Rape Raj: Shrouded in Shadow

By Shahnaz Islam, TwoCircles.net

A frenzied attack or bouts of insanity; “rape is rape”! Every 30 minutes one rape is committed in India. A woman or a child, they are all prey of this heinous crime. The rape cases are shooting up in numbers each day. Bruises and injuries only leave scars, not recoveries. The victims sooner or later are succumbed or marked as grime. Sympathies don’t lie in its supreme constituents.


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The list of names flourishes each year — Nirbhaya case in 2012, Aruna Ramchandra case in 2015, Asifa Bano in 2018, Priyanka Reddy in 2019, Manisha Valmiki in 2020 and who’s next in 2021? Why is it stated that ‘she was raped’? Why not alleged ‘he raped her’? This brutality is not just an android game in contemporary society, the cruelty had been breathing since centuries ago. The social responses, the laws and sections are very tedious to heal the wounds of the victims. Justice is just a dream.

According to a survey, 87 rape cases occurs every day, recorded in 2019, a 7.3 per cent increase in last year, and the victims are mostly in anguish. From 2018, 4.5 per cent rape cases ballooned up against children, were registered in 2019. Further, the government data reveals that of men in India, at least in their entire lives one out of 5 males are either groped or molested as a child or by the stronger men. Over 50 per cent of them are boys between the age of 5 and 15 only.

Any good society is formed with people’s organization on uniting aspects and with their contributions towards universal human values.Unfortunately, we live in a society which mainly boasts over caste, creed, class, religion, language, gender, and most importantly influences of politics and power is supreme overall.

One can calm oneself by acknowledging that every individual is not the same and these disgusting acts are committed by a few who are grounded in their different characteristics or individual behaviours. But how can one repeatedly slaughter humanity and that too with the complicity of the state from top to bottom?

The Hathras incident from UP is an example in hand as to why is rape trending in India? Why the Rape Raj is not abolishing yet even after the harsh Constitutional amendment following the Nirbhaya incident in Delhi? We have to remember that rape has no caste, religion or identity. It is an act of hysteria, an act of madness against any sane society.

Blaming only the government is always not wise. The crime committed by the member is from this very society that we all live in. The government is not a pessimist or mind reader of the culprits or the rapists — what are their intentions or who they want to rape next. However, being complacent with the crimes or protecting the criminals like rapists and lynchers has been observed time and again from certain governments for their political interests. This is an additional bolt for all of us in India.

It’s not enough to call rape just a rape alone. The act of rape devours humanity and undermines faith in human beings. Human beings have constituted laws, unlike animals, for the guidance of citizens and to protect humanity from falling apart.

Despite the harshness of these laws, an actual punishment falls less severe. Indifference and tolerance of sexual crimes are increasing. The agony and trauma the victim goes through is such that no brutality or punishment given to the rapist will justify. Rape does not cut or mark injuries on the intimate parts of the body of a victim but pierced into their psyche. Such wounds are often unseen but never washed off. No amount of guilt or worries will cure it. No functioning of NGOs or systems run by the government or the law-makers can bestow the pride of justice. If we are in our senses and understand ourselves then we have failed humanity. It’s high time we wake up from slumber and educate our minds and thoughts.

Instead of ‘Beti Bachao Beti Padhao’, we should make our sons aware that raping a woman is raping the womb of every mother.

Shahnaz Islam is an advocate at Gauhati High Court, a freelance writer and a poet.

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