Respecting women
IN this present scenario, women are seen as a toy that anyone and everyone are ready to play with.
Why a woman is raped, harassed, humiliated and eve-teased?Is it only because she is a woman?
From her birth till her death, she is treated as a sex object.When a girl is born, she is rarely accepted by most families.
When she grows up and goes to school or college, boys tease her. In 80 to 90 per cent cases, the accused is known to the victim.
For instance, 27 per cent of rapes are committed by neighbours, 22 per cent involves the promise of marriage and 9 per cent are committed by immediate family members and relatives.
Many times the victims don’t come forward to file a complaint against the family members and relatives, as it might tarnish the reputation of the family.
From the abortion of female fetuses, child marriages and dowry killings to rape and domestic violence, Indian girls and women face multiple threats, largely due to deep-rooted attitudes that view them as inferior to men.
When a woman gets married, she is mentally and physically harassed by her husband and in-laws for the sake of dowry.
There is no safety for our girls/women under the democratic government in our country. So many cases of rape are reported everyday and the culprits are freed after their arrests.
Even the police are not trained and sensitised to handle sexual crimes in our country. Whenever the victims approach the police station for filing a complaint, the police are reluctant to register an FIR.
Even if you rape a hundred women or commit a thousand murders, you are not arrested and put behind bars.
All you have to do is hire some corrupt lawyer who will bribe the police and the judge and they’ll set you free.
Even for seeking admission in schools or in colleges or getting your ration card or voter’s id done, you have to pay a bribe to the officials.
Even though the government had amended anti-rape laws to approve death penalty for rapists for girls below the age of 12 crimes against them continue to rise unabated.
Already there is a huge backlog of rape cases in courts. Due to snail paced justice delivery system, women have to wait for a long period of time to get justice.
It is rightly said that justice delayed is justice denied. Instead of amending laws there is a need to create awareness in the society about respecting women.
It’s time we start working seriously for the betterment of women in our country. The government must gear up its efforts to provide them their legal rights.
—The writer is contributing columnist, based in Mumbai, India
