You want to know why all this happens!

If you are a man reading this, you would probably never get to know how

many times the women in your life (your own mother, sister, wife, girl-

friend or even just a friend) have been disgraced at various instances..

and If you are a woman, you must have often chosen silence over words,

when you would have experienced an insult to your modesty. I, like many

other hundreds and thousands of people, have also been outraged by what

has happened to that girl who was gang-raped. I refuse to accept it as

just another story. And why only her? When I first read the news of a

rape in Hindustan Times in the newspaper’s specially devoted column,

‘This city is not safe for women’, I was still a teenager, and I kept on

asking myself why would something of this sort would happen at the first

place.

Today, after ten years, fortunately or rather unfortunately, I have found

some answers… I started commuting in Delhi buses when I joined a college

in Vasant Kunj. My brother, always, worried, accompanied me to college

several times but of course that could not have continued forever, and

not always could I find companions to commute with me… Men often sat next

to girls and women, including me, and were often reminded to behave

themselves. This is not a memory that I can recall, but it still happens

around me each time I commute. Initially, I often ignored the

misbehaviour, but gradually realized that it was better to ‘make noise,

embarrass them and give them a piece of mind’, so that the miscreants

would think at least once when they do it the next time. Often, these

people think that the girl would stay quiet and that is where they are

encouraged. My first lesson was learnt. Never let these eve-teasers go

away with their momentary pleasures!

But speaking up is always not the easiest option, especially, when the

victim is young. So many friends of mine, who I know for years, have

recently confided to me now how they have also come across such

situations, not only in Delhi buses, but with their relatives,

neighbours, teachers, street lechers, when they were young, when their

sisters were young. Since we never talk about such things openly in our

families and often the mothers of the girls ‘train’ them to be tolerant

to all this, we tend to oversee how these things will later become a

bigger problem not only for us but for society at large…

A mother never gives birth to a rapist, just like a terrorist is not

born. Probably, this is how it goes--A man is probably never discouraged

to be violent at home, he then becomes an eve-teaser on roads, then

molests a child or a girl or woman at the first chance he gets; and when

he has perfected all of the aforementioned skills, he finally tries his

hands at raping, which is in a politician’s language- A DASTARDLY ACT OF

VIOLENCE. When things go out of hand and translate into such inhuman

acts, we try to figure out various reasons, including the failure of law

and order, psychological disorders in the rapists, and what not! However,

are you absolutely sure that in your own capacity, you have in no way

contributed to this menace that the society is facing? Don’t we let our

imagination work over-time when we come across a news or somebody’s

experiences like this? Talking of this very instance of gang-rape, I have

received so many forwarded messages mentioning that rods were inserted

into the gang-rape victim’s vagina, her uterus was thrown out of the bus

and what not! If I myself, ever choose to confide my own experiences to

friends and family, they first convince me to dismiss it as just another

everyday instance, and would then probably like me to oblige them with

details, of what exactly the lechers did, where did they ‘touch’, so that

they can judge whether my reaction is justified or not! I just cannot

imagine what a rape victim would have to go through! More often, than

not, girls are also lectured on how prevention is better than cure, and

how they can prevent these instances at their own end in various ways.

But putting together all the case studies from the past, a ‘sensible’ and

a ‘rational’ person has to agree that such a ‘dastardly act of violence’

is quite difficult to be prevented by somebody who will be at the

receiving end.

And then we have to head to India Gate or Jantar March, but sadly these

protests, though showing a kind of awakening among people, cannot be

solely trusted upon to change the ground realities.

Dear society, my only appeal to you is that, for once, let us NOT

consider rape as an act of having sex, wanted or unwanted, it is an act

of violence and so is molestation. Also, let us not consider a rape to be

an act of violence to only the victim. If a murder happens in your

neighbourhood, it does send shivers down your spine because you fear for

your own safety, but a rape probably does not evoke similar reaction,

because we consider it to be an individual’s plight.

Getting angry is a good thing! Feeling helpless is also good if you have

finally become aware that there are challenges around to be addressed.

But if this noise again dies down without bringing any meaningful

results, it would be another let-down to our country. The most important

takeaway that we should remember from this episode, if at all, we think

it has woken up from our procrastination, should be to reduce our

tolerance to any sort of unreasonable behaviour directed to us, or any

woman we know or do not know. Empathy, more than excitement, would help!