A girl raped in a moving bus was national news. December 16, 2012, was a dark day for India, and Delhi was immediately declared as the rape capital of India. Justice was delivered faster than usual.
But, how do we say that we live in a sovereign, secular and equal society when in the first place the temples of law don’t feel the same about its citizens. The sensitivity of a case relies on the caste, class, culture, religion and whatnot, but the word ‘rape’ is still uttered in such hushed tones.
It doesn’t matter who, when, where and why, what matters is, it happens and it isn’t something which torments an individual physically but haunts them for life until they finally give in to their nightmares and give up on life. It was justice for Nirbhaya, but what about the instances when justice isn’t even asked for. Instances where a man’s pride is far ahead of other lives.
A 13-year-old boy was sexually assaulted on a deserted street in a car, and justice knocked his doors only yesterday when the court declared a ten years old jail for the assaulter. Even though the boy was lured in for money after he finished cleaning his car, what he paid back was a lesson for life.
Earlier, rape was blamed on norms of short clothes, late nights and unsafe roads, what I wonder now is, does any factor matter? A little boy, who might not have seen much in life went through an experience which will haunt his life forever, what we need to know is, what creates these hooligans, what makes them grow into something so horrendous and unimaginable.
When recently there was a march of “male” volunteers who created a shout out on, Short Clothes Cause Rapes, I was appalled. What causes rape is the ideology, the mindset and the hooliganism which reside inside the mind of the culprit. It doesn’t depend on the length of the skirt or the stretch of the sari which indicates that “She’s asking for it.” It completely depends on what runs in the mind, the way we perceive the other person, the social conditioning in our heads and our need to assert power. It’s never about the victim; it has never been.
But the difference lies in there too, where people say, Men cannot be raped. Rape never comes along with a name-tag of gender, but it surely comes with the mindset of hunger. The hunger to destroy another life. Let’s try and not feed it with silence.