The voice of women - Ignore it at your own peril

As we approach one year this Dec 16 into the ghastly gangrape of a young paramedic in Delhi, the public outrage that had erupted in its wake didn’t fade away just as quickly as it had built up. The perpetrators did not get away, the case did not drag on for years. Exactly a year after the barbaric rape, the discourse on women’s rights has not only persisted, it has acquired new vigor, more nuance and a stronger, more assertive tone. Suzette Jordan, a single mother of two who was gangraped in Calcutta, refused to be referred to as the ‘Park Street rape victim’ and demanded she be identified by her real name, even though the law prohibits anyone from naming a rape victim; of the law intern who plucked up the courage to blog about retired Supreme Court judge A.K. Ganguly as the man who harassed her in a Delhi hotel; of the young journalist from Tehelka who spoke up against her powerful editor Tarun Tejpal and subsequently quit; of the women who exposed godman Asaram Bapu and his son Narayan Sai, landing both in jail on rape charges.

Statistics are shocking. Every 22 minutes a woman is raped in India. Abuses occur both within and out of the circle of trust. With the rates of crime against women escalating at an alarming level, a group of activists has come to the forefront and championing the cause of womens’ rights.  Some of these groups are very inventive in their tactics. Mind the Gap, stages anti eve-teasing flash mobs on the Delhi Metro wearing T-shirts reading ‘Main cheez nahin hun mast mast’ or ‘I am not an Item’.  

Blank Noise Project, a campaigning community art group that put a lie to the tired argument about eve-teasing victims ‘asking for it’ by wearing western outfits when they staged an exhibition of garments Indian women were wearing when they were sexually molested—most, of course, turned out to be in saris and salwar kameezes.” More than ever, we are just about coming to terms with both an increase in violent crimes and an understanding of the inequalities women face every day but have learnt to brush under the carpet over the decades.

While various groups are doing all sort of campaigns, here is a very interesting video satire by Kalki Koechlin.

It is heartening to know that more are now coming out to speak about the harrassments as did the young Tehelka journalist.

Here is what the young Tehelka journalist had to say about the recent sexual advance by her former employer.

I am heartened by the broad support I have received over the past fortnight. However, I am deeply concerned and very disturbed by insinuations that my complaint is part of a pre-election political conspiracy.

I categorically refute such insinuations and put forward the following arguments:

The struggle for women to assert control over their lives and their bodies is most certainly a political one, but feminist politics and its concerns are wider than the narrow universe of our political parties. Thus, I call upon our political parties to resist the temptation to turn a very important discussion about gender, power and violence into a conversation about themselves.

Suggestions that I am acting on someone else’s behest are only the latest depressing indications that sections of our public discourse are unwilling to acknowledge that women are capable to making decisions about themselves for themselves.

In this past week, television commentators who should know better, have questioned my motivations and my actions during and after Mr. Tejpal molested me. Some have questioned the time it took for me to file my complaint, more inquisitive commentators have questioned the use of the word “sexual molestation” versus words like “rape.”

Perhaps the hardest part of this unrelentingly painful experience has been my struggle with taxonomy. I don’t know if I am ready to see myself as a “rape victim”, or for my colleagues, friends, supporters and critics to see me thus. It is not the victim that categorizes crimes: it is the law. And in this case, the law is clear: what Mr. Tejpal did to me falls within the legal definition of rape.

Now that we have a new law that broadens the definition of rape, we should stand by what we fought for. We have spoken, time and again, about how rape is not about lust or sex, but about power, privilege and entitlement. Thus this new law should be applicable to everybody – the wealthy, the powerful, and the well connected – and not just to faceless strangers.

As seen by some of the responses to this case, instances of familial and custodial rape present doughty challenges to even the most adamantine feminists.

Unlike Mr. Tejpal, I am not a person of immense means. I have been raised singlehandedly by my mother’s single income. My father’s health has been very fragile for many years now.

Unlike Mr. Tejpal, who is fighting to protect his wealth, his influence and his privilege, I am fighting to preserve nothing except for my integrity and my right to assert that my body is my own and not the plaything of my employer. By filing my complaint, I have lost not just a job that I loved, but much-needed financial security and the independence of my salary. I have also opened myself to personal and slanderous attack. This will not be an easy battle.

In my life, and my writings, I have always urged women to speak out and break the collusive silence that surrounds sexual crime. This crisis has only confirmed the myriad difficulties faced by survivors. First, our utterances are questioned, then our motivations, and finally our strength is turned against us: a politician will issue a statement claiming that speaking out against sexual violence will hurt our professional prospects; an application filed in the Delhi High Court will question why the victim remained “normal”.

Had I chosen silence in this instance, I would not have been able to face either myself or the feminist movement that is forged and renewed afresh by generations of strong women.

Finally, an array of men of privilege have expressed sorrow that Tehelka, the institution, has suffered in this crisis. I remind them that this crisis was caused by the abusive violence of the magazine’s Editor-in-Chief, and not by an employee who chose to speak out.

Thank you everyone for your support.

The words of the journalist just about sums up the entire point. Let us hope that more and more victims will come foreward and more will be done on the prevention for crime against women.