{"id":339526,"date":"2022-09-16T03:50:24","date_gmt":"2022-09-16T09:20:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tehelka.com\/?p=339526"},"modified":"2022-09-16T03:50:25","modified_gmt":"2022-09-16T09:20:25","slug":"bilkis-bano-time-to-hang-our-heads-in-shame","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/bilkis-bano-time-to-hang-our-heads-in-shame\/","title":{"rendered":"Bilkis Bano: Time to hang our heads in shame"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/p>\n

The hapless rape victim and her husband, children and relatives are living in fear and moving from\u00a0 place to place, whereas the convicted rapists-murderers\u00a0 are getting\u00a0 garlanded!<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

I\u2019m focusing on Bilkis Bano. And as details are fast emerging of fear gripping her entire\u00a0 clan, after the\u00a0 release of\u00a0 her\u00a0 rapists, a strange\u00a0 irony hits:\u00a0 This hapless rape victim and her husband and children and relatives are\u00a0 living in fear and moving from\u00a0 place to place, whereas\u00a0 the convicted rapists – murderers\u00a0 are getting\u00a0 garlanded by hard core outfits as though they have\u00a0 indulged\u00a0 in some\u00a0 heroic deed! Couldn\u2019t be a bigger irony hitting us!<\/p>\n

Isn\u2019t rape and killings and murders, heinous crimes? The core fact is Bilkis Bano has been terrorized by her tormentors –\u00a0 she was\u00a0 gang raped, her 3 year old daughter Sahela, who was then with her, was brutally killed by the rioters, seven of her relatives were also killed. To top it all, she and her family have been surviving in fear. In fact, her tormentors ought to be booked under any of the terror acts, because she has been terrorized all through, all these twenty years!<\/p>\n

Expand and broaden the very definition of terrorism and the very basic fact that emerges is that Bilkis Bano went through severe terrorizing onslaughts on her body, psyche and soul. She was gang-raped by these very men who have been set free, she also saw her little daughter getting brutally killed, and also the killings of her relatives.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s time to hang our heads in shame, for here is this woman who has suffered all these years and even now she and family are getting hounded, moving\u00a0 from one locale to the next, for safety, security, safe refuge and sheer survival! If the political who\u2019s who of the country are provided with security so why not this hapless citizen – Bilkis\u00a0 Bano and\u00a0 the surviving members of her family and clan.<\/p>\n

A connected reality<\/strong><\/p>\n

Isn\u2019t it time to document details to hundreds of women and their families who have been targeted and assaulted and threatened and attacked?\u00a0 Even today, the very word \u2018Gujarat\u2019 drags along images and details of the affected, either during the 2002 pogrom or even years after \u2026an ongoing trauma for the survivors. Many living in isolation, cut off and bruised to the extent that they have lost all hope. Their lives completely ruined and destroyed and their emotions trampled upon.<\/p>\n

In fact, the hapless women victims are too scared and petrified to even lodge complaints\/ FIRs against the Hindutva culprits as they are worried about the severe aftermath; of the political mafia taking revenge, making life hell for them! I have been hearing this dark reality from the women victims of the various communal carnages and onslaughts.<\/p>\n

During my visit to Ahmedabad in 2006, as I got interacting with the affected families, it got more than apparent that they was surviving amidst fear. And there seemed to be no respite for times to come. Many of the pogrom survivors were too terrified to return to their homes. Mothers spoke of their \u2018lost\u2019 children, not just in pogroms or encounters but in the aftermath. Muslim families put their children in far off hostels, or sent them to distant relatives, so that their children somehow survive\u2026Women spoke of the nothingness spread around them \u2013 they had lost just about everything!<\/p>\n

I’m reminded\u00a0 of what a well-known dancer-activist\u00a0 wrote in the backdrop of the then Gujarat situation: \u201c In\u00a0 Gujarat, people are so terrified that they are silent. They are to be made voiceless. How does it matter how rich you are if you are voiceless!”<\/p>\n

To this day, there\u2019s been no closure to the maddening communal killings and rapes and anarchy of 2002! How can there be, if survivor-victims sit all too marginalised?<\/p>\n

The fact that these eleven rapists and killers have been set free speaks volumes of our decaying system, of the breakdown of the basic norms and values, of the hollowness of the political speeches of the rulers of the day.<\/p>\n

Yet we, the mute spectators, sit all too quiet!\u00a0 Why?<\/p>\n

******<\/p>\n

Another connected reality<\/strong><\/p>\n

Read these latest officially released figures related to rape and crime against women in the country. And after one has gone through these facts and figures, can one stop oneself from raising question after\u00a0 question on the release of the rapists of\u00a0 Bilkis Bano!<\/p>\n

To quote from news reports: India registered 31,677 cases of rape in 2021. That is, an average of 86 daily, while nearly 49 cases of crime against women were lodged every single hour, according to the latest government report on crimes in the country.<\/p>\n

Among states, Rajasthan (6,337) was on top of the list followed by Madhya Pradesh (2,947), Maharashtra (2,496) and Uttar Pradesh (2,845), while Delhi recorded 1,250 rape cases in 2021.<\/p>\n

The rate of crime (per lakh population) for rape was highest in Rajasthan (16.4) followed by Chandigarh (13.3), Delhi (12.9), Haryana (12.3) and Arunachal Pradesh (11.1). The all-India average rate stood at 4.8, according to the NCRB.<\/p>\n

Overall, 4,28,278 cases of \u00a0‘crimes against women’ were lodged across the country in 2021, with a rate of crime (per one lakh population) at 64.5. The charge-sheeting rate in such offences was 77.1, the official data showed.<\/p>\n

In 2021, the maximum cases of crimes against women were lodged in Uttar Pradesh (56,083) followed by Rajasthan (40,738), Maharashtra (39,526), West Bengal (35,884) and Odisha 31,352, the NCRB showed.<\/p>\n

However, in terms of rate of crime against women, Assam (168.3) was on the top of the list for 2021, followed by Delhi (147), Odisha (137), Haryana (119.7) and Telangana (111.2).<\/p>\n

*****<\/p>\n

Gujarat pogrom had brought along intense verse \u2026Bureaucrat-poet J. P. Das wrote in 2002 \u2014 After Gujarat:<\/p>\n

\u2018After Gujarat<\/p>\n

will there be\u00a0 poetry?<\/p>\n

Could poets write<\/p>\n

after Alexandria\u00a0 was\u00a0 razed ?<\/p>\n

After Auschwitz<\/p>\n

Hiroshima and Vietnam<\/p>\n

after the Emergency<\/p>\n

after Babri Masjid<\/p>\n

9\/11 and Iraq?\u2026Poetry cannot be banished<\/p>\n

It returns at will<\/p>\n

to Plato’s Republic<\/p>\n

to Stalin’s Siberia<\/p>\n

to Pokhran and Kalahandi<\/p>\n

following in the footprints<\/p>\n

of violence<\/p>\n

as it chronicles<\/p>\n

the descent of man<\/p>\n

As with history, to poetry<\/p>\n

there is no end \u2026<\/p>\n

Poetry will be written<\/p>\n

despite fatwas and bans<\/p>\n

Poetry will defy the Gulag<\/p>\n

it will ignore the censor’s blue pencil<\/p>\n

and the fundamentalist ‘s frown<\/p>\n

poetry will be written<\/p>\n

even as books<\/p>\n

are being burnt\u00a0 \u2026After\u00a0 Gujarat<\/p>\n

poetry will be written<\/p>\n

About Gujarat itself<\/p>\n

beginning with<\/p>\n

the shame of Ayodhya<\/p>\n

and following the bloody trail<\/p>\n

to Godhra, to Gujarat<\/p>\n

and on to Mumbai\u00a0\u00a0 \u2026When\u00a0 Babri\u00a0 rises<\/p>\n

poetry will affirm<\/p>\n

that temples are made<\/p>\n

not with blood-scribed bricks<\/p>\n

or stones carved in hate<\/p>\n

that they, like poetry<\/p>\n

are founded on<\/p>\n

imagination and faith<\/p>\n

in the hearts of\u00a0 men.\u2019<\/p>\n

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The hapless rape victim and her husband, children and relatives are living in fear and moving from\u00a0 place to place, whereas the convicted rapists-murderers\u00a0 are getting\u00a0 garlanded! I\u2019m focusing on Bilkis Bano. And as details are fast emerging of fear gripping her entire\u00a0 clan, after the\u00a0 release of\u00a0 her\u00a0 rapists, a strange\u00a0 irony hits:\u00a0 This […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":339527,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[23,2205],"tags":[11309,4760],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/339526"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=339526"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/339526\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":339528,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/339526\/revisions\/339528"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/media\/339527"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=339526"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=339526"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=339526"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}