I'm glad that the newly formed Uttar Pradesh government brought up the issue of women safety. This is a big concern among males and females in their teens to those in their 40s. Not every woman can have a male companion walking by her 24x7 as a safety measure. After coming to power, government formed “anti-Romeo Squad” to protect women from so called romeos who assault women in different places on different occasions. Many squads have been formed right after the announcement by government as a result of initiative taken by the police or volunteers. Each squad deals with the problem in its own way and everyone has a different opinion about women safety. The title “anti-Romeo Squad” in itself can be debatable and I'll write another blog about it. News and social media have extensively covered all the activities of this group. The responses are mixed in nature. While dealing with Romeo Squad and debating on its applicability, lets see what are the basic concerns which results in a threat to women safety.
A women is really safe when: she is not scared being followed by someone because she is a female; she is not sexually or verbally harassed; she gets respectable space while travelling in public transit; she is not scared of walking alone whether it is day or night.
There are all types of people in a country: the good, the bad and the ugly. Bad group of people will do bad things and law is there to deal with them. But women should not feel insecure even from good people just because she belongs to a specific gender type. I started my life in a small village and have been to the biggest towns in India. Every place is different based on its geography and demography. But women are not safe anywhere. Except certain areas in some towns, women are scared to go alone anytime of the day or night. This problem is certainly related to our education system and law and order enforcement. As a result, this evil is manifested quite uniformly all across India. Growing up, I was part of the same society and during multiple occasions, I might have acted like those jerks. But with time, as I traveled different cities in various countries, I observed things with a changed perspective. Here are some incidents which occur most commonly in India and are the basic reasons behind threat to women safety.
- Sexual Harassment: Women are sexually harassed in crowded places such as gathering/party, queues, transit etc. Most of the male population try to take advantage of the situation and reach out to women's private parts and sexually harass them.
- Verbal Harassment (making comments while passing by): Passing comments, abusing, making unpleasant remarks are another common incidents that women face in daily life. Such incidents can be seen anywhere and anytime.
- Staring: Continuous staring at your fellow female rider, shopper, and pedestrian is another incident that can be seen in public places. It makes women uncomfortable and make them feel unsafe.
- Following women riding motorbikes: If there is a female riding a motorbike, most likely there will be multiple males following her. Some try to assault her while driving (which is dangerous), some abuse, some make unpleasant statements, some follow her to the destination and change their daily route.
- Making rounds around the victim’s house: This is not seen very often in metro cities but is very common in small towns and villages. If there is a young girl or woman living in a house, it is most likely that guys start making rounds of her house, try to make friendship with the house owner, talk loud, whistle and many other things while passing through the house.
- Not giving proper space in auto, bus and trains: While riding in an auto, bus and train; if a female is looking for some space to sit, she is offered a very small area (even if there is proper space as per the count) and she has to adjust with it. This small offered space gives an opportunity to fellow riders to physically assault their newly joined female passenger.
Apart from rapes and group harassment activities, these are small incidents which make the daily life of women highly unsafe. Some women raise their voice against it and rest just go with it accepting it as their daily routine. Not every women can get a personal security, but punishing offenders, strict law enforcement will definitely make the life of women and everyone else much safe.
We also need to reform our education system/syllabus and include sexual (and ethical) education as mandatory courses throughout the academic schedule of a student. Kids don't get proper sexual education (neither from school nor from parents), and as a result they learn it with time from their friends and internet. With this learning process, they keep the information pleasing to them and ignore the rest.
At the end, we are still living in a male dominant/governed society. So whatever a male does, is right; even if it is related to women safety or sexual harassment. And we need to change this by changing ourself, society and system.
Domestic violence is a different issue and I haven't talked about it.
