By Pooja Walia, Contributing Writer
Where a perv is free to roam and thrive
And a girl is caged in a room to barely survive
Where the rules are ruled by the rulers of lust
And if u feel pain, keep shut you must
For it’s no big deal if your body is mishandled
Be quiet, else it’ll be a scandal
Stay put, cause your tears will dry away
But don’t talk to anyone about THAT day
Cause it is natural for a male to act this way
It’s okay to let your boundaries slay
For the people will believe just what they see
No matter how shattered you may be
The lecherous will still walk innocent with pride
Into the depths, you have to stride
No law, no person can save you from this hysteria
Cause the land you come from is indeed Incredible India!!Thanks & Regards,
A frustrated Indian Girl
This was a submission made to one of the leading Indian newspapers, The Hindu, in 2018 by a girl who wanted to let people know how it feels to hail from India, which was titled world’s most dangerous country for women in 2018.
The country has been known for its diverse culture, cuisine and art and being the world’s largest democracy. Demos = people, Kratia = authority. These words don’t just define a system of government but also how powerful the inhabitants of a country are. We became independent in August 1947, but to this day, I am unable to celebrate “Freedom.” We became independent from the British in 1947.
Rape Culture
Jammu and Kashmir, called heaven on earth, is one of the most beautiful scenic beauties of the country. The union territory contains a town called Kathua, where an 8-year-old girl, Asifa Bano, belonging to a “lower caste” was raped and strangulated to death by over four men. She was kidnapped on January 10, 2018, sedated and raped for several days before being killed.
New Delhi, my home state, is known as the rape capital of India and is home to one of the most heinous crimes committed in the country. On the night of December 16, 2012, a 23-year-old woman was raped and assaulted by six men on a bus while her male friend was severely beaten and stripped. The rapists took turns assaulting her and maimed her private parts with an iron rod before throwing both victims out on the street, naked, bloodied and helpless. After being found by a passerby, she succumbed to her injuries and died in a hospital in Singapore. Throughout her fight and the case’s investigation, her real identity was kept confidential. She was named Nirbhaya – fearless.
Aruna Shaunbag, a nurse in Mumbai, was sexually assaulted by a ward boy in November 1973 and strangulated with a dog chain. She spent 42 long years in a vegetative state and died aged 66 years old in May 2015 due to pneumonia. While in her coma, she was blind, deaf, paralyzed, unable to talk and could only survive on mashed food.
These incidents are just a few of the most heart-wrenching cases that moved me to the core. These victims died instantly, after two weeks or after 42 years, all still fighting. What many refuse to acknowledge is that the law and order of the country and women’s safety were also dead a long time ago. In Asifa’s case, after almost a year and a half, three convicts faced life imprisonment and three police officers were sentenced to five years in prison for tampering with the evidence after accepting a bribe from the 61-year-old mastermind behind the crime. One of the accused was acquitted due to “lack of evidence,” and one juvenile who kidnapped the victim is still under trial. This juvenile was made a part of the plan only because the accomplices were aware that he wouldn’t be charged. In Nirbhaya’s case, four of the six convicts were executed after eight years, one died in custody, and another, a juvenile, spent only three years in jail before walking free. In Aruna’s case, justice was never served. The culprit was imprisoned for seven years for robbery and attempted murder but was never even charged for rape because sodomy was not considered rape at the time. People reacted to her case by saying that “her ordeal will always shame India.”
Indeed, it did. India shook, protested, spoke up and marched, but the safety of women in India is still a big question mark. These horrific instances prove that lust and criminal tendencies are not dependent on the age of the victim, and neither should our laws. Furthermore, the normalization of objectification, the patriarchal system and casteism still remain systemic problems that cause women to become victims and spend their lives in the darkness. Whether it’s assault, domestic violence, rape, murder or sex trafficking, crimes have diversified, gone global and become more frequent with time.
Human Trafficking
With the worldwide economic meltdown and consequent high rates of unemployment, human smuggling is taking a toll on the country more than ever before. Female- headed families in rural areas are more vulnerable to this practice as they are easily conned by traffickers who falsely promise instant monetary support and distant jobs.
Indian tradition calls for marrying girls off and sending them to live with their in-laws. Due to a patriarchal system, several states, especially Haryana, still face female feticide, which leads to a decline in the female population. This, in turn, gives rise to bride trafficking of girls who are trafficked from other parts of the country or world to meet the demand for eligible brides. Many of these girls aren’t even of legal age for marriage. They are exposed to abuse, violence and early pregnancies and aren’t treated as equals but as commodities to be recycled and resold.
According to the International Labour Organization, India constitutes the largest child labor in South Asia with “5.8 million children aged 5-17 working in poor conditions.” The Oscar-winning movie Slumdog Millionaire rightly underscores the situation of forced labor and child trafficking for sexual exploitation, domestic service, begging or work in agriculture, textile, brick industries, etc. West Bengal has the greatest number of children trafficked, followed by Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and Gujarat. Cases of slavery can still be witnessed due to debt bondage, especially in brick kilns, where there are high number of workers migrating from other states and bound to work for indefinite periods of time with negligible benefits.
“Child victims of commercial sexual exploitation, forced labor, and human trafficking are more likely to be children from marginalized groups, such as low-caste Hindus, members of tribal communities, and religious minorities. Children from marginalized groups also face barriers to accessing education. Teachers sometimes subject these children to discrimination and harassment.”
-Bureau of International Labor Affairs
Several government shelter homes are also known to be hot spots of such types of trafficking. The victims of such practices are deprived of their childhood, basic education, privileges and, above all, normal mental health.
Systemic Problems
Patriarchy
This gender-based bias, where a male is given all the privileges and a female is either killed before birth or subjected to household chores without any freedom, runs rampant in India. Given the lack education and awareness in some states, many wives face abuse if they give birth to a daughter because it is considered their fault if the baby is not a boy. In some states, women are expected to keep their heads and faces covered in front of everyone, to not raise their voices or concerns, and to dedicate their lives to serving their husbands, children and in-laws. Cases of dowry are still prevalent and often lead to wives being tortured or even killed. Domestic violence is a major problem, and most women are too scared to speak up, take action or seek help, let alone file for divorce, which is considered taboo in India. During the COVID-19 lockdown, several countries around the world have seen a rise in cases of domestic violence, thus strengthening the fact that women become targets of men’s rage due to any inconvenience. Inhumane acts like marital rape are not even considered a crime in our legal system because women are supposed to perform their “wifely duties” regardless of their consent.
One of the culprits in the Kathua case was quoted as saying that the victim’s fault was that “she belonged to a lower caste.” Victims of sex and bride trafficking in India usually belong to lower castes. Despite a ban on discrimination based on caste in 1948, casteism has undermined the safety and security of many people, making them more prone to violence, abuse, assault, rape and murder.
Similar to casteism, religious beliefs play a major role the country. The Kathua victim was also preyed upon because of her religious minority background. Recent violence over biased government bills, political decisions and hate speeches from various people in power have exponentially corrupted people’s mindsets and given them the illusion that they are above the law. Several recent cases include mob lynching, rape, murder, destruction and violence over religious differences.
Change
The Nirbhaya Act, or Criminal Law Amendment Act, 2013, was introduced in the aftermath of the New Delhi case. This broadened the definition of rape and included acts of vagina penetration by penis into vagina, anus, urethra or mouth or inserting a foreign object into any of these parts. The law also recognizes acts such as acid attack, sexual harassment, voyeurism and stalking as offenses dealt under the Indian Penal Code.
After the Kathua rape and murder case, along with a similar incident in Unnao, Uttar Pradesh, the minimum punishment for rape of a female less than 16 years of age has been increased from 10 years to 20 years under the Criminal Law Amendment Act, 2018.
In 2018, three years after the death of Aruna Shaunbag, passive euthanasia under strict guidelines was legalized in India.
As per the 2019 Trafficking in Persons Report, the country has tried to strengthen its regulations to deal with the increasing levels of human trafficking under the Trafficking in Persons (Prevention, Protection and Rehabilitation) Bill but still remains in Tier 2 of the report due to its improper structure and implementation.
With the deeply rooted issues still prevailing due to poor execution of the changes in the law, India still suffers from major safety concerns. Corruption, political motives and lack of fear among perpetrators due to their faith in a flawed judicial system add to a delay in justice and rise in crimes.
To read more about the prevalence of these issues worldwide and learn how you can help abolish child sex trafficking, visit our website at one-bread.org. Go the extra step this month by bookmarking our shopping page here and directly benefiting One Bread Foundation.