Preventing Sexual Harassment in India – What all can we do?

Gang rape of a Delhi university medical student in south Delhi has rightfully outraged the whole nation. Every upright citizen is asking for justice – quick justice. Every activist, every journalist, every celebrity, every twitterctual and every female legislator in the parliament (wonder where male legislators were…) is asking for quick justice. I can fully understand that the issue at hand is very emotional and thus people are justifiably angry and want rapists to be publicly hanged at four-way crossing. That instant justice might give all of us a quick satisfaction and closure but it will not provide the long-term sustainable solution that is needed to protect the dignity of our women and citizens at large. It will be a short-term band-aid for a deep-rooted problem. It will bring the rapists, the monsters in human's clothing, to instant justice but that is all it will be. It will be soon forgotten and life for the women of India will be same – devoid of security, honor and dignity.

A large section of society is clamoring for new and stricter laws. I personally don't believe that we need any new laws. What we desperately need is the strict implementation of existing laws. Criminals in our country are not committing crimes due to lack of laws. They are committing crimes because they know that they can get away with these crimes by "managing" the system. It is the "management' of system that needs to be eradicated. If existing laws were strictly implemented per the book, many such crimes would be prevented.

In my humble opinion, here is what ought to be done to streamline the implementation of existing laws that shall provide the sense of security to our women and citizens at large:

Sexual Harassment Prevention Police Units

Each municipal locality needs to have police units exclusively focused on sexual harassment prevention. These police units need to be totally separated from other day-to-day policing work. Sexual harassment victims need to be able to reach these units 24x7 via a phone call. Many have suggested phone systems like 999, 911 et al. Again, it is a matter of implementation. Today we already have "Call 100 for Police, Fire" but how efficient is. We need to make sure these systems actually work and are used effectively. Each call to the unit has to be recorded for evidence purposes. Each call has to be treated as SOS call and help needs to be dispatched and delivered to the victims on a priority basis. Each complaint has to be registered instantly without any red tape.

Sexual Harassment Prevention Legal Cells

Once the sexual harassment complaint has been filed; case needs to be investigated on a priority basis in a time-bound (60-90 days) fashion. Even though the accused has rights to "due process", these cases cannot linger on for ages. It is these delays in delivery of justice that encourages criminals. We need to dramatically cut short the delivery time so that bad guys are taken off the streets and put away for long times. Crimes like rape are already non-bailable offences and should stay that way. Such criminals cannot roam free on streets while their cases are trudging along in our legal world.

Organizational Reporting

Both Sexual Harassment Prevention Units and Sexual Harassment Prevention Legal Cells need to reside in one department (Department of Citizen's Dignity), which organizationally reports directly to local DC. There should be no red-tape and sixteen levels of hierarchy that victims have to walk through. DCs should be the person responsible for ensuring that these two departments are working efficiently and honestly. DCs should be held responsible for the performance of these departments. Their compensation needs to be tied to their performance. No more automatic annual increment and dearness allowance. Like all of us, they need to earn their pay check.

Online Reporting

All Sexual Harassment Prevention Units and Sexual Harassment Prevention Legal Cells need to be electronically connected. All the data (complaints, periodic status of each complaint, weekly dashboard reporting etc.) need to be made available online for general public. Once performance of each unit is available online for all to see, there will be social pressure on these units to perform.

National Sex-Offender Registry

After an accused is actually convicted of sexual offence, his/her name ought to be registered in the National Sex-Offender Registry. This registry has to be available online for public viewing. This registry will serve two purposes: (a) help shame these sex-offenders publicly and (b) help employers to screen potential employees. Large posters with pictures of these sex-offenders should be pasted in their respective local post offices. This public shaming of the accused can work as a deterrent.

Lastly

In addition to streamlining the implementation of existing laws, we as a society also need to look within and see what is creating these monsters in the first place. I believe that even though it is primarily a policing and governance issue, there is definitely a societal component there as well. Societies, where thousands of rapes occur in a month, cannot just blame everything on the policing and legal system. Families, particularly parents, need to take responsibility as well and think about how they are rearing their children and what kind of citizens they are providing to the nation. Crime rates in any society are always related to the prevailing social environment. We all need to take a step back and see what kind of societies we are creating and what kind of social environment we are providing to our children and future generations. Societies where "Chikni Chameli", "Munni Badnam Huee", "Sheila Ki Jawani" are topping the music charts need to go for a deep introspection and see where we are headed. I am not in any way condoning or justifying the rapes. These rapists are inhuman beasts and should be taken off the streets right away and kept away for long long time. There is absolutely no justification for any rape or sexual harassment. But we cannot just blame the government system. We need to do our part too.

9/14 – We Shall Never Forget

9/14 – We Shall Never Forget

Long before 9/11, there was 9/14.

Long before 26/11, there was 9/14.

Long before 7/11, there was 9/14.

Yes 9/14 in the fall of 1989 - the day when first shot of Kashmiri Hindus’ ethnic cleansing was fired in the vale of Kashmir. Kashmiri Hindu, the minority community in Kashmir, lost its tallest leader Pt. Tika Lal Taploo to the bullets of Islamic terrorists that fateful day. Pt. Taploo was not killed because he was a political leader. He was not killed because he was BJP’s Vice-President in Kashmir. He was killed because he was a proud Indian to the core - proud of his ancestry, proud of his service to the nation and most importantly proud of his nationalism. He was brutally killed in broad daylight because he was a Hindu and a spanner in the wheels of Islamic terrorism whose only agenda was establishing Nizam-e-Mustafa in Kashmir.

23 years ago to this day, Islamic terrorists openly declared their agenda of Kashmiri Hindus’ ethnic cleansing. It started with Late Pt. Tika Lal Taploo but didn’t end there. The selective and targeted brutal killings of Hindu minority folks continued for months on. Barbaric killers were on the rampage. No one was spared. Young, old, men, women, children – all were targeted and killed. Women folk were raped before killing them. One of the innocent martyrs was first raped and then cut into two pieces using a carpenter’s saw. Some were hung from the trees with eyes gouged out. Some were dumped in the river Vitasta, also known as Jhelum. The brutal nature of these killings vividly displayed the bestiality of these terrorists. There can be no two opinions about the motives behind these horrific killings. It was simply to create a fear psychosis in the minds of minority community so that they would run for their lives and leave Kashmir exclusively to Islamists. And leave they did. After months of ethnic cleansing, this forsaken community was finally hounded out of its homeland in 1990.

Half a million Kashmiri Hindus left their homes and hearths back in the valley and literally ran for their lives. Families after families boarded whatever transportation they could get and overnight left the valley. Majority of these half-million refugees left in the middle of dark nights with just the pair of clothes that they had on – leaving behind their roots, heritage and ancestry. All they could and did carry with them was their honor and self-respect. After India’s partition in 1947, this has been the largest involuntary displacement of people in India.

Today, while we observe this day of 14^th September as Martyrs day and pay our homage to all those innocent souls who were brutally killed by Islamic terrorists, we also pledge that one day we will be back in our homeland, with our heads held high and honor in tact. We will reverse our exodus but only at our own terms and at a time of our choosing. That will be our most appropriate homage to our martyrs.

It has been 23 long years since this community is in-exile but its spirits have not died down. In spite of horrendous living conditions in refugee camps in Jammu and elsewhere, this community has survived and survived successfully. Along with its honor and self-respect, one additional key thing this community carried with itself was the education. This community would sleep hungry but will never compromise on education of its young ones. And it was this education that served it well during its toughest last two decades. All these refugee families, even when 8-10 people lived in one-room tenements, always kept education as their top priority.

Today, after 23 long years in-exile, its youngest generation is making waves in all spheres of life. They have succeeded in whatever field they have gone into. Be that media, IT, business, medicine, scientific research, hospitality, they have succeeded in all. They have made their parents, who all started their lives from scratch 23 years ago, very very proud. But being professionally successful has not dampened their resolve to reclaim their homeland. Homeland will be reclaimed and reclaimed in such a manner that there will not be another exodus and another ethnic cleansing of this community again ever. It might take time but it will happen.

If not today, definitely tomorrow!

Role of the Media on 26/11

Supreme Court of India today (August 29, 2012) delivered its verdict in case:

CRIMINAL APPEAL NOS.1899-1900 OF 2011
MOHAMMED AJMAL MOHAMMAD AMIR KASAB @ ABU MUJAHID … APPELLANT
VERSUS STATE OF MAHARASHTRA … RESPONDENT

WITH CRIMINAL APPEAL NO.1961 OF 2011
STATE OF MAHARASHTRA … APPELLANT VERSUS FAHIM HARSHAD MOHAMMAD YUSUF ANSARI & ANOTHER … RESPONDENTS

AND TRANSFER PETITION (CRIMINAL) NO.30 OF 2012
RADHAKANT YADAV… PETITIONER VERSUS UNION OF INDIA & OTHERS… RESPONDENTS

Here is an unedited (emphasis is mine) excerpt from the verdict that specifically deals with role of the media during 26/11 Mumbai attacks:

* Start of the excerpt

AN OBITER:
Role of the media:

402. Before parting with the transcripts, we feel compelled to say a few words about the way the terrorist attacks on Taj Hotel, Hotel Oberoi and Nariman House were covered by the mainstream, electronic media and shown live on the TV screen. From the transcripts, especially those from Taj Hotel and Nariman House, it is evident that the terrorists who were entrenched at those places and more than them, their collaborators across the border were watching the full show on TV. In the transcripts there are many references to the media reports and the visuals being shown on the TV screen. The collaborators sitting in their hideouts across the border came to know about the appellant being caught alive from Indian TV: they came to know about the killing of high ranking police officers also from Indian TV. At one place in the transcript, the collaborators and the terrorists appear to be making fun of the speculative report in the media that the person whose dead body was found in Kuber was the leader of the terrorist group whom his colleagues had killed for some reason before leaving the boat⁵⁶. At another place in the transcript the collaborators tell the terrorists in Taj Hotel that the dome at the top (of the building) had caught fire. The terrorists holed up in some room were not aware of this. The collaborators further advise the terrorists that the stronger they make the fire the better it would be for them⁵⁷. At yet another place the terrorists at Hotel Taj tell the collaborators that they had thrown a grenade. The Collaborators reply, “the sound of the grenade has come, they have shown the grenade, the explosion has taken place, people are wounded”⁵⁸. At yet another place the collaborators tell the terrorists at Hotel Oberoi that the troops were making their position very strong on

⁵⁶ Nariman House, Talk No. 26 (Ext. no. 990) ⁵⁷ Hotel Taj, Talk No. 4 (Ext. no. 971) ⁵⁸ Hotel Taj, Talk No. 8 (Ext. No. 972)

the roof of the building⁵⁹. At yet another place the collaborators tell the terrorists at Taj Hotel the exact position taken by the policemen (close to a building that belonged to the navy but was given to the civilians) and from where they were taking aim and firing at them (the terrorists) and advised them the best position for them to hit back at those policemen.⁶⁰ There are countless such instances to show that the collaborators were watching practically every movement of the security forces that were trying to tackle the terrorists under relentless gun fire and throwing of grenades from their end.

403. Apart from the transcripts, we can take judicial notice of the fact that the terrorists attacks at all the places, in the goriest details, were shown live on the Indian TV from beginning to end almost non-stop. All the channels were competing with each other in showing the latest developments on a minute to minute basis, including the positions and the movements of the security forces engaged in flushing out the terrorists. The reckless coverage of the terrorist attack by the channels thus gave rise to a situation where on the one hand the terrorists were completely hidden from the security forces and they had no means to know their exact position or even the kind of firearms and explosives they possessed and on the other hand the positions of the security forces, their weapons and all their operational movements were being watched by the collaborators across the border

on TV screens and being communicated to the terrorists.

⁵⁹ Hotel Oberoi, Talk No. 4 (Ext. no. 979) ⁶⁰ Hotel Taj, Talk No. 3 (Ext. No. 970)

404. In these appeals, it is not possible to find out whether the security forces actually suffered any casualty or injuries on account of the way their operations were being displayed on the TV screen. But it is beyond doubt that the way their operations were freely shown made the task of the security forces not only exceedingly difficult but also dangerous and risky.

405. Any attempt to justify the conduct of the TV channels by citing the right to freedom of speech and expression would be totally wrong and unacceptable in such a situation. The freedom of expression, like all other freedoms under Article 19, is subject to reasonable restrictions. An action tending to violate another person’s right to life guaranteed under Article 21 or putting the national security in jeopardy can never be justified by taking the plea of freedom of speech and expression.

406. The shots and visuals that were shown live by the TV channels could have also been shown after all the terrorists were neutralized and the security operations were over. But, in that case the TV programmes would not have had the same shrill, scintillating and chilling effect and would not have shot up the TRP ratings of the channels. It must, therefore, be held that by covering live the terrorists attack on Mumbai in the way it was done, the Indian TV channels were not serving any national interest or social cause. On the contrary they were acting in their own commercial interests putting the national security in jeopardy.

407. It is in such extreme cases that the credibility of an institution is tested. The coverage of the Mumbai terror attack by the mainstream electronic media has done much harm to the argument that any regulatory mechanism for the media must only come from within.

* End of the excerpt

Complete Supreme Court verdict is available at: Supreme Court Verdict - August 29, 2012

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