Is It the System or Us??

Nowadays whenever I switch on a news channel or any newspaper, the main highlight is CRIME AGAINST WOMAN. Everywhere it is the Delhi rape case or some other crime against woman which is being discussed. I had promised myself to avoid writing about it, not because I am least bothered about a human life or I do not respect women, but I just didn't want to be a part of people who just talk and blame. To my agony, I recently saw some of my friends from abroad putting up statuses saying 'How India is unsafe for Woman and every 20 minutes a rape happens in India'. Well I do not know how to react, how to tell them that this is not true, but then it is us only who are portraying this in front of the world. Instead of finding a solution, we somehow are making lots of hoolah.

When I think about the incident, I wonder who is to be blamed. The government, the police or is it us? I won't blame the girl or the friend because that is the most foolish thing anyone could say. Travelling in a public bus or going out with a friend is in no way a mistake. But I want to ask myself and all these people who are actually standing out on the road, showing their anger. What have we done, are we not somewhere responsible in this? I feel we all have some hand in it, and we are doing it without our knowledge.

Statistics shows, 65% of the accused in all the rape cases are juvenile or in their early 20's. Apart from rape cases which have increased in the recent times, if you try to account more crimes against woman, the cases where Acid is thrown on a girls face or abduction of girls also have increased. Sad part is that these cases go unreported or do not have much TRP to be shown on news channels. Majority accused in all these cases are in their teens or late twenties. What is this telling us? Are these people born rapists or can't they identify what is wrong or right? Well I think we all are the reason for increasing this number at such a rate.

How many times have you been a part of discussion, where a friend of yours has proposed to a girl and she rejected him. Try to recall it and look at it from an outsider’s viewpoint. You will find that we rarely try and console the person, instead we are mock them that he has been let down by a girl, a meagre creature, adding agony to an already hurt person. This agony somewhere turns in to need to revenge. 100% of acid throwing cases have a similar story like this behind them. She dumped me or didn't say yes to be my friend and I felt insulted, and took revenge.

Somewhere I also feel that our society is moving in a direction where Women are now considered as a commodity. Those who don't agree, please tell me why is there a need of an item number in movie then. If you want to create hype, put an item number and people talk about it. Woman will have a role to sing and dance only while guy is the hero who fights and leads the way. Similarly, if you have a girlfriend or a woman around you, you are a DUDE or else you are nothing. You have an event, you need tall models in short dresses to stand at the gates, if you are in sales, you try to hire good looking woman to increase your sales and send them for sales pitch, Cheer girls for cricket matches and so many more situations where women are used like a product. What are we doing? We are actually killing their value and that is why every tom dick and harry thinks he can pick up any second girl from the road, do what he wants and then throw her on road. And mostly these thoughts are really boosted when you are drunk, which we have seen as most of the accused of rape cases are drunk when they committed that horrifying crime.

We blame the police that they don't do their duties. What about our civic duties?? There were reports that people were taking pictures of the girl who was raped and thrown on road naked. Instead of informing authorities and draping that poor soul, we click pictures. Are we humans anymore? News guys who are supposed to create awareness are using these opportunities to increase the TRP's. Infact everyone is trying to take on this opportunity and utilize it in their way. The supposed God men preaching about gods and telling that rape victim should have called for god. Sms company sending messages creating chains and forwarding the message, where they earn money on bulk messages.

In all this what we forget is that we are not taking any step to prevent these incidents in future. Its not new to have protests and candle march. In 2008 Scarlett Case pulled alot of  International attention towards rapes happening in India, similarly many more cases there was an uproar, we shout, we scream and then we expect the police and government to do their duties. What have we done to change the situation?

 

How many of us have ever thought of organizing a community patrolling in your own area during nights? How many of us have offered our neighbourhood women help if we find them going alone in night? Have we ever tried to make our friend realize that, if a girl has dumped him or said no to him, it is good for both of them, because it is better than having a relationship where either of them is not happy. If i talk about rape cases, how many times have we tried to help a woman when you see that she is being harassed or in danger. And how many of us have come forward and helped a rape victim to come back and live life normally. When you see a crime happening, report it or try to stop it, instead of being selfish.

We have to work on which can improve the condition of society. I am not saying that these silent protests should be stopped, but we need to act more and work to improve our society.