The shocking revelation of the prolonged sexual abuse of a 12 year old school-going girl (and her two younger brothers) by the driver of a private cab is just a pointer to a much larger and more serious problem, suggests a survey of the young girls published on Wednesday.

The survey found that and 69 percent of the girls surveyed felt cities offer an unsafe and insecure living environment and 74 percent felt most vulnerable in public places.

"With the urban population expected to reach 586 million by 2030, more than 50 cities are expected to have a population of over a million people, half of them being girls and women. The cities offer the greatest opportunities as well as some of the greatest risks."

Also 40 percent of the girls surveyed said that they coped with harassment by ignoring it.

The report titled ‘Girls in a changing landscape: urban and digital frontiers’ also indicated that girls were deprived of the access to the modern digital technology like internet while use of internet and mobiles in India had increased phenomenally.

“Forty four percent of the girls surveyed are aware of the internet; only 15 percent have access to it,” the 59-page report added.

“Clearly girls are being left out and many who decide to venture in the cyberspace are pushed out through various patriarchal strategies,” Shantha Sinha, chairperson, national commission for protection of child rights wrote in foreword of the report.
 
“Women and children especially girls are the worst affected in the process of rapid urbanisation in India,” the report showed conditions of girls in the country.

More details came out from the report which brought some of the glaring conditions of Indian girls. “Seventy seven percent of girls feel that eve teasing is the biggest challenge they face in urban spaces,” the report mentioned which is based on survey from 10 cities in India and voices of 10,000 girls across the country.

“India is undergoing a social and economic transformation but the bias against the girl child is still prevalent on a large scale,” said Bhagyashri Dengle, executive director, Plan India. 

Echoing Dengle’s view, Govind Nihlani, Bollywood film director and chairperson of Plan India said, “Across the country, girls face double discrimination because of their gender and age leaving them at the bottom of the social ladder.”

Promoting gender equality and empowering women is the Goal-3 of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). “Indian women still reflect the dominant face of poverty, with a continuing low social position and disproportionately lower development indicators,” this was the assessment of conditions of Indian women in a recent MDG report by Wada Na Todo Abhiyan (WNTA) a Delhi based civil society group tracking India’s achievement on MDGs. 

Shabana Azmi, bollywood actor who was present during the launch of the report asked government to do seriously rethink its policies towards girls. “We need to put girls in the centre of development,” she said. 

The report has been prepared by the Plan India, a Delhi based NGO that aims to promote Child Rights and improve the quality of life of vulnerable children.

The report is based on studying conditions of girls of different age groups (14-17 years and 18-21 years) and from different socio – economic background (urban slums, street/homeless, school/college going, out of school/working and the socially excluded).

Plan India also launched the “Because I am a Girl” campaign in 2007 to empower girls.