Tuesday, March 18, 2008

मातृ देवो भव

An unadmirable growth rate of 700 percent over the last 30 years... grown from 7 reported a day to 53 reported a day and growing...children and grown ups treated alike...villages,cities,everywhere...India's fastest growing crime.

Welcome to Incredible India, a glorious civilization degenerated; a land of integrity and culture, in posters and presentations,the land where values from time immemorial are still remembered, in books।It is the country whose earliest scriptures describe women as a divine race. Even by the rules of the detestable caste system, women were not allowed to lower their status.Today, even as women are expanding their presence into every field imaginable, they are being lowered to mere objects of play by the physically stronger human species.

My outrage has been fed by the lately regular reports of foreign women being raped and murdered in my country.The anger is not directed at the fact that the victims are foreigners, but that every woman, no matter the color of her skin has a right to walk anywhere on god given land without fearing for what is not her fault, and yet has to. The foreign victims have only brought the shocking statistics to light.The fuss made by the foreign media have sparked retorts that rape rates in India are by no means the highest in the world(sexual assaults are reported in the US about every 6 minutes). I shudder to think that there are people who justify the worst crime in the world in such a crass manner!and I donot wonder that justice has not been meted out even in publicised cases like that of Jessica Lal.
Everybody knows why such crimes occur, but why do they continue to occur? Even after the victim, if alive and has answered humiliating questions, the culprits walk free sooner or later. I am not being an extreme feminist but I do believe that only extreme punishments can rein these uncontrolled acts. Anything less than capital punishment will not suffice. I am sure Christ did not think of this when he asked us to show the other cheek when slapped on one...this is what we are precisely doing. The culprits are certainly among the lowest breed of mankind, but are the adjudicators any better? I wonder how they can bear to hear about lives being ruined in this fashion and not exercise their power when they can.Atleast the knowledge that a kid who has no clue why she is suffering should melt a human heart.
These stories are told by statistics, and they do not tell half the story. The victims are put to shame more than the culprits.The family is ashamed and try to hide her than bring her justice. If they do try for justice, the media without discretion capitalize on another's misery under the pretext of reaching out to the public.I wonder,would the women have been better off if they had been murdered?
I am sorry if this article makes an extremely unpleasant reading, but these are my thoughts on these gory crimes. I wonder if people who wrote the taittiriya upanishad wrote what was or what should be when they wrote "मातृ देवो भव "

8 comments:

Ajeeta said...

this is one of my fav topics. very nice post. :-) blogging continue maadi please.

Sur said...

You know how I feel when I read anything like this. I feel suffocated! And even more when I read that the woman is made an object of humiliation and declared 'deserving' the act, rather than feeling compassion towards her. Was the society so degraded even in ancient times? Whatever the scriptures describe I feel it was!

Lakshmi Priya said...

@sur: we will never know how it was. But I feel good when I think that the society has degraded than that it was always like that and there are no good times to go back to.

Vacha said...

All in all, an excellent post!

Whether or not we have capital punishment for rape, a better law enforcement is required for all laws at home, not just the ones related to rape. People should be afraid of breaking the law of the land..

We need to overhaul our police force/judiciary and close the loopholes that delay cases and allow criminals to roam about free.Only then, I think, the punishment really matters..

Even if the punishment for rape is death, whats the point if no one (or no one with any sort of money/influence/political clout) is ever hung?

Lakshmi Priya said...

@vacha : u r absolutely right

rs said...

very disturbing..but the veritable truth..

Fate said...

An excellent post!!

In addition to Law enforcement for such crime, I believe that we as a society should also not treat the victims of such crime as a social stigma...

Ramu's Corner said...

"I wonder,would the women have been better off if they had been murdered?" These words are stiching like a thorn in my heart. How cruel is the crime of Rape? Definitely persons who does that, deserves the Capital Punishments.
Sentence ot death for rape is practiced in many Gulf counties, Why shdn't it be followed in our country?