Syeda Mazhar
37,000- That’s how many women have been raped in Shining India in the year 2104 and the numbers are increasing every year. This means on average 101 women are defiled in India every day since 2014 a staggering number that should make any sane human being hold their head and cry out in agony. But these numbers reflect only the tip of the iceberg. These are the cases the authorities actually registered. There are countless other victims which are not reported to avoid social embarrassment. The shame and embarrassment is all for the victim there is no shame on the part of the government or the society which fail to provide protection to their women.
Recently a 14 year old Dalit girl who was raped, tortured and forced to drink corrosive substance, allegedly by a man who had raped her earlier died on Sunday. Delhi Commission for Women Chairperson Swati Maliwal seems to be the only one expressing her outrage and offering support to the victim’s family. The government however has failed to provide any security to the women of India. It is truly horrifying that these gruesome acts of savagery don’t even register on the collective radar of these people in power. Despite her sacrifice she still remains one of thousands of vulnerable women of this country who were raped and the state failed to provide them justice. Some of them merely ‘succeeded’ as being officially registered as “rape victim” a stigma they have to carry for the rest of their lives.
In December 2012, Nirbhaya was beaten with iron rods, gang-raped, and tortured in a private bus while she was travelling with her boyfriend. As a result of an international outrage over her assault and subsequent death, new laws and new fast-track courts were promised. More women are now willing to report rape cases. But even two years after Nirbhaya, her father claims that the promises of reform were unmet, and that justice in India has failed his daughter and women like her.
One explanation given for the ongoing rape problem is the lewd sex scenes on Bollywood industry and the sex depraved youth with nerdy needs. But it is more than that. More than the imbalance of male to female ratio, this is also said to be one of the factors of this beastly violence.
The simple solution points to the Indian caste system. There is an expression in India that says that “bringing up a daughter is like watering a neighbor’s plant.” India places women lower than men. There is a total and complete lack of respect for women in Indian religious scriptures. The Mahabharata, Book 13 Section 40 (13.40), states, “There is no creature more sinful, than woman. She is poison, she is snake.” Other texts say that “Women are living lies.”
Therefore this violence comes without remorse and becomes unhinged. It is common for the Indian society, along with its women, to shun a rape victim. A man convicted in a rape case stated, ” a girl is far more responsible for rape than a male”.”A decent girl won’t roam around at 9 o’clock at night”, “a woman’s place is at home and not in the offices and in open places”, “girls should stay at home and cook. They should not be at the bars and partying” among other misogynistic comments are more to reduce space for women but not to reduce and prevent abuse against them.
At this moment in its long tumultuous history, India is seeing a renaissance of a narrowly defined, ultranationalist, militant Hindutva ideology. Modi is the poster child of this ideology. This ideology places a lot of emphasis on India’s most beloved epics and historical stories. Sadly at the heart of these ballad-like mythological stories lie lurid tales of sex that glorify rape. There so called gods also revel in rapes and view it as something heroic so why wouldn’t their general public do what their gods do whom they worship.
The god Vishnu is said to have raped Tulsi/Vrinda by assuming the guise of her husband. Then there is god Brihaspati. He is the Guru of all Indian gods. Well, this Guru of gods raped his own pregnant sister-in-law, Mamata. But Brihaspati, even after the tales of rape, is still a god in India. Not even agod in India was ever demoted, leave alone “prosecuted,” for raping a women. That is why every rape in Indian stories is given a clean chit. It is merely what macho men do; it is just normal. Indian mythology conditions people to attach zero consequence to rape.
In a society where women have little or no respect this oppressive atrocity against women in India will get worse, not better. Things will not get better unless there is an international outcry against Modi and the Shiv Sena promoting the Hindutva Ideology. It is an eternal ordeal for women of beastly India.
