go waste.

The NHRC Chair-person said that the National Human Rights Commission does not have an adversarial role to the Governments, it only helps in good governance and it would continue with this policy.