Taking cognizance of the increasing sexual harassment and rape cases against women, the central government announced that all mobile phones will have a emergency/panic button installed in them from 1 January, 2017.
“Technology is solely meant to make human life better and what better than using it for the security of women. I have taken a decision that from January 1, 2017, no cell phone can be sold without a provision for panic button, and from January 1, 2018 mobile sets should have also Global Positioning System inbuilt,” IANS quoted the union minister for communications and information technology Ravi Shankar Prasad.
Image courtesy: Indian Express
According to Department of Telecommunications (DoT), ‘numeric key -5’ or ‘numeric key – 9′ in feature phones will function as the emergency button and smartphones will have an emergency call button installed in the keypad or a facility of short-pressing the power button thrice.
The facility will be GPS enabled in both new feature phones and smartphones to locate the person-in-distress without any hassle.
The new rule will be included under the Indian Wireless Telegraphy Act, 1993.
Meanwhile, DoT has not clarified as to what will happen to the existing phones without the facility.
