A young mother got gang raped by seven men on her way back from work late at night. She was traveling back in a cab with her younger brother when her cab was stopped and she was pulled out, forced into another car, taken to a flat, raped repeatedly and then ‘dropped’ at a metro station. This is not a movie script it is a sad reality that we have almost become inured to, as we have to a host of aberrations that plague our society.
I cannot begin to imagine the pain and hurt of that poor woman. The ‘investigation’ is in process and it seems that some have even be arrested. I only hope they are not let out and pay for their crime but this seems like wishful thinking. Anyway, that is not the point of this blog. What made me see red was a comment made by a senior cop. The woman had stated that she worked in a pub. However the cop in question was quick to retort that she was not employed by the pub but worked as a “help” for single men enter the “couples only” pub. My question is: did that make her ‘rape material’ in the eyes of the law. God only knows what circumstances made this young mother step out from her home and work late hours. Whatever it is did not give her the right to be raped!
It is now common practice to blame the victim for any crime against women. It is always what she wears, where she goes, the hours she keeps that are brandished as causes for her being molested, abused, assaulted, groped, raped and even murdered. Her clothes are too revealing, her hair is too short, she is drinking, she has too much make up, she is out too late and so on. What is revolting is that it is always the supposed guardians of law that come up with these aberrations. No wonder they are not really interested in bringing the culprits to book.
I did not take long for my thoughts to be super vindicated as today’s headlines screamed : Don’t work after 8pm, Gurgaon tells women! So here it is, the solution our administrators and law keepers have come up with. Malls, shop keepers, pub owners have been told not to employ women after 8pm and have absolved themselves of all responsibility just like Pontius Pilate. In cases of rape, molestation et al women are the problem. This is unacceptable and offensive. How long are men going to treat us as objects, slaves, commodities to be treated with utter contempt and disrespect. We need to be told what to do, what to wear, where to go, the list is endless.
The constitution gives us equal rights and we are in our entitled to exercise them all. The state has to provide us the enabling and safe environment to enjoy all the freedoms enshrined in our constitution in the same manner men do. As I have always said I am not a rabid women libber but at this moment I am outraged and rightly so!