Enough has already been said....

As someone who is normal, trust me, I share all the emotions that each one of you has for everything that has marked our existence in the last 15 days. I am someone who has led a city life- to be precise, I have led the Delhi life. I have been to college in this city and having traveled in the public transport I know how it feels when someone touches you without your permission! I am active on social media hence I have read each and every post that has circulated in this regard. I am a mother, so I relate to the pain of the girl's mother who saw her baby suffer for days. I am a woman whose husband once slapped someone in the middle of the market when she raised an alarm that a guy was trying to 'act' smart, whose brother literally wraps her between his arms when we are making our way into a crowded cinema hall, whose father bought her a car when a Blue Line bus driver almost killed her one afternoon.

But in a way I am not all that normal too. I have a set of family living in the smaller towns and even rural part of our country. When I witness the anger, anguish and apparent practicality of my FB or twitter contacts, there is only one thought that makes me NOT believe in the urgency with which the myriad solutions are being provided. Because I have interacted with 'Indians' who belong to 'the other India', I know that these solutions are not easy to come by. They aren't long term. They are so NOT the solutions!

Respecting a woman is not one of the things that are part of a normal Mother-child curriculum in these parts of our country. Boys learn about the women, by observing how their fathers treat them. They have better things in the world to worry about- like how will they go to school everyday or how will they pass the exams. They have things like- how to kill time when there is no electricity for 12 hours- to worry about. I can imagine that if today I sit down with some cousins and uncles who are still in my native place, they will say- "Hua to bahut bura par raat ko ladke ke saath bahar jaayegi, to aur kya hoga uske saath?". Its not that they are insensitive. They are just conditioned to equate a woman's freedom with her being "loose" or "prone to disaster". And they are not even wrong. For years they have protected their women from other men! Hence all the notions of a "proper" time to come back home and "proper" way to dress were developed.

That is why I say that by putting up possible ideas on twitter or blogs or FB, will not give you the REAL solution. You know what will? Going to the root of this mentality which still exists in those parts of our country where you have not yet been. Reaching out to the "majority" of India and curtailing these thoughts from where the seeds are sown. Not assuming that rapes do not happen in richer societies but definitely the brutality or shamelessness of even assuming that a girl who is alone is definitely "open" for your trespass- starts in these pockets! Those cousins of mine and their friends, will never ever get to read how you think women are not objects or are stronger. Yes, if your insistence makes the rape law strict, they will get capital punishment when they commit this crime, but its the solution of the AFTER. Figure out a way to prevent the BEFORE. 

Be angry- but channelize it to where it is required. Heard enough about how you FEEL, time to tell everyone how you can CHANGE THINGS! Because the former is mere convenient, its the latter that will uplift us as a nation.....