India reformed its law on sexual violence quickly after December 2012, and it has since added funds, schemes and institutions on a scale few countries have attempted. Recorded crimes against women, however, have risen sharply over the same period, and fresh incidents in the national capital suggest that public space remains a site of fear. This article argues that the problem is best understood as a failure of the delivery chain that connects a statute to a woman’s actual experience of safety, and not as a shortage of legal provisions. It examines the post-2012 framework, explains why official crime statistics are an unreliable guide to progress, and shows how fear operates as a restriction on women’s liberty and livelihood. It then proposes five connected reforms: making the findings of safety reviews binding on named authorities; measuring protection through results and not spending; designing cities around women’s real journeys; changing who staffs the public realm; and repairing the process that follows a complaint. The article concludes that women’s safety is a test of whether constitutional equality has reached the street.