The courts seem only too eager to hand out sops in the name of Women’s Day. But true action is called for on part of the legislature, not the judiciary. It will be three years to the day that a bill for reserving 33 per cent of all Parliamentary seats for women remains to be passed. It must be borne in mind that courts merely interpret the law, and their use is limited if the laws themselves are out of date.

On several occasions, this newspaper has pointed out the glaring lacunae in laws dealing with crimes against women. The presidential ordinance fell far short of people’s expectations, which ran high after the recommendations of the Justice JS Verma Committee. Recently the Bombay HC has, albeit ineptly, made egregious policy changes in favour of women. Weeks after the now-infamous Delhi gangrape, the court allotted all appeals against convictions in rape cases to a division bench comprising two women judges.