From 2017, new handsets will require mandatory panic button

New Delhi, April 25: In a bid to make mobile phone handsets an effective tool for self-protection, the government on Monday said no such device will be sold from next year without a single-key panic button.

"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," Communications Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said here. The notification did not specify which agency would connect the number, but sources in the ministry said the decision will be taken soon.

The Gazette of India notification dated April 22, said from January 1, 2017 no mobile phone handset manufacturing company shall sell in India: "The feature phones without the facility of panic button by pressing 'numeric key - 5' or 'numeric key - 9' to invoke emergency call and the smart phones without the facility of emergency call button by pressing the same for long time to invoke emergency call or the use of existing power on or off button, when short pressed thrice in quick succession."