As soon as the video of the “Rohtak sisters” beating up the boys, who were allegedly harassing them, went viral, the media went gaga without an investigation. The Haryana government also announced cash and bravery awards for the girls.
However the other version that has surfaced now seems to suggest that the two sisters are serial thrashers of boys and this particular issue was a fight over a bus seat that has been paraded as a fight back against eve teasing. Six female witnesses have come forward saying that the girls and not the boys were at fault.
Another video of the girls has surfaced where they are thrashing another boy, who is trying to defend himself. One of the girls claimed that more videos would come out since she has been harassed by 2000 boys and she has beaten up many of them. Though the Haryana government has now put the awards on hold, we are still in no position to judge the truth because at this point we do not know whom to believe. However both situations are possible.
This interesting twist in this case urges us Indians to have a more wholesome and objective outlook towards such issues. This also brings some other important issues to the fore, regarding the rights and safety of women in India and the rights of the other stakeholders in such cases, the men. Every right thinking man in India needs to support every protest against crimes against women in every possible forum. However one also needs to separate the genuine cases from the spurious ones.
As a society we are very quick to make heroes and villains out of people without a proper analysis of all the points of view and the available facts. The problem with the laws and especially their execution in our country is that many people who are suffering and really need them, often do not have the means or the courage to use them and they keep suffering, while these laws are often misused by the unscrupulous.
Take the misuse of the NREGA, the domestic gas cylinder and ration subsidies as examples. We all would have come across instances where fairly well off people take the benefit of these subsidies while the poor keep languishing in their poverty. The tax laws are such that the middle class pays through its nose while many extremely wealthy citizens in the business class escape the tax net and get away paying almost nothing.
When it comes to laws for the protection of women, the misuse of these laws critically impact the lives of the innocent men at the receiving end. The alleged eve teasers in the Rohtak case were on their way to join the army and may lose out on this career opportunity. In case the allegations against them are found to be false, who would compensate them?
The Supreme Court had observed that 498A, the anti-dowry law of the Indian Penal Code has been grossly misused by women to harass their husbands and in-laws and this has spoiled the lives of many men and emotionally and financially destroyed their families. Hence in its judgment this year, the apex court ruled that the police cannot automatically arrest an accused in a dowry case, before judicially examining it. This is a step in the right direction and has been hailed by women rights groups as well.
This does not mean that women are not suffering in the country. They are, and the numbers are worrying. The question we need to ask is, “Are our laws and enforcement agencies helping the right people and ensuring that innocents are not suffering because of these laws?” If this is not happening, then it beats the entire purpose of having these laws.
The heinous Nirbhaya and Badaun rape cases have shaken the collective conscience of the nation and everyone is up in arms against the oppression and crimes against women and rightly so. There can be no excuse to dowry harassment, domestic violence, eve teasing and rape and men and women together should speak up against these social evils and they are doing so.
However the incident in Rohtak brings into limelight certain other instances that could be lesser in number but are important nonetheless. What if a young girl with a misplaced sense of women rights, in an act of hyper activism, starts bashing a boy in a bus because they had an argument over seats and the girl claims that the boy was eve teasing? The society and the laws have to be capable of distinguishing these incidents and not victimize the boy in such cases.
This incident below happened with me in Kolkata, which underlines the desperation of immature hyper activism in our society that trivialize the importance of women issues.
I was travelling in a bus and the journey was around 2 hours long. I was not very well that day and was on cetirizine tablets which cause drowsiness. Hence sitting at a window seat I decided to have a nap and was fast asleep. In my sleep, my head would have rolled over towards the shoulder of a young girl sitting beside me.
Suddenly a man woke me up rudely and asked me what I was doing and accused me of harassing the girl. I said I was not well and hence dozed off. Another lady started shouting that they know all these excuses and I should be beaten up. They asked me to come out and they would show me what being ill meant. Understandably I was shocked and scared.
Thankfully, the girl turned out to be very polite and matured. She said that I was actually asleep and did not realize that my head was brushing against her shoulders and she does not think I did it deliberately. But for the nice lady, I could have been beaten up for eve teasing that day. I thanked her and heaved a sigh of relief after leaving the bus.
The point is that we need to speak against these things, but we also need to be matured and ethical enough while deciding as to what we are terming as “harassment” and “eve teasing”. If a man is teasing a woman, the woman needs to give it back (ensuring that she is safe) and others should not be mere onlookers.
However there could always be a bit of an argument over seats in a bus or a train. If a man speaks impolitely to a woman, the woman can fight back, the other passengers need to reprimand the man and try to moderate the situation. Similarly if a woman is unduly aggressive, others need to tone her down.
But these incidents should not be projected as harassment and eve teasing. Hyper active men and women should not start thrashing the man without knowing the facts of the matter.
Parents and teachers should teach the boys that women always need to be respected. That eve teasing or any kind of violence against women is not acceptable in any situation. Similarly girls also need to be taught that these are serious issues and how to protect themselves against crimes directed at them.
At the same time they need to be sensitized that they must never misuse the laws or the public opinion against these things for their benefit, because repeated acts of misuse dilute the gravity of these issues and slowly people might look with cynicism even at cases where women are rightly raising their voices.
I have seen incidents where people believe that a 498A dowry harassment case had been made in bad faith, while they were actually genuine cases. The reason is that so many girls have misused this law in the past few years. If it is proved that the Rohtak incident was not a case of eve teasing, real perpetrators of such crimes may go scot free in the future.
While we need to collectively speak against eve teasing and harassment of women in public places, we also need to ensure that innocent boys are not victimized. The aim should be for a society where women are respected and can move around freely without fear, where there is a high degree of equality and mutual respect between the two genders.
It also needs to be understood that most men also support women in this cause and right thinking men are important partners towards achieving this equality at a much larger scale across India. Hence the collective anger of the society regarding crimes against women and the laws against them should not be targeted at men who do not deserve to be at the wrong end of the stick.
However the other version that has surfaced now seems to suggest that the two sisters are serial thrashers of boys and this particular issue was a fight over a bus seat that has been paraded as a fight back against eve teasing. Six female witnesses have come forward saying that the girls and not the boys were at fault.
Another video of the girls has surfaced where they are thrashing another boy, who is trying to defend himself. One of the girls claimed that more videos would come out since she has been harassed by 2000 boys and she has beaten up many of them. Though the Haryana government has now put the awards on hold, we are still in no position to judge the truth because at this point we do not know whom to believe. However both situations are possible.
This interesting twist in this case urges us Indians to have a more wholesome and objective outlook towards such issues. This also brings some other important issues to the fore, regarding the rights and safety of women in India and the rights of the other stakeholders in such cases, the men. Every right thinking man in India needs to support every protest against crimes against women in every possible forum. However one also needs to separate the genuine cases from the spurious ones.
As a society we are very quick to make heroes and villains out of people without a proper analysis of all the points of view and the available facts. The problem with the laws and especially their execution in our country is that many people who are suffering and really need them, often do not have the means or the courage to use them and they keep suffering, while these laws are often misused by the unscrupulous.
Take the misuse of the NREGA, the domestic gas cylinder and ration subsidies as examples. We all would have come across instances where fairly well off people take the benefit of these subsidies while the poor keep languishing in their poverty. The tax laws are such that the middle class pays through its nose while many extremely wealthy citizens in the business class escape the tax net and get away paying almost nothing.
When it comes to laws for the protection of women, the misuse of these laws critically impact the lives of the innocent men at the receiving end. The alleged eve teasers in the Rohtak case were on their way to join the army and may lose out on this career opportunity. In case the allegations against them are found to be false, who would compensate them?
The Supreme Court had observed that 498A, the anti-dowry law of the Indian Penal Code has been grossly misused by women to harass their husbands and in-laws and this has spoiled the lives of many men and emotionally and financially destroyed their families. Hence in its judgment this year, the apex court ruled that the police cannot automatically arrest an accused in a dowry case, before judicially examining it. This is a step in the right direction and has been hailed by women rights groups as well.
This does not mean that women are not suffering in the country. They are, and the numbers are worrying. The question we need to ask is, “Are our laws and enforcement agencies helping the right people and ensuring that innocents are not suffering because of these laws?” If this is not happening, then it beats the entire purpose of having these laws.
The heinous Nirbhaya and Badaun rape cases have shaken the collective conscience of the nation and everyone is up in arms against the oppression and crimes against women and rightly so. There can be no excuse to dowry harassment, domestic violence, eve teasing and rape and men and women together should speak up against these social evils and they are doing so.
However the incident in Rohtak brings into limelight certain other instances that could be lesser in number but are important nonetheless. What if a young girl with a misplaced sense of women rights, in an act of hyper activism, starts bashing a boy in a bus because they had an argument over seats and the girl claims that the boy was eve teasing? The society and the laws have to be capable of distinguishing these incidents and not victimize the boy in such cases.
This incident below happened with me in Kolkata, which underlines the desperation of immature hyper activism in our society that trivialize the importance of women issues.
I was travelling in a bus and the journey was around 2 hours long. I was not very well that day and was on cetirizine tablets which cause drowsiness. Hence sitting at a window seat I decided to have a nap and was fast asleep. In my sleep, my head would have rolled over towards the shoulder of a young girl sitting beside me.
Suddenly a man woke me up rudely and asked me what I was doing and accused me of harassing the girl. I said I was not well and hence dozed off. Another lady started shouting that they know all these excuses and I should be beaten up. They asked me to come out and they would show me what being ill meant. Understandably I was shocked and scared.
Thankfully, the girl turned out to be very polite and matured. She said that I was actually asleep and did not realize that my head was brushing against her shoulders and she does not think I did it deliberately. But for the nice lady, I could have been beaten up for eve teasing that day. I thanked her and heaved a sigh of relief after leaving the bus.
The point is that we need to speak against these things, but we also need to be matured and ethical enough while deciding as to what we are terming as “harassment” and “eve teasing”. If a man is teasing a woman, the woman needs to give it back (ensuring that she is safe) and others should not be mere onlookers.
However there could always be a bit of an argument over seats in a bus or a train. If a man speaks impolitely to a woman, the woman can fight back, the other passengers need to reprimand the man and try to moderate the situation. Similarly if a woman is unduly aggressive, others need to tone her down.
But these incidents should not be projected as harassment and eve teasing. Hyper active men and women should not start thrashing the man without knowing the facts of the matter.
Parents and teachers should teach the boys that women always need to be respected. That eve teasing or any kind of violence against women is not acceptable in any situation. Similarly girls also need to be taught that these are serious issues and how to protect themselves against crimes directed at them.
At the same time they need to be sensitized that they must never misuse the laws or the public opinion against these things for their benefit, because repeated acts of misuse dilute the gravity of these issues and slowly people might look with cynicism even at cases where women are rightly raising their voices.
I have seen incidents where people believe that a 498A dowry harassment case had been made in bad faith, while they were actually genuine cases. The reason is that so many girls have misused this law in the past few years. If it is proved that the Rohtak incident was not a case of eve teasing, real perpetrators of such crimes may go scot free in the future.
While we need to collectively speak against eve teasing and harassment of women in public places, we also need to ensure that innocent boys are not victimized. The aim should be for a society where women are respected and can move around freely without fear, where there is a high degree of equality and mutual respect between the two genders.
It also needs to be understood that most men also support women in this cause and right thinking men are important partners towards achieving this equality at a much larger scale across India. Hence the collective anger of the society regarding crimes against women and the laws against them should not be targeted at men who do not deserve to be at the wrong end of the stick.
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