Who exactly is standing for the cause of the victim of thebeastly gang rape that took place inside a moving bus in south Delhi lateSunday evening? Is it only the young victim in hospital, battling for a lifescarred, and/or impaired?
Except for the frenzy on social media and slogan-shouting bythe political class, there is no sustained effort at finding concrete steps toensure such crimes do not recur.
If ‘crime against women’ is not on the aam aadmi’s agenda,whose agenda is it on anyway? The political class has already shown itscommitment on empowerment of women by its collectively handling of the women’sreservations bill.
Less than 60 hours since the incident, the Delhi chiefminister already sounds satisfied, after issuing a media release that she hasterminated the license of the bus. Delhi's women and child developmentminister, Kiran Walia, in a statement said she feels “helpless”.
Was it then the first time that the city has been a witnessto a rape incident? History shows Delhi is, and has been, an unsafe city forwomen. Statistics (which only confirm reported cases, mind you, not thethousands that are never reported) say 507 rape cases were reported in thenational capital in 2010, the highest among 35 major Indian cities; the numberrose to 568 rape cases in 2011.
It is also to be kept in mind that a rape victim undergoestwo crises, one of undergoing the trauma of rape and the subsequent trial tobook the guilty beyond reasonable doubt. While the first seriously wounds herdignity, curbs her individual, destroys her sense of security and may oftenruin her physically, the second is no less potent of mischief, inasmuch as itnot only forces her to relive through the traumatic experience, but also doesso in the glare of publicity in a totally alien atmosphere, with the whole apparatusand paraphernalia of the criminal justice system focused upon her.
There are lots of fallacies in the Indian Penal Code, 1860(IPC), which makes it difficult in proving an incident of rape and sexualassault. Under IPC, a man is said to commit “rape” who has had sexualintercourse with a woman without her consent. Incidentally “sexual assault” hasnot been defined in IPC separately. However, in view of increasing number ofsexual crimes, the government had few months back sought to replace rape with sexualassault in the Indian Penal Code and widen the scope of the offence in theCriminal Law Bill, 2012.
Further, cases of “rape” are difficult to prove beyondreasonable doubt. The Supreme Court in one such cases noted that the broadprinciple that the prosecution has to prove its case beyond reasonable doubtapplies equally to a case of rape and there can be no presumption that aprosecutor would always tell the entire story truthfully," the apex courtsaid in an order. “Proving the case beyond reasonable doubt” always remains thebiggest challenge that the rape victim faces. Hence in many such cases theaccused is left scot-free and commits another such offence with similar modusoperandi.
Another and the larger challenge is that the judicial systemof our country is slow and already overburdened. Therefore judgment in a rapecase comes very late.
Sometimes it comes so late that either of the parties die.Hence the challenge is to expedite the hearings of such cases, which wait forits turn for adjudication for years amid “more important cases”. Demand fromvarious nook and corner across the country for fast track courts/designatedcourts, which could book the guilty in a time bound manner could also be apractical solution.
Be that as it may, it is indeed also concerning to noticethe absence of the likes of notable civil society leaders claiming to beworking for and with the aam aadmi for the ‘aam aadmi issues’ and why then hasthe ‘Aam Aaadmi Party’ been silent on such grave issue.
Would the Civil Society clap and cheer the police for itscommendable investigation so far focus only on movements that give instant andrequisite publicity among the class less known for its concerns on empowermentof women or crime against women?
Is there hope for taking concrete measures to preventrecurrence of a similar crime in future?
If yes, on whose agenda is it?
In association with Governance Now
