A protester during a protest against violence against women and for peace in August in Manipur state, northeast India | ARUN SANKAR/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES
A woman, who was stripped naked, paraded through the streets of a city in India earlier this month.
The news sparked outrage, but it was a sadly familiar headline.
Legal experts and gender rights activists say the law is not yet equipped to deal with such heinous crimes against women.
Shortly after 1 am on December 11, more than a dozen people broke into Sasikala’s (not her real name) home.
They dragged her outside, stripped her naked and took her around the city. Then they tied her to a light pole and beat her for hours.
The 42-year-old woman was being punished because her 24-year-old son had run away with his 18-year-old girlfriend.
The young woman’s family, who had engaged her to another man and who would marry her the next day, was furious and wanted to know where the couple were.
The events occurred in the village of Hosa Vantamuri, in the state of Karnataka, in southern India.
After receiving a tip-off, police reached the village around 4 am and rescued Sasikala and took her to hospital. She had suffered a serious trauma.
Her husband told a minister in that state that “my wife and I didn’t even know about our relationship.”
Arrests
More than a dozen people were arrested and a local police officer was suspended for “dereliction of duty.”
In recent years, incidents similar to what happened in Karnataka have made the news EXCELLENT IMAGES
What happened made headlines in the national press and the authorities took notice. Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah called it an “inhuman act” and promised that justice would be done.
The government also donated some agricultural land and money to the victim, although the authorities acknowledged that there could be no compensation for the humiliation suffered.
Chief Justice of the Karnataka High Court Prasanna Varale and Justice MGS Kamal, who summoned the police and initiated a hearing of their own, said they were “shocked” that such an incident could have taken place in modern India.
But what happened to Sasikala is not really uncommon and several similar incidents have made headlines in India in recent years.
Other cases
One such case occurred in July, in the northeastern state of Manipur, and sparked global outrage.
A video that went viral showed two women being dragged and groped by a crowd of men before one of them was gang-raped.
The terrible attack had a political context: Manipur was hit by violent ethnic clashes involving the Kuki and Meitei communities.
Demonstrators took to the streets in Guwahati, northeast India, to protest sexual violence against two women from the Kuki community in Manipur in July | DAVID TALUKDAR/NURPHOTO VIA GETTY IMAGES
But reports from other states show that such incidents often have their roots in family or caste conflicts, where women’s bodies routinely become the battlefield.
In August, the husband and in-laws of a 20-year-old pregnant woman paraded her naked in Rajasthan after she allegedly left him for another man.
In Gujarat, a 23-year-old woman was similarly punished for eloping with another man in July 2021.
In May 2015, five Dalit women were paraded naked and flogged by members of an upper caste in Uttar Pradesh after one of their daughters eloped with a Dalit boy.
(Dalit is a term used to refer to members of marginalized social groups in India’s strict caste hierarchy. Previously, its members were known as untouchables.)
In 2014, a 45-year-old woman in Rajasthan was paraded naked on a donkey after being accused of killing her nephew.
These are just some of the cases that have made headlines, but overall there is a lack of data on such incidents.
without reporting
Some cases are politicized and raised by opposition parties to embarrass the state government.
But human rights activists say women often don’t report these crimes for fear of being callously questioned by police and courts.
«In many cases attacks against women are not reported out of shame. Families do not report because it is a matter of honor and the system does not support survivors or offer them a safe space to report these crimes,” says lawyer and human rights activist Sukriti Chauhan.
In Delhi there were also protests in solidarity with the two women from the Kuki community who were stripped naked and paraded in Manipur in July | DAVID TALUKDAR/NURPHOTO VIA GETTY IMAGES
In the National Crime Records Bureau’s database, undressing is recorded under a broad description called “assault with intent to outrage modesty.” [de una mujer]», which associates the crime with cases of street harassment, sexual gestures, voyeurism and stalking.
Last year, 83,344 such cases were registered and 85,300 women were affected.
These cases are prosecuted under section 354 of the Indian Penal Code and carry sentences of three to seven years in prison, which Chauhan said are “grossly inadequate”.
«It is a mockery of justice. The law only works when it is deterrent. At this time this law is not a deterrent and this undermines women. “It needs to be changed to improve punishment.”
Another mobilization after what happened in Manipur, held in July, in Bombay | ASHISH VAISHNAV/SOPA IMAGES/LIGHTROCKET VIA GETTY IMAGES
At the Karnataka High Court, the judges also noted that the assault on Sasikala had been witnessed by “a crowd of 50-60 villagers”, adding that “only one man tried to intervene and he was also beaten up”.
Stressing the need for “collective responsibility” to stop such atrocities, the judges cited a case dating back to 1830 – when India was ruled by the British – in which an entire village was found to have been forced to pay for a crime.
“Everyone in the city should be responsible… Someone could have tried to stop him,” they said.
Judge Varale also invoked Draupadi, the protagonist of the epic-mythological text Mahabharata, who the Hindu god Krishna saved while she was being stripped, to advise women “to take up arms, since no god will come to protect them”.
For Chauhan, this advice is impractical.
«We are not Draupadis and there are no weapons to collect. Furthermore, the responsibility cannot fall on women. “The law must speak to the wrongdoer, but it continues to tell women that they must find a way to stay safe.”
«The message we must convey is to stop fighting ethnic, caste and family battles in our bodies; “I’m not your battlefield,” he adds.
Law and education
Maumil Mehraj, a researcher who works with young people on gender equality issues, says the reason a woman’s body is treated like a battlefield is because it is linked to her honor and, by extension, to that of her husband, her family, the caste and the community.
“This is why women always have to disproportionately bear the brunt during conflicts,” she points out.
These incidents, he says, also have an element of voyeurism because they are seen, photographed and filmed.
In Karnataka, she notes, one of those arrested is a minor, indicating that such crimes have been normalized to such an extent that the next generation has also grown up with ingrained gender ideas.
«Will a law be enough to deal with these cases? I think the only solution is to educate children better. You need to teach them that connecting a woman’s body with her honor is problematic,” she says.
“It is a Herculean task, but it must start soon. Otherwise, this cruel violence against women will continue.
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2023-12-29 22:31:09
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