Check out 16 Return-To-Work Programs In India For Ambitious Women Like You!
Every government promises change, but judicial reforms in India are still needed. Until then, rape survivors will continue to be denied justice.
Every government promises change when in the opposition, but the reality is that judicial reforms in India are still urgently needed. Until then, rape survivors will continue to be denied justice.
“Par ap isme Modiji ya Yogi ji ko kyu beech me la rahe ho?”
Why are you bringing Modiji and Yogiji into this, asked a 65 year old uncle who has been quite a BJP fan over the years, during a heated discussion on the Kathua and Unnao rape cases.
There are many others like him — uncles, aunties, college students, crybabies sending Whatsapp forwards supporting either the BJP or the Congress with the single-mindedness of a woodpecker.
But the fact that I as a lazy person, who takes as much interest in politics as a saloon owner in dandruff, am instigated to write this, is due to my caustic disgust at what is happening around me.
No, it is not about your esteemed Modiji or Yogiji or Rahulji or Kejriwalji. It is about 18 rapes in Vachathi village in Tamil Nadu, that happened in 1992, for which punishment was granted in 2011. It is about the fact that many of the accused, for all the crimes committed on that night in Vachathi, died comfortably of old age before they served any of the sentence for their crimes.
Look around. When was the last time that you heard of a murder, an abduction, a rape receiving its final verdict from the court many years after the crime happened? Probably yesterday.
In a country with the highest backlog of cases pending in the world, how can we expect justice for the rapes that occurred in the past, let alone the present ones?
Why aren’t we talking about our understaffed courts, our non-digital court work, the corruption in courts to stall cases where the affluent can buy as much time as they want while the deprived have to give up their life’s savings for a decent lawyer?
Are the tears of the Chief Justice of India not enough to scream about the state of the Indian judicial system, in our faces and in the faces of those in government?
Every government that shouts reforms when in the opposition tries to ‘control the situation’ when ruling.
Now digest this: According to a NCRB data, among the cities with the most rapes were those in Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan. Is it shocking that these states fall in the bottom rankings for literacy rates according to the 2011 census?
Certainly, a good education and high qualifications doesn’t warrant that a person will not rape, but there is at least the possibility that it makes humans more civilized, aware of their rights and sensible.
Anybody earning a decent salary wants to get their child admitted in an English medium private school, since we all know what happens inside the confines of most Government run schools. Then what remains the fate of the education of 360 million people (the largest section of people in poverty anywhere in the world) in our country? It’s no secret that joblessness and crimes go hand in hand.
But we are not even talking about higher education here, or even of strengthening education till the senior secondary level, or of the rote learning framework we use, or of effective checks on the corruption and laxity of government teachers, or of how inculcating gender equality studies might prove impactful.
In recent years, it has become a vicious pattern to be dumbstruck by a monstrous rape every few months. After the national outrage, the candle marches, the heated TV debates where none can hear the other speak, we all go back to living with a minimum of six rape headlines a day. We have become numb to the normalcy of rape being a statistic, in our daily lives, in this country.
Though fast track courts have been created and laws have been strengthened, their implementation seems like the spit marks in our Government buildings that everyone neglects.
Reforming the judiciary and education: two factors among many others that can play a key role in ceasing this spate of rapes that are happening and will happen; are they included in the statement of the leaders running this country?
We have every right to ask and scream, to reach out to our Government at the blatant gap between manifestos and reality. And if we don’t, we are also at fault.
First published here.
Top image is from a protest at India Gate in 2012, after the ‘Nirbhaya’ incident that galvanised the country. The poster says Justice delayed is Justice denied. Photo credits Ramesh Lalwani, used under a Creative Commons license
Doctor, night owl, Quoran, cat person who spends his pasttime reading engrossing literary fiction and avoiding cold showers. read more...
Women's Web is an open platform that publishes a diversity of views, individual posts do not necessarily represent the platform's views and opinions at all times.
Stay updated with our Weekly Newsletter or Daily Summary - or both!
Neena was the sole caregiver of Amma and though one would think that Amma was dependent on her, Neena felt otherwise.
Neena inhaled the aroma that emanated from the pan and took a deep breath. The aroma of cumin interspersed with butter transported her back to the modest kitchen in her native village. She could picture her father standing in the kitchen wearing his white crisp kurta as he made delectable concoctions for his only daughter.
Neena grew up in a home where both her parents worked together in tandem to keep the house up and running. She had a blissful childhood in her modest two-room house. The house was small but every nook and cranny gave her memories of a lifetime. Neena’s young heart imagined that her life would follow the same cheerful course. But how wrong she was!
When she was sixteen, the catastrophic clutches of destiny snatched away her parents. They passed away in a road accident and Neena was devastated. Relatives thronged her now gloomy house and soon it was decided that she should be married off.
Being a writer, Nivedita Louis recognises the struggles of a first-time woman writer and helps many articulate their voice with development, content edits as a publisher.
“I usually write during night”, says author Nivedita Louis during our conversation. Chuckling she continues,” It’s easier then to focus solely on writing. Nivedita Louis is a writer, with varied interests and one of the founders of Her Stories, a feminist publishing house, based in Chennai.
In a candid conversation she shared her journey from small-town Tamil Nadu to becoming a history buff, an award-winning author and now a publisher.
Nivedita was born and raised in a small town in Tamil Nadu. It was for schooling that she first arrived in Chennai. Then known as Madras, she recalls being awed by the city. Her love-story with the city, its people and thus began which continues till date. She credits her perseverance and passion to make a difference to her days as a vocational student among the elite sections of Madras.
Please enter your email address