India has seldom cancelled festivities following the death of a hitherto unknown individual; and seldom has any incident shaken the nation’s conscience as the death of a 23-year-old rape victim did last fortnight.
The gang rape of the physiotherapy student in the presence of her male friend in a moving bus in Delhi shocked the country’s teeming millions. And the brutal way in which she was thrown out of the moving vehicle forced thousands of people in the country’s capital call for deterrent punishment not only to the six men who had perpetrated the heinous crime but also to anyone who may dare contemplate a similar offence in the future.
Protests nationwide
Her death in a Singapore hospital on December 29, 2012 succumbing to the injuries and multi-organ failure that she suffered prompted protests all over India.
While the President called off New Year celebrations and appealed to people not to send him greetings, opposition parties pressurised the government to convene a special session of Lok Sabha (the lower house of Parliament) to discuss fresh legislation prescribing harsher punishment for rapists.
In fact, India went into grief on December 16 when the poor woman was brutalised. There were debates about the need for tougher laws and some even spoke of capital punishment for sex offenders.
Thousands of people gathered in various places in Delhi, notably at India Gate, to voice their protest with placards and slogans.
Our editorial (in this Section) reflects the opinion of many people on this issue. Following are the views of a few prominent people in India.
Dilip Padagoankar
Former Editor (now Consulting Editor) of The Times of India said:
We still disagree on what the strictest possible punishment for convicted rapists means. The popular mood clearly favours death by hanging or, at the very least, castration. This calls for a serious, sustained and result-oriented debate.
It should examine international precedents to find out if capital punishment has indeed resulted in the lowering of rape-related cases.
Such evidence as is available in the public domain does not clinch the issue one way or the other.
But on a host of other issues, there appears to be a large consensus.
They include swift and effective police investigation leading to arrests, training of the police to be gender sensitive, more stringent laws, fast-track courts, rapid convictions and the earliest possible implementation of the sentences.
The commission set up by the government to examine these issues is expected to deliver its report within a month.
But whether the government can summon the will to accept its recommendations and put them in place is another matter.
Shoma Chaudhury
Managing Editor of Tehelka said:
It is not just the extreme savagery the young girl suffered that jolted everyone.
Running beneath that was the affront that it could happen at 930 pm, while a decently dressed woman was with a male friend, in a well-lit tony south Delhi neighbourhood.
This certainly accentuates the impunity that has set in. But it also lays bare the maddening subtext that blunts our responses at other times.
The assumption that rapes later at night, in places more secluded or less privileged, and of women who may be alone or sexily dressed is less worthy of outrage because they feed into two pet ideas India holds: that a woman asks for rape either through her foolishness or promiscuity. In some way or the other, she is fair game.
Harsher, swifter punitive measures are definitely needed to puncture the idea of immunity that is built up around rape.
Fear of consequence is a powerful tool.
But that can be only one aspect of the correctives.
What is equally needed is a government-led gender sensitisation blitzkrieg at every level of Indian society: in schools; in anganwadis or courtyard shelters; in pop culture; in village shows; in the police, legal and judicial fraternity.
Even ‘sensitisation’ is too patriarchal a word: what we need is a determined drive towards modernity.
Indians have an inherent impatience for process.
We prefer the drama of retributions: demands for lynching and capital punishments. Set aside for a moment the larger argument against death penalties, we forget to ask, who will take these cases to a point where judgments can even be handed out?
What others said
Rape is a cultural thing in India; just as the US has gun culture, we have this. Eve teasing is so widely accepted, as if men must prove their manhood by indulging in it. The police subscribes to the same value system.
Flavia Agnes, Lawyer
The police suffer from a statistical approach. You may have failed professionally, but may be successful statistically. The numbers show there has been a marginal increase in rape cases. But many more go unreported.
Kiran Bedi, Former Indian Police Service Officer
The traditional Indian idea of the body as a temple only provokes pitying glances. Under the onslaught of western superficiality, not its serious underpinnings, we are reverting to primitive barbarism.
Sudhir Kakar, Psychoanalyst
You need to stop killing women at birth, so as to not skew the gender ratio. Areas where you have a balanced ratio have lower reports of sexual violence. I do not think hopelessness is a valid response.
Nilanjana Roy, Author
We cannot legislate good behaviour, we have to build its DNA (in schools, homes and the media) which must begin by denying that this entitlement and the violence it takes to live it is the only way to be men.
Gautam Bhan, Queer Rights Activist
The police needs better investigation methods. We do not have proper witness protection programmes or the best prosecutors, though the victim’s lawyer being allowed to be present now helps somewhat
Karuna Nundy, Lawyer
Courtesy: Times of India, Tehelka
