The Spark that Ignited the Fire
On December 16 last year, a group of men beat and gang raped a young woman after she boarded a bus with a male friend in New Delhi. The woman suffered fatal injuries and died within two weeks. The juvenile defendant was sentenced to three years imprisonment in a reform facility, while the four remaining adult defendants were sentenced to death by hanging. Echoing this tragedy, a photojournalist was brutally gang raped in Mumbai on August 23 this year.
These two incidents highlight the growing trend of sexual assault and rape against women in India. While it’s clear that number of reports of sexual assault is increasing, whether or not the level of gendered violence is rising in India is difficult to discern. Yet, what is causing this upward trend of sexual assault cases? A major factor is modernization, which has caused cultural tensions to arise between the old and the new.
Cultural Polarization
In an increasingly modern and urban society, more women in India are becoming educated, pursuing ambitious careers, and climbing the social ranks. This can be exemplified by the fact that a woman, Sonia Gandhi, currently serves as President of the Indian National Congress.
At the same time, deep cultural customs and traditions are inhibiting the progress of gender equality in Indian society. Gender disparity persists as the notion that boys are better than girls continues to pervade Indian society, demonstrated by the rising number of dowry deaths and the widening gender gap resulting from increasing female infanticide. Treated like second-class citizens, Indian girls and women suffer from lack of education, poor nutrition and health care, and violence. In addition, with rape socially stigmatized, women are discouraged from reporting abuses. Not only are rape victims shunned in society, but police officials, until recently, have been reluctant to investigate rape and sexual assault cases.
“[D]espite changes—such as education and greater employment opportunities for women as well as increased political participation—the culture of patriarchy remains untouched,” said Mumbai-based independent journalist and columnist Kalpana Sharma. “An Indian woman is still essential a commodity, one who can be traded in marriage, one who can be attacked, raped, murdered for any number of reasons that have nothing to do with her being, but her relationship to the men to whom she ‘belongs’.”
With this tug-of-war between modernization and conservatism, Indian society appears to becoming more polarized. On one end is the belief in gender equality and social progress. On the other end is the reactionary desire to preserve tradition, including underlying sexist notions.
“As an Indian woman, I feel that I have been struck by how patriarchal the society is, which is where all of this stems from,” former co-president of Harvard’s undergraduate South Asian Association (SAA) Preetha Hebbar said. “While I haven’t personally experienced this, as someone who has always identified with India and loves going back and seeing my family, it’s hard for me to reconcile the fact that this country that I love so much and identity with so much has these inherent biases against women.”
A Cultural Shift
Amid such cultural polarization, an evident shift in cultural attitudes or norms is occurring. After the rape of the woman in New Delhi last December, the public has expressed its indignation via multiple protests in the nation’s capital. Mirroring public outrage, there has been constant media coverage of violence against women, with cases of sexual assault and rape being highlighted in newspapers daily. Furthermore, many efforts for reform have taken place, including legislative and judicial reforms by the government.
The issue of violence against women seems to have finally entered the public consciousness. According to Professor Jacqueline Bhabha, Professor of the Practice of Health and Human Rights at the Harvard School of Public Health and the Jeremiah Smith Jr. Lecturer at Harvard Law School, various women’s rights and human rights organization have been diligently addressing the issue of gendered violence for decades, yet no one has recognized their work. India is evidently at a cultural tipping point right now, and it is high time that efforts to curb violence against women, as well as efforts to bridge gender disparity across the board, be taken seriously.
Decreasing Impunity
In order to address the endemic violence against women, the Indian government has made efforts to decrease impunity of sexual assault offenders by amending legislation and reforming India’s judiciary system. In the face of a culture that devalues women and has historically turned a blind eye to the issue of violence against women, the Indian government is trying to convey that sexual violence is not acceptable and will be punished.
In March this year, the government passed The Criminal Law Bill, which amends anti-rape legislation to be more clear and strict. For example, the bill more clearly defines sexual harassment, widely expands the definition of rape, criminalizes acts such as stalking and voyeurism, requires initial reports of sexual assault or any form of sexual harassment to be taken by female police offers, and extends the punishment for sexual violence to the death penalty in the most serious of cases. In addition, the government has created special “fast-track” courts specific to sexual assault cases. These courts are designed to speed up the trial process for rape cases and ensure justice quickly for rape victims.
A Holistic Approach
While these government efforts are laudable, decreasing impunity is not enough, according to Bhabha. Instead, a more holistic approach is necessary, in which the deeper underlying issues of inequality are addressed.
“Conviction rates are important, but beyond that, changing the infrastructure that leads to the unequal playing field between boys and girls is critical,” Bhabha said. “We need to have adolescent and pre-adolescent education for the conception of gender roles—that a strong boy is not predatory and respects girls. We need education in school that addresses reproductive issues and sexuality, which are taboo in India. All of these are critical pieces to the puzzle.”
A holistic approach to curbing gendered violence may also involve making reforms at both the federal and local levels of government. According to SAA Academic/Political Co-chair Siddhartha Jena, simply focusing on the national Indian government is not enough. Instead, due to the rampant corruption and apathy extant in local governments of states in India, a focus on the lower levels of government of justice could potentially help India progress greatly. Therefore, the current reform efforts in India do not prove sufficient to addressing the issue of gendered violence.
Question of Efficacy
Besides the holistic approach, are the reforms currently being made even proving to be effective? The efficacy of efforts to decrease impunity appears questionable. For example, the Criminal Law (Amendment) Bill is criticized by many women’s rights and human rights organizations for not criminalizing marital rape.
Describing this issue of not defining marital rape as a crime in India, Jena explained, “In the United States, we have redefined the definition of sexual assault to include factors that right now in India are beginning to be recognized. There’s an overbearing pressure in India that puts it in the hands of women to protect themselves from sexual assault. The hypocritical sentiment is that women should stay at home and be around their husband, brothers, and cousins; there’s no support of women to walk around at night without fear of being assaulted. In many of these cases these women come back home, and the source of sexual assault is at home. A big factor in India is the amount of power that the husband holds in the household: marital rape is defined as the husband’s right to demand what he wants from his wife, and it’s her role to submit and do what he wants.”
In addition, some argue that the fast-track court cases are counterproductive. Rather than accelerating the trial process of sexual assault cases, the fast-track court cases appear to slow down the trying of rape cases. Furthermore, some women’s rights organizations criticize the death penalty convictions of the four men in the Dec. 2013 New Delhi rape case, arguing that hanging the men does not tackle the root of the problem. Both Bhabha and Sharma are examples of such critics. Bhabha said, “Unfortunately, a lot of attention has gone to this punitive calling for the death penalty, which I think is a call for vengeance and is evading what is important. These are endemic issues of inequality that need to be addressed. There aren’t quick fix solutions.” Meanwhile, Sharma noted that rather than serving as an effective deterrent for future crime, the death penalty “makes society avoid understand the real underpinnings of violent crime against women that are rooted in our attitudes towards women.”
The Intersectionality of Class and Gender
Then what is the root of the problem? As mentioned above, the deeply entrenched viewpoint of male superiority in society serves to perpetuate the issue of gendered violence. In addition to the cultural element, another key aspect of the issue of widespread sexual assault is the matter of class, or more specifically, the intersectionality of class and gender.
The reason the New Delhi rape triggered such massive outcry from the public, generating extensive media coverage and thereby increasing awareness of gendered violence, can be traced back to not only the sheer brutality of the rape, but also back to the socioeconomic class of the victim and perpetrators. The defendants were men of poor backgrounds, while the victim was a middle-class woman. The attention brought to this case may be attributed to the higher social class of the woman in comparison to the men, illustrating the tension between social classes and the violent backlash resulting from the success of modern female urbanites.
Yet, according to Sharma, most rapes do not involve poor men and middle-class women, but instead are “those of poor women, often by men in uniform, by men of a higher caste, of a higher class (for instance maids working in middle class homes).”
Unfortunately, poor women are widely neglected in the judicial system and by society as a whole. Sharma noted, “Until our judicial system begins to serve everyone’s needs, not only of the rich and powerful, we will continue to fail women. At present, the prosecution is simply not interested when the case concerns a poor person. They don’t bother with collecting evidence; they don’t argue the case forcefully in court. As a result, the conviction rate for rape is pitiful. The only cases that have come through quickly are those that are high profile, like the December 16 Delhi gang rape. That case illustrates a possibility that is, sadly, very far from the reality.”
Moving Forward
The government, along with women’s rights and human rights organizations, should utilize the current public momentum and move forward in the effort to curb gendered violence. However, there are some questions that still need to be answered. It is unclear whether sexual assault is actually on the rise in India, or whether it is simply a matter of increased reports. Meanwhile, there is much critique of the punitive approach, in comparison with a more holistic approach, and the effectiveness of current efforts to decrease impunity is also dubious.
The bottom line is this: it is necessary to tackle the root of the issue of sexual violence against women and recognize that a long-term strategy is necessary. While people may simply cry out for the hanging of the perpetrators in the December 2012 New Delhi case in the hopes of a quick and easy solution, it is important to recognize that there is no such magic remedy to an endemic issue with deep systemic cultural and historical roots. Instead, we must recognize the complexity of the challenge we face and tackle the issue with a long-term, holistic approach that will demonstrate to the women of the world that we are there for them in the long haul.
Photo Credit: The Hindu