The country has seen protests and public
outrage after four men allegedly raped and murdered a woman on the outskirts of
the city of Hyderabad. After unsettling details of the crime were revealed,
there have been conversations in the media and in public about the timing of
the crime, seclusion of the site, breakdown of the woman’s vehicle, consumption
of alcohol by the perpetrators, the woman’s phone call to her sister, among
other facts. There have been remarks made on what could have been done by the
woman and what should be done by other women who step out of their homes and
face threat of such incidents. Little is being said about the alleged
perpetrators and the underlying mindset that made them carry out the heinous
crime. The question we are evading here is how the four men thought it would be
alright to even touch a woman without her consent, let along brutally raping
and killing her.
Our response to the incident has been
as problematic as the attitude that gives rise to such gender-based violent
behaviour. In expressing our anger, we made social media hashtags with the
woman’s name, in absolute violation of the Supreme Court’s directive to refrain
from revealing the identity of the victim. Notwithstanding the SC directive,
the tendency to focus on the woman rather than on the men who carried out the
crime is commonplace. News headlines that read similar to ‘Woman doctor raped
in Hyderabad’ were seen more than headlines like ‘Four men held for rape and
murder’. Both may mean the same, but they carry different meanings. Placing women
at the centre of public attention in crimes not committed by them converges
with the larger societal norm of placing women under scrutiny while letting men
be free and not holding them accountable for their actions. Debates and
discussions that followed the incident analysed the rates of crimes against
women, feeling of fear among women, and ranked cities and public spaces based
on their ‘safety index’. Women were asked about how safe they feel on the
streets and in the night. Men, four of whom carried out the criminal offence,
were kept out of the conversation. Also kept out of the conversation was the
deep-seated patriarchy and sexism that gives legitimacy to such acts of
gender-based violence.
A fourteen-point directive was issued
by the Telangana police for women, girls and anybody travelling. While the
intent may be well-meaning, the message it conveys is flawed at multiple
levels. One, it yet again puts the onus of safety on girls and women. The
larger message given is to girls and women to be more cautious, more vigilant,
more prepared to face any such incident once they step out on to the streets,
as though public spaces are not meant for them. In a society where there is no
girl or women who doesn’t feel a sense of fear as soon as she steps on to the
street, asking them to ‘stay safe’ and ‘be vigilant’ is not just downright
insensitive but also discriminatory. It is high time that we acknowledge that
incidents of rape and sexual violence do not happen because the woman was not
vigilant or the place was unsafe. They solely happen because some men find it
acceptable to force themselves on women, perhaps viewing the latter as objects
rather than human beings.
Why men act in gender-violent ways,
how they feel about their status vis-à-vis women, what they think about the
consequences of their actions, and when they begin to acquire the assumption
that women are subordinate to them and that they can force their will on women
are questions that must be asked now.
In a country where only one in four
rape cases ends in conviction, and reporting rate of such cases is even lower,
calling for stronger punitive action will not solve the problem. A
multi-pronged conversation with boys and men across age groups, social and
economic identities and geographies needs to be initiated that addresses the
root cause of gender-based violence. We must begin with young boys at homes and
in schools and give them lessons in gender equality and mutual respect before
they become men who have internalised that they are superior to women and that
they can do as they please. For men who have crossed the threshold of formal
education, it is time we bring them to rethink on what it means to ‘be a man’
and hold them accountable for their actions. Collective outrage against rape
shall not hold much value if we do not follow it up with sustained, long-term
interventions in changing gender-unequal mindsets and attitudes.
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