Of sexual harassment and gang rapes in India

Another gang  rape. This time in Mumbai. Mumbai, as I used to know it way back in the mid-Seventies was a secure place for women. Unlike Delhi, I could stay out late, board a late night bus, which I often did after my office duty as a journalist, and feel safe. Unlike Delhi, the men in Mumbai were better behaved. They did not grope and pass lewd comments. They were comfortable with women around and did not make them feel like strange objects to be stared at. A taxi driver once went out of his way to drop me to my destination during a particularly heavy monsoon shower, when the city had become waterlogged and came practically to a halt. My attempts at waving taxis to stop was proving futile, for they all had passengers. And then he came along. He told me he was on his way home, but he would drop me at my place, which was in a different direction. To my great surprise he did not ask me for any extra fare.

That was the Mumbai I knew, a safer city for women. But over the years, instead of becoming better, it has deteriorated, become an unsafe metro. This ghastly crime, as well as the New Year assaults on women, show that the city of  Mumbai has sunk to the same pit as Delhi!

This comes soon after a Canadian student on a study tour of India, described her harrowing experience of being in India. What she described and what has driven her into depression so severe that she has to seek treatment for  it, is what Indian women face day in and day out. It is the price they have to pay for "stepping out" of their homes into work spaces, or just to enjoy a movie or eat out. The sad tragedy is that the criminals get seldom punished. Eight months later, despite a fast track special court and the public outrage, the bunch of men who raped the Delhi girl on a bus, are still to be punished. One demon ended his life. Probably he was shamed to face the world! We have had some people clamour for showing leniency to another who was not yet 18! But the act he committed was not an act any child would commit. The hearings are still on.... We are awaiting punishment for the gang of goons. The state has yet to act on behalf of a young girl who lost her life in a most brutal way and her friend who was beaten up. And as we wait, another gang rape.

Why doesn't India act decisively for once? And tell the women that it cares for them!

More gang rapes and a new law

Today three ghastly stories of  rape were reported. Two of them were of gang rape, and one was about a sessions court announcing the punishment for the founder of a home for orphans in Mumbai who had raped the inmates under his care, often with accomplices.  Each of these stories is a chilly reminder of how unsafe it is to be a girl or a woman in India. These crimes come in the wake of the gang rape of a Swiss tourist as she camped with her husband in Madhya Pradesh and a British tourist who jumped from the  first floor balcony of her hotel when the owner tried to assault her.  

Links to the three articles -

http://www.hindustantimes.com/India-news/MadhyaPradesh/MP-Girls-gangraped-in-front-of-family/Article1-1029575.aspx

 

http://www.hindustantimes.com/India-news/UttarPradesh/Ghaziabad-19-yr-old-flags-share-auto-near-Shipra-Mall-is-gangraped/Article1-1022162.aspx

http://www.hindustantimes.com/India-news/Mumbai/Death-for-Mumbai-orphanage-founder-for-rape/Article1-1030227.aspx



But today, there is a difference. For along with the these terrible cases was the news was that the Upper House of Parliament, Rajya Sabha,  had passed the anti-rape law which provides for stringent punishment to offenders of sexual violence, and makes stalking a crime in India (for the first time and high time!)

The law is somewhat a watered down version of the recommendations made by the Justice Verma Committee. The debate in Lok Sabha saw our elected legislators sniggering, laughing, making outrageous comments during discussions on the bill. It showed the mindsets of the persons we elect as leaders  A very sad commentary, indeed. But I am a born optimist and I see the new law as a step in the right direction. Look: At least they found the time to discuss the issue, which had been pushed into oblivion by our political worthies for decades. It took the very tragic and brutal death of a student following a gang rape  in a bus that moved on the streets of  South Delhi to to shake the country out of its stupor. If this could happen in South Delhi,  India's poshest area, what would be the situation be for women elsewhere? Shudder!

Our leaders showed their utter ignorance of the reality for the Indian woman by making stupid outrageous remarks. Wish women could band together and see that men like these never get elected for another term. I think the time is coming when this will be a reality. The out-of-sync leaders will be shaken off as dead wood. And it will be the urban  young educated women and men who will be leading the charge. We saw the wonderful and spontaneous way they came out demanding that the country be made safer for women.  

The law that was passed could have been stiffer. Why  are the perpetrators of acid attacks not being given life imprisonment? The number of women in India who become victims to acid attacks by men who cannot take 'no' for an answer is just too large to be ignored. These women are scarred for life. And the man receives little or no punishment, and goes about living a normal life. It is sad that the legislators did not view the crime with the seriousness it deserves. 

And marital rape failed to find mention. Also, even boys are raped. I have come across brutal cases of homosexuals having been  raped, two of them by policemen!

But I am glad that our legislators have at least started noticing that crime against woman needs to be tackled. And have started talking about the issue. The safety of our girls and women, and of those who come to this land as visitors, should be given paramount importance. For a home, or a country, where women feel unsafe has a lot to introspect on.

Rapist who committed the crime in his car has his driving licence revoked

It was very heartening to read this bit of news in Indian Express today - 

The state transport department said from now on licences of people accused of rape using a motor vehicle would be suspended as soon as a chargesheet is filed, and cancelled permanently upon conviction. Licences could be cancelled even for old convictions, the department said.

A Gwalior Road Transport Officer M P Singh used powers under Section 19(1) of the Motor Vehicles Act on Friday to revoke the licence of Vishwambhar Gurjar who abducted a schoolgirl in his Bolero before raping and dumping her. Two others convicted with him, Rakesh Singh and Niranjan Singh, don’t have licences, and will never get one in Madhya Pradesh because their details and photos have been blacklisted... 

Kudos for the Madhya Pradesh state transport department  and Mr M P Singh in particular!  The state transport commissioner Sanjay Choudhary has said that the transport authority would also cancel licences of those convicted in the past if the police sent them details. They must! Hope the public sentiments will force them to do so.

And hopefully  the example set by Madhya Pradesh will be followed by other states.

To read the news item click here.

More questions for our leaders

A question for the Madhya Pradesh BJP minister

Mr Kailash Vijayavargiya says women who cross the line will be punished. What about the men who do so? What about the men, Mr Minister? Why are you silent on them? Ravan was killed for kidnapping Sita.

And for the RSS chief Bhagwat , who said "Rapes occur in India, not Bharat"

Sadly, rapes occur in Bharat too. Except that most go unreported. Who will come out and lodge a complaint? And the brave girls who do, see what happens to them.
Just read the following links Mr Bhagwat -

http://www.ndtv.com/article/india/a-teen-rape-survivor-is-fighting-for-justice-311251

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/kanpur/Girl-gang-raped-killed-in-Kanpur-Dehat/articleshow/17879640.cms

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/kanpur/Rape-victim-killed-by-accused/articleshow/17631377.cms

Are we going to see more of this?

Is this how girls would have to protect themselves when they are sexually harassed? A girl in Delhi decided to take on a man who harassed her. It was heartening to see one man join her in thrashing the culprit. But others in the crowd just watched...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=92ygSK2ZhGU


I recall an incident 30 years ago when as a young reporter I waited for a bus on Bahadur Shah Zafar Marg at 8 pm. A man just walked into me. Straight into me as if he could not see. There were four to five men standing at the bus stop. No one said anything to him. I found after banging into me he was walking away as if nothing had happened. I hit him hard on his back and he was surprised by my action. "Why are you hitting me?" he asked before he melted into the darkness when I shouted at him. Then one man from the crowd said, "It is a good thing you hit him." I had to say this to him and the others who stood listening - "I wish you all had said something to him."

Thirty years down the road some things have changed, while some remain the same. Delhi, in fact, most north Indian cities, are hard on women. There are many more women out now -- on the road, in offices, in restaurants, in buses...And it is good to see the girls are not prepared to take this nonsense from men anymore.  Decades ago I used to see women refrain from saying anything to the men who would bother them as they did not want to create a spectacle. Crowds in India love to watch and pass comments usually on the woman. But now,  the girls are not  going to take this behaviour anymore. If society or the police are not going to come to their help, they will take on their tomentors. And how!

Now see a girl in Allahabad set the bike of a neighbour on fire. He is said to have tormented her with lewd comments and she could take it no more. She acted the only way she could.

Such cases are bound to increase as girls get educated and find the police and society do not speak up on their behalf or act.
Notice how the crowd stands and watches.


Our boys and men need to learn how to behave with women.

The long lonely battle

For the raped and their families, it is always a lonely long battle, often with no closure in sight. Any wonder then why girls and families do not come out to file rape cases.
Click here to read the plight of a young girl who was raped at the age of eight, and now eight years later, still awaits justice. She has had to drop out of school because of the taunts. She has no friends and she faces a lonely bleak future. Her father was accused by the rapist of filing the rape charge to get a paltry amount of Rs 1200. And in its order, the Bombay High Court has observed that it was possible that a father had accused a relative of rape to extract a petty amount in the range of Rs 1200! 

Haryana police should first learn how to deal with women before it begins its school campaign

The following news item in today's Times of India caught my attention. I could not help but think of Ruchika and what one of Haryana's top cops did to a young girl.

And also how Haryana policemen are among the most gender insensitive of men I have encountered.  And now, they are going to reach out to school girls! Hope the police force has been sensitised enough before being allowed access to the girls, especially those who are being sexually harassed and molested.

Read the newsitem

Haryana police reach out to girls, place drop boxes in schools for complaints


ROHTAK: Haryana police have decided to reach out to girls in every school in the state to get their feedback and complaints about incidents of sexual abuse and harassment with them. The police, in association with the education department, will launch a special drive to interact with the girls. They also plan to place feedback boxes in each school for girls to drop their complaints into them. The feedback from girls of six government schools in Rewari has stirred the police into action. During a special campaign undertaken earlier this ...link ....

Delhi gangrape and mindset of the rapists

In continuation of my earlier post...
Another gangrape in Delhi, how will we act?



"...The men on the bus taunted the woman for being out at night with a man".  When he tried to protect her, they attacked him with an iron rod.  The medical student tried to help him, but was beaten and then gang-raped. 

- as reported by NDTV.


These men could not tolerate the mere presence of a woman with a man of her choice. They felt that they should attack her, and the man who was with her. For in the society they come from, women are denied personal freedoms and the freedom to move around. Fathers, brothers, uncles think they have the right to use violence over women to get them to do what they want. Domestic and sexual violence is the norm.

But it is okay for them to drink, to take joy rides in a bus, which was supposed to be off the road at that time, rape and maim. They see nothing wrong with that!

What does this say about the mindset of such men? How do we change it?

Another gangrape in Delhi, how will we act?

My prayers are with the 23-year-old physiotherapist who was gang raped in a moving bus, beaten with a blunt object, stripped and pushed out of the vehicle and left to die on the road in Delhi on December 16. Her friend, who was accompanying her, was also beaten up and thrown out of the bus. The young woman is battling for her life. I hope she recovers to see justice done to her.

Such cases have become the norm in the city. They are just happening so often. And it is spreading to other parts of the country. In this blog a lot has been said about this societal illness that grips Indian society today.

On the television show, Newshour, last night, Arnab Goswami repeatedly asked if women in Delhi feel safe. He wanted women to call in. There was just one woman caller from Delhi. What can the women in Delhi say? It has been said just so often - Delhi is extremely unsafe and unfriendly to women. As a woman who has grown up and lives in this city, I say - A woman always feels insecure in Delhi. Never mind the fact that we have a woman for a chief minister, and many women occupying important and high posts as ministers and in the bureaucracy.

For the rot is in the minds of the society. (Check out this story) It is the whole way in which  women are viewed that translates into their inhuman treatment. Killed by parents in the womb when they discover that the foetus is female; neglected as a girl child (the best the family can afford goes to the boy and it is the leftovers for the girl); made to feel like an object, whose sole purpose in life is to be a good wife and daughter-in-law;  treated shabbily by the law-enforcing agencies, so badly that she is scared to enter a police station to even complaint. And if she does, the custodians of law may misbehave with her. Lax laws and judgements that make a mockery of her plight.

Delhi, overrun by men from areas where the khap panchayats rule, by classes that have no value for a female life, it is no wonder that India's capital can be called The Rape Capital. A couple of rape cases are reported everyday. Many, many must be going unreported.

What should be the punishment for the rapists? I will not say "Let the law take its course", for justice in India like its law enforcers have shown scant respect for women. Cases take years to be tried and then the accused cannot be brought to book as the police often fails to properly record the case and collect evidence. And even when they do, the judge may take a warped view and let the acused off. So the message society gets - It is okay to misbehave with a woman! That is how we show our manhood!

So what should be done? The women of the city and concerned citizens have to step in. Shame the rapists. Picket in front of their houses. Let everyone know who they are. Demand that they be thrown out of their jobs, ensure that if they are unmarried, no one ever marries their daughter to them, ever. A convicted rapist should be debarred from a government job for the rest of his life. And private organisations pressurised not to employ them ever. This can be ensured by women's groups and neighbours. The punishment meted out by the society should be a deterrent in itself. The way things are in India today, only the society can act. Only it can ensure that the rapists never live in peace.

Some earlier posts on the issue in this blog -
Justice dispensers - Who will make them see sense?

Rape fastest growing crime in India

Some sensitive rules to enable sexually abused children to get justice

Finally, we are going to see some change in the way child rape victims are treated by the state and their cases tried. It is indeed, harrowing for children who have been abused to testify in court and come face to face with the abuser. A child sensitve set of rules has been put in place.
But have the lawyers and judges been sensitised? And the cops who will be handling such cases?
Let us see how things go from here, and the punishment that will be given to child abusers.

Justice dispensers - who will make them see sense?

An insane verdict on rape by a judge, this time from UK. He thinks it is okay to rape an 11 year old because she looks 14. And says she was willing! How can a child be willing to be raped?

http://www.parentdish.co.uk/2012/02/21/rapists-jailed-for-just-40-months-after-judge-says-11-year-old-victim-was-willing/

This is as bad as our cop thinking women invite rape by wearing a salwar kameez! And judges reducing jail terms on grounds that the rapist is married, or has a daughter. And this great Indian judge who decided to commute a sentence on the ground that it was okay  for the man to rape a baby, yes you read it right, a BABY, because he lost control for he was staying away from home. (Read instead, he could not control himself as he was away from his wife to satisfy his biological need so our dispenser of justice felt the man could be excused for pouncing on the baby and  badly injuring her.

Why can't the crime be viewed as it should be --a violent assault on a human being that scars him or her for life? When will these great justice dispensers learn to serve justice in a fair manner?

Rape and molestation, mindset and judgments

It has been a rather sad first week of the New Year. It is difficult to change mindsets and again and again the same kind of judgments land making light of the plight of girls and women on the receiving end of gender violence.

No faith that the legal system will help
First came the news of a mother wanting to opt out of the legal system which had failed to bring justice to her daughter now 18, who had been raped in Delhi four years ago. The girl fearing ridicule and bias by the society had tried to commit suicide by swallowing acid. Her damaged food pipe had to be replaced by an artificial one and the mother informed the court that her daughter lay in a vegetable state. The mother pleaded in court that the case be closed. She expressed the family's inability and unwillingness to fight the case and seek justice any longer.

Waiting for four years is indeed a long harrowing time, especially when the authorities do not act. It leaves the victim and the family which also suffers trauma, double victimised, first by the rapist criminal and then by an inactive state system. In this case, the parents had pursued the case for four years, during which the girl's father suffered two heart attacks and her mother had to work as a maid to feed the family. There was no help from the state, monetary or otherwise.

Finally, the Delhi court ordered Rs one lakh as compensation, pointing out that the apex court too has held that subordinate courts trying rape cases have the jurisdiction to award interim compensation as the offence of rape is against the victim's basic human rights and violation of her fundamental right to life and liberty.

"I'm shocked to observe that despite this pathetic state of the victim and her family, who, I find, are feeling a sense of physical and psychological isolation, no assistance has been provided to her by the state," the judge observed, ordering Delhi Government to award her the compensation, noting the vegetative state the victim has reduced to.

The judge, who has given some gender sensitive judgments in the past, noted: "Rape of a minor not only affects her but has also a devastative impact on her entire family, which equally suffers in silence as has happened in the present case."

"It is cases like these which the Ministry of Women and Child development needs to target for restorative justice so that the medical and legal assistance, besides professional and psychological counselling, shelter and other support is provided to the victim, which, in the present, case has not been done," the judge is reported to have said.

Pack of molestors
And just as the New Year dawned we learnt of yet another very sad case of a gang of raucous men pouncing on a young girl. Check out the complete lack of restraint by a group of young men on New Year's eve in Gurgaon. A similar case had happened in Mumbai some years ago. The poor men get so out of control at the mere sight of a woman that they pounce on her.  The Hindustan Times quotes an eye witness as saying, “They were touching her initially and ended up tearing her clothes. They were passing lewd remarks in the middle of the road. I was shocked to see what could happen on Gurgaon roads."

Society should be very concerned that it raises its members to behave in this fashion. These men need urgent psychiatric help to be able to control their impulses. Otherwise they need to be put behind bars.

When we have a top cop talk of "josh food" and that "clothes can provoke men to rape" one can only wonder at the sheer ignorance of these men in powerful positions. I had the occasion to go through the training course of Haryana cops. There was just no effort made to sensitise them on  gender violence and how to deal with it. So it comes as no surprise when you find these men indulging in gender violence themselves and the rising number of custodial rapes.

In all such cases, as our top cop, society feels the women ask for it. This is what prevents women from lodging a case. In the Gurgoan case, the FIR has been registered by the policemen who got injured in the melee that followed their attempt to rescue the girl. Not by the girl. For the girl knows better. She will have to relive her trauma if she lodges a complaint. And then what? What will happen to the men? Their families will probably laugh it off. The men will continue to strut around and nothing would have changed.

Where is justice?
Now, look at another mockery of justice: The judgement given by the Bombay High court in the case of a 10-month old baby girl who was sodomised. The court actually reduced the sentence  handed out to Ramkishan Harijan, who worked as a labourer with a brick-trader in Mumbai, from 10 years to seven.years, accepting his contention that "he lost control over himself as he was living away from his family".

The Indian Express reports that in his judgment, Justice M L Tahaliyani also said that the six years Harijan had already spent in jail be taken into account. “Trial judge was aware of the fact that the appellant (Harijan) was married and (had) two children and his family was staying in Uttar Pradesh... No doubt, this by itself may not be a reason for lenient sentence. However, had it been considered in the proper perspective, the learned trial court probably would have imposed lesser sentence than 10 years,” Justice M L Tahaliyani wrote in his judgment recently. Click here for earlier shocking judgements.

Increase the sentence, keep the man locked up, for he is a beast and cannot be trusted among humans
Why should the fact that the man is married and has children reduce the sentence? In fact, there is all the more reason to free the wife legally from such a man so that she and the children have nothing to do with him. If the man is so deranged to force himself on a neighbour's child, a  10-month old baby at that and injuring her so brutally that she was left bleeding from her private parts, just think of the danger he would pose to his own wife and children. Think how cruel he could be with them over whom he has more control. So, there is all the more reason for the court to increase the period of the sentence so that he poses no threat to his own and other children. And arrange psychaitric counselling for him. For only a totally depraved and deranged being (I cannot call him human) can act in this way with a baby.

You might like to read-
Chemical castration for rapists, why not?

Convoluted Justice: Violence most foul

I am proud to get this badge from blogging gurus, IHM and her Team, for the post that follows.  It is an honour that I treasure.

To read other award winning posts click here. Each post makes one THINK!

The post appeared as an article in The Tribune on September 2, 2011

Violence most foul

Rape is one of the most heinous crimes, impacting the victim for life. Given its enormity, it should be considered next only to murder. Sadly, it has not been given the attention it needs by social scientists, law makers and justice dispensers. When two Class IX boys attempt to rape a Class I girl, as in a Bathinda school recently, it is time society introspected. What kind of signals are we sending out to our young?

The National Crime Records Bureau had termed rape "India's fastest growing crime". We have complete figures for 2009, when according to the NCRB, a total of 21,397 rape incidents were reported countrywide. Add to this, 25,741 cases of kidnapping and abduction of women and 38,711 cases of molestation, and you get 235 reported cases of molestation/rape/ abduction of women every day. These are just the reported cases. Most, especially molestation and rape cases, go unreported in the name of guarding 'family honour'.

Let us examine some recent sentences proclaimed by our justice dispensers and the messages these have sent out to society.A few months ago the Supreme Court decided to let off three farmers, who had been convicted of gang raping a woman in Ludhiana district. A sessions court had awarded a 10-year imprisonment to them. The Punjab and Haryana High Court had upheld their conviction, following which, the criminals appealed to the Supreme Court. Their sentence was cut short after a few years under a "compromise formula" that entailed paying Rs 50,000 each to the victim.

The rapists had appealed to be let off as "they and the victim were happily married to their spouses" and "wanted to live peacefully". The fact that the victim is "happily married" is no credit to the rapists. Did the judges ascertain the happiness quotient of the criminals' marriages? Did they speak to their wives? Men who rape, make for draconian and violent husbands. As far as "wanting to live peacefully is concerned", it is easy to say that after committing a violent crime. The fact that they can indulge in rape makes them dangerous criminals. If they could do that to one woman, they can inflict themselves on another. How does the court ensure that this does not happen? The National Council for Women has asked for a review of the case for it sets a bad precedence of reaching a compromise in rape cases, where conviction rates are extremely low anyway.

Wrong signals embolden rapists

It is not surprising that such a judgement should come from our highest court. The former Chief Justice of India, K G Balakrishnan, is reported to have said that society and the state must respect the decision of a rape victim if she chooses to marry the rapist. His words as reported by a newspaper: "Due regard must be given to their personal autonomy since in some cases victims may choose to marry the perpetrator." Imagine the trauma of a woman having to spend her life with a man who has raped her? It is like inflicting a lifelong sentence of mental and physical cruelty on her, while the man goes scot free. And then, what would prevent the rapist from marrying the victim to escape punishment and then deserting her? This kind of a mindset furthers the warped view society holds that marriage is the be all and end all for a woman. And that it is better to marry a man who has raped you than not marry at all!

Now look at the punishment a panchayat in Ghaziabad meted out to an rapist uncle: It ruled that five smacks with a shoe was enough punishment for raping his niece. In another case, also in Ghaziabad, a five-year-old was raped by her 19-year-old cousin. But the family chose to keep quiet, not even getting medical attention for the little girl.

She was sent to school the next day where she complained of abdominal pain and died. It was only then that the parents approached the police. The girl's mother said she had raised an alarm when she saw the cousin raping the child. The family elders had caught him, slapped him and let him off. Consider now how these family elders and panchayats handle youngsters who marry outside their caste group or marry within their own gotra. The punishment has ranged from social ostracism to even death! Obviously, rape is considered a minor crime compared to violation of caste and kinship lines.

Compounding victims' trauma

The law as it stands today is weak and archaic. Apart from woefully inadequate sentences, it only recognises vaginal rape and does not believe that children below 12 can be raped. Women's groups have been demanding its amendment but though decades have passed, the bill is still in a draft stage.

The Aruna Shanbaug case illustrates the complete warpedness of our justice system. While Aruna, the nurse who was raped and maimed for life has been lying in a hospital bed for the last 37 years, the rapist, ward boy Sohanlal Walmiki, is a free man today. He is said to have changed his name, moved to Delhi with his family where he works in a hospital. He was imprisoned for only seven years for attacking her and stealing her jewellery, but not for rape as it was anal and not vaginal rape he indulged in as Aruna was menstruating at that time. What kind of justice is this?

The death penalty awarded to rapist and murderer Santosh Kumar Singh was commuted to a life sentence because of what is termed as "mitigating circumstances". Among them were that he was "young, just 24 years old" at the time of his crime. At 24 years, one is an adult! The fact that he was "married" and "the father of a girl child" were the other "mitigating" factors. Now, how does this help either the wife or the daughter? They have to fend for themselves anyway and live with the knowledge of having a rapist and murderer as a husband and father for the rest of their lives. In fact, the law should give the wife and children of a rapist the choice to walk off from the relationship with no legal binding on their part, while retaining all their rights on the family property. If the wife has the option of being legally freed of the relationship, she can think of starting her life again. It is extremely traumatic for a young girl to grow up knowing her father is a rapist. In fact, such men are best kept away from their daughters.

We have also had judgments where the sentence was commuted when the rapist passed a civil services exam. What is the message that went out? That if you pass the exam, all will be forgiven and you will occupy an important government post. In fact, the opposite should be the case. Convicted rapists who have served their term in jail should be debarred from holding a government job.

Need for unorthodox methods

The law must acknowledge that rape mars a person for life. The condition has been recognised as Rape Trauma Syndrome where the victim suffers from phobias and nightmares and feels emotionally crippled, unable to form meaningful relationships and friendships for life.

Kamini Lau, Delhi's additional sessions judge, recently called for a public debate on “chemical and surgical castration” of child rapists and serial offenders as an alternative punishment. She said this while delivering a sentence for a man who raped his minor step daughter for four years.

Chemical castration is being used in parts of United States and many European countries, with the rapist's consent. Sweden, France and Germany are among them. In Poland it is mandatory. A province in Argentina is the latest to adopt it. It involves an injection of an anti-pregnancy drug every three months to lower libido and uncontrolled sexual impulses. There is much evidence in the medical and psychiatric world that a rapist cannot be cured unless there is a medical intervention. It is time to act. There can be no compromises with a rapist.


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Chemical castration for rapists? Why not?

Kamini Lau,  Delhi's additional sessions judge, has shown a lot of pluck in calling for "chemical castration" of child rapists and serial offenders. It is high time we had some stiff punishment for these criminals. In our country rapists rarely get the imprisonment they deserve. At the end of this post, I give links to some cases which show the non serious manner in which society and our judges have been dealing with such cases. A former Chief Justice of  India had even suggested that the victim marry her rapist!

Kamini Lau is quoted as having said: "A full public debate, with regard to imposition of castration (both surgical and chemical) as an alternative punishment for the offence of rape and molestation, is the need of the hour." She made the observation while delivering a 10 year rigorous imprisonment for a man who raped his minor step daughter for over four years. To read the report in full click here.

Rapists in our country are let off  very lightly with just a few years in jail at best. The woman however goes through a private hell her whole life. The most telling example is the case of the Aruna Shanbag, the nurse in a Mumbai hospital who was raped by a ward boy.  Walmiki, the rapist, is a free man today after a few years in prison. He lives with his wife and children and works, (really horrifying as per some newspaper reports) in a hospital! Aruna, instead, lives a life confined to the hospital bed, having lost her power of speech and movement. Her fiance and family have deserted her. She has been alone for decades. The punishment meted out to the criminal in this case does not match his crime. He should have been imprisoned for life. And kept away from his wife and children. If he could behave in this way with a woman who was a senior colleague, it does not need much imagination to think how he must be treating his wife and daughters, if he has any.

A couple of years ago I had asked women bloggers from around the world what they felt should be the punishment for rape. What do you think they said? Prison for life or castration! The similarity in their response was amazing.

Some earlier posts -
Another shocking judgement on rape

Rape victim has to resort to legal action to take an exam!

Six month old baby girl raped

Rape, fastest growing crime in India

Society elders decide five shoe smacks enough punishment for a rapist

'Family honour' more important than 'justice'

Another one of those stories of misplaced family honour was in The Hindustan Times today. It makes you wonder what is wrong with our value system. A five year old was raped by her 19 year-old cousin. The family came to know about it, but chose to keep quiet in the name of family honour. They probably did not seek medical help for the child and sent her to school. She complained of abdomen pain and died a little later. A complaint with the police was lodged only after she died.

Some hard facts -
The family prizes 'honour' over a member's life. 
The family does not even think the man needs to be punished for the barbaric act.
Female lives are cheap. Especially a little girl's life.
Adults even today find it  tough to argue their case in front of  'family elders'. Reminds one of the khap panchayats ruled by patriarchs where the young  and the women have no say.

Wouldn't the family be held in esteem if its elders had tried to pursue justice for the victim and get the criminal, even if he happens to be from the family, punished?

This case reminded me of an earlier one where a few hits by a shoe was considered enough punishement for a rapist!

Rape fastest growing crime in India, says National Crime Records Bureau

The National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) says rape is the fastest growing crime in India. NCRB figures available for 2009 show that 21,397 rape incidents were reported in the country in 2009. There were also more than 25,000 cases of kidnapping and abduction of women, aside from cases of molestation which numbered more than 38,000.

This means that every day -
about 60 women who get raped in India, report the crime. There will be many more who keep quiet.

About 68 women get abducted and kidnapped and 104 women who are molested pick up courage and report the crime.
To read a detailed report by Inter Press Service, click here.

Other posts - Rape and punishment
Is there something seriously wrong with the way we bring up boys?

I came across this post - Valuable advice
What do you do if you have been raped 

Another shocking judgement on rape by the Indian Supreme Court

All it needs is Rs 50,000 as fine to buy freedom from a prison sentence for gangrape.

Three men were convicted of gangraping a woman and the Punjab and Haryana High Court had upheld their conviction and punishment. The three criminals appealed against their conviction and the Supreme Court of India let them off after (as reported in The Hindustan Times) they agreed to a "compromise formula" of paying Rs 50,000 each to the victim.

Note what has been considered by the court -
1. The rapists had said that "they and the victim were happily married to their spouses".  Consider, if a man can rape a woman, what torture he must be inflicting on his wife? Did the judges talk to the wives? Did they find out what kind of husbands the men were? I think the wives are better off without having to live with such men. The court would have done the three wives a big favour by keeping their men locked up.
I would go so far as to say that the wife or fiancee of a rapist should have the freedom to walk off from the relationship with no legal binding if she so chooses and take the children with her. The man should lose all his rights to his property which should go to the wife and other dependant relatives.

2. The fact that the victim is "happily married" is no credit to the rapists. I would say that the woman's husband has shown maturity and not reacted the way we have known some husbands to behave.

3. The men said "they wanted to live peacefully". It is easy to say that after committing a violent crime. What happened to their desire of living peacefully earlier? The fact that they can attack a woman in this way makes them dangerous criminals. They should be kept behind bars for life. For they spell danger for women. How will the court ensure that they do not repeat their act? It is not only the safety of the victim but other women too in question.

I am happy to see two eminent women advocates Kamini Jaiswal and Pinky Anand crticise the shocking judgement of the highest court in land.

India does treat its women shabbily.

My reaction to the judgement is as an Indian woman. To read what lawyers are saying about the judgement read here.

It was heartening to see the National Commission for Women react to the judgement and prepare to seek a its review.  But I am wondering why there were no protests by Indian women. What has happened to our women's groups? I remember the mid-Seventies and the early-Eighties when as young women we marched to Parliament, held protest marches, organised sit-ins and gheraos on so many issues affecting us - dowry, rape laws, portrayal in the media. The activism helped initiate many changes in the laws and society.

But where are our young firebrand women today? 

Punishment for sexual harassment in the US and for rape and murder in India

I read the following news item from Washington in the Indian Express about a man being indicted by a jury for groping a sleeping woman on a flight-

Ranchhodbhai Lakha, 61, of Alpharetta, Georgia, faces charges of assault and abusive sexual contact for the Sep 28 incident on a Delta Air Lines flight from Dallas to Atlanta, the US Attorney's Office said on October 20, 2010.


A 20-year-old woman seated in the same row as Lakha fell asleep and woke up to find the man allegedly touching her below the waist, according to US.Attorney Sally Quillian Yates. The woman removed his hand but Lakha allegedly touched her again, prompting the woman to get up from her seat and report the incident to a flight attendant, Yates said.

If convicted, Lakha could face a maximum sentence of life in prison and a fine of up to $250,000.

What amazed me is the kind of punishment he would get - a maximum of life in prison. Just contrast this to the very lenient laws we have in India. Even the recently proposed quantum of punishment for rape gets only a few years in prison. And then, the courts here are so liberal in letting off  sexual offenders, even those who have been convicted of serious crime like rape. The Supreme Court of India recently commuted the death penalty awarded to rapist and murderer Santosh Kumar Singh to life sentence because of some "mitigating circumstances" in his favour. And what did the court find as mitigating? Among them the fact that he  had married after his acquittal by the lower court and was the father of a girl child! What if he had fathered a male child?

As a woman, I find this reasoning difficult to digest. The judgment, like most judgments on rape and murder,  is very patriarchal in its nature, completely overlooking justice to the woman raped and the welfare of the women around the man. In this case Priyadarshini Mattoo who he raped and murdered, strangling her with an electric wire and battering her face with his helmet, and his own wife and daughter who would have to live with the constant reminder of him being in jail. Imagine life for the little girl. Growing up would be so tough knowing that your father was a  rapist and murderer.

What kind of a life would the wife have?  Having to come to terms with the fact that the husband has raped and killed a woman? Would she ever be able to forget that fact? It would be haunting her every single moment of her life.  Controversial as it might sound, it would be better for both the mother and the daughter if he was awarded the death penalty as the court had earlier decreed.  They would have a chance to start their lives afresh.  There would be justice done for Priyadarshini Mattoo, the woman he stalked, raped and brutally killed.  Priyadarshini's father, Chaman Lal Mattoo, who has been fighting a tough battle to get justice for his daughter says he is "shattered and dismayed" by the verdict.  His lawyer has said they would go in for a review of the punishment to be meted out to the rapist and murderer.

Life term in India is really no punishment for the well connected. They have reasonable comforts and do  some light jobs. What is more they can be released in a few years, and be regularly out of jail on parole. Watch on NDTV what Neelam Katara, whose son was murdered, has to say about life term in India.

What do you think should be the punishment for rape, and rape and murder?

One true heroine - calls off wedding after baby is raped

I was heartened to read the following report in the Hindustan Times -

Bride calls off wedding after infant's rape.

If you have read my earlier post regarding the rape of a six month old baby, you would know why this is such great news.

If things have to change for women, it is the women who must act. The 18 year old bride - Rizwana Parveen -deserves the highest praise for taking the bold step in calling off her wedding after the guest from the groom's side raped the baby. She said she did not want to get married in a village, Kithor in Meerut district, where they did not respect women.

This is the best and the boldest decision the young woman could take and she did it. I hope one of our many NGOs honour her. For she deserves it. And I am so happy that she had the support of her parents and the entire panchayat in taking the action.

Meanwhile, the baby is battling for her life in a hospital. What should the punishment be for such a crime?

An earlier post on the issue of rape and punishment - http://shreevenkatram.blogspot.com/2009/07/rape-and-punishment.html

Shame! A six month old baby girl raped

What do you say to this? A 20 year old raped a six month old baby girl left in his care. How brutal can humans get! And we have people who recommend a punishment of a few years for such men. A man like this is so sick in the head, that he would be best bobitted or locked up in a cell for life.

I cannot understand why such people should get away with just a few years in jail. And we have our jurors order the release of a rapist from jail who had raped his student, driving her to suicide. Our law makers felt that as the man had performed well in the civil service exam he should be released. Five and a half year of a jail term that he had already served was enough for him. I gather he is a free man today. Just imagine, he will now be the Indian government's representative, a member of the Indian Adminstrative Service! God help us.

Some prominent citizens have appealed to the Chief Justice of Delhi. against the judgement.

Recently the Chief Justice of India recommend that a raped woman should be free to marry her rapist if she wants. I would think in a civilised society, a rapist should be punished, not offered matrimony. In our country, very few men will come forward to marry a raped woman. And as marriage is held as the be-all and end-all for a woman, there could be instances where a woman  may feel it is better to marry the rapist than face the taunts of the society for the rest of her life. We need to change mindsets so that society shuns the culprit and not the victim. If a man who has raped is made an outcaste, thrown out of his job, made ineligible to ever hold a  government job, and no woman agrees to marry him, and others refuse to socialise with him, instances of rape would come down.
The suggestion by the Chief Justice has shocked many. What justice can women hope to get when our law makers think in this vein? Read here another reaction to the judge's suggestion. And does the fact that there are few women judges tell it all. Women are less than 10 per cent in India's judiciary.

And this post following the bride's reaction.