[Reader-list] (Fwd) Rape As An Instrument Of Politics By Vidya Bhushan Rawat

[Venugopalan K M]

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Rape As An Instrument Of Politics

By Vidya Bhushan Rawat

22 July, 2009
Countercurrents.org

UP Congress is on a high these days. After Congress Chief Rita
Bahuguna’s infamous words on rape, the debate started that chief
minister Mayawati said the same things to the then chief minister Mr
Mulayam Singh Yadav after she visited the Maderasa in Allahabad where
some Muslim women’s were raped. Why were the channels running it for
the whole day. Was it an effort to douse the flames created by the
brahmanical sophistry? Is it just a slip of tongue or the very
psychology of our political class which use victim as a tool to score
a political point?

Well, if you have seen some surveys on these channels, then a majority
of Indians have send roses to Rita Bahuguna. I think this is there way
of doing Gandhigiri on channels and feeling happy that ‘some one’ had
the guts to take their ‘cause’. Justifications are there that Ms
Bahuguna meant something else but if you see the whole social history
and later on the post independent India’s socio-political climate,
then one should not wonder that word rape has become a political
instrument and the person who is victimized is tortured more by our
actions and deeds.

And I call it mindset of a pervert society. A society which is full of
fear from openness and which shows its strength through masculinity.
Is not it strange that the victim of rape violence is asked to cover
her face and live in indignity and hide while the perpetrators roam
around with shouting slogans and taking shelter under various taboos.
And this is what I call brahmanical mind beautifully exposed by Dr
Mulk Raj Anand in his epic novel ‘Untouchable’, as how a priest of
temple try to allure a girl Gulabo who is a sweeper in the temple to
enter into the sanctum-sanctorum of the temple where she is normally
prohibited to enter and then try to molest her. As soon as the girl
retaliates and condemn him, the Brahmin priest shouts ‘polluted...
polluted... blaming the girl for polluting the temple by entering into
its sanctum-sanctorum.

The responses of both the UP government and the rival political party
are according to their power base. But the way the whole script is
being played showed that the even the women politicians play the
script largely written according to the code of Manu Dharm Shastra, a
code which degraded them and made them an object of ‘pleasure’.

No one knows the plight of those women who become victims and in whose
name these political dramas are enacted. The script changes and
politicians takes over and make it like a Bollywood scene where the
aim of the director is not to really show injustice but to give more
‘material’ to our bruised and unsatisfied male egos, something to
watch.

Our responses have been crude and humiliating and when this rhetoric
comes from women then it become more painful. So, it is a country
where the laws are made in such a way where the victim is more
victimized and those who do it walk with their head high.

Just as section 377 was set aside by Delhi High Court, many of the
activists, including those claiming to work for social justice, felt
that by allowing the homosexual to do things according to their
choices would amount to breaking of our social relations and that we
are a society based society and individuals do not matter.

Why individual should do not matter? How can a society be developed by
killing an individual. Dr Ambedkar said about Indian society: ‘The
Indian society does not consist of individuals. It consists of
innumerable collections of castes, which are exclusive in their life
and have no common experience to share and have no bond of sympathy.
Given this fact, it is not necessary to argue the point. The existence
of caste system is a standing denial of the existence of those ideals
of society and of democracy.”

Once we understand this feeling of Dr Baba Saheb Ambedkar, we can
easily analyse the root cause of our structural problems influenced by
the brahmanical social order where for different set of rules and
punishment meant for different communities. Therefore a rape committed
by a Brahmin would definitely not attract the same punishment as done
by some other community.

The atrocious laws and social taboos in our societies have turned
against individuals and those who challenge to live according to their
own life style face the brutality by the society. One should not
therefore be amused about our whole marriage system and how it is an
event to ‘celebrate’ and show your ‘strength’ and ‘power’ in the
village rather than being an entirely private event of a few. And
there are communities and traditions when you celebrate the first
night ‘victory’. Also, communities have their way defined how to find
the next morning whether the girl was a virgin or not.

It is therefore not ironical that during a mass marriage ceremony in
Madhya Pradesh that the doctors were called to testify the girls after
two of them developed labor pain. Now, mass marriage customs are very
popular in India as it gives the political parties a license to become
the custodians of the community. But as my friend Joane Payton
referred why marriage can not be a private affair. Why should the
state promote dowry by promoting such practices. There are number of
other things as pointed out by some people that some marriages were
just replayed to extract the paltry Rs 5,000/-. In fact a former
Madhya Pradesh minister once said that people lodge false cases of
rapes for compensations.

Now, that is the problem with the political parties. They link women’s
dignity with compensation. At the same point of time we will have to
understand how a woman has to face this violence in our society.
Hence, she lives a life of miseries and there are no efforts by the
family to revive her. That is why most of the people do not even want
to let the incident out in open and file a case in the police. They
know that if the ‘truth’ is out the girl would not be able to marry.
And hence in many cases the women themselves refuse to accept the
charges.

Of course, when rape becomes a male chauvinist debate among different
constituent then it is shameful. Rather then condemning the act, we
the launch counter offensive about why it was not done with others.
Rita Bahuguna’s shameful tongue was the same brahmanical wisdom of
challenging another woman. May be she wanted to look more sympathizer
then Mayawati. Perhaps, she should remember Khairlanji which happened
a few years back in Maharastra.

Rape will always be a powerful weapon in the armed struggles, communal
disturbances, social upheavals as long as women’s virginity and purity
are the ‘honor’ in our society. As long as we consider them as a
matter of our ‘ijjat’, it will be used as a tool to dishonor them.
Whether some boy picks up quarrel with another one in the village, it
is the sister who has to face the consequences. The villagers will
moan, communities will fight but the girl would be destined to live a
life in isolation and misery. She can not come out hence even if she
receive hefty compensation, unless our families are properly counseled
no rehabilitation can take place and the money would go to the parents
who would then find out a person for her and she would be tied for
marriages but the stigma of being raped would also be there. There are
very few cases where the girl would live a life of honor as she will
not be accepted by the larger society.

The Supreme Court gave a historic verdict today after hearing a very
passionate petition of an orphan girl who was raped by a warden in the
Nari Niketan in Chandigarh. This girl is mentally challenged with an
age of 19-20 years of age with an IQ of 9 year old. She became
pregnant and she does not want to terminate her pregnancy now. It said
that the girl has a right to keep her baby. Let us not go into what is
right and wrong. Important point is that this girl’s desire to live
her life with dignity must be appreciated.

The problem is many times, to save them from an adverse verdict, the
lawyers advice the alleged rapist to ‘marry’ the girl and withdraw
charges of rape. Law has never been reformative and any person who is
different from others, find it difficult to get a good lawyer to
present her case. How can the court grant permission to alleged rapist
to marry the girl. It is because of the social taboos. Fact is that
India may not be officially a Hindu Rastra but the laws of Manu are
very powerful in our society and they prevail over a secular
constitution.

Ofcourse, Manu’s Islamic cousins are not left behind. There are
hundreds of Imranas and Mukhtar Mais who face these indignities. And
what does Panchayats do, which many of our friends appreciate so much
in the name of ‘golden’ culture? These Panchayat do not listen to the
victim. They victimize them further. Imrana was asked to marry her
‘rapist’ father in law and call her husband as son while Mukhtar Mai
was ordered rape by the ‘Jirga’in Pakistan. One need courage and
patience of a Mukhtar Mai to face the law which is against her at
every step. Therefore most of the women live in indignities as the
psychology of rape is just not to kill the girl but to make her
virtually a living dead where you are killed many time every time when
people pour you with different questions and discuss about your fate.
It also creates a psychology of indignity and guilt around her and her
family. Laws have never been useful at all and politicians more
dangerous than ever. One can find how many time they went to help
Imrana. A typical response would be ‘either it is a community matter
or ‘we have not read about it or heard it’.

The only answer against such heinous crime is to fight against it and
not feel guilty and humiliated. And one woman who challenged it and
became an icon was Phoolan Devi. Educated upper castes called her
‘dacoit’, but none ever came forward to encourage her live a life of
dignity after she was raped and molested by the Thakurs in rural
Kanpur Dehat region. She did not accept the defeat. She did not lead a
life in miseries. She decided to avenge it. Many people might not
justify what she did and none can justify those violent acts yet
Phoolan revolt against the brahmanical system is an example that
rather then feeling shame of their misdeeds, it is time to pay back
with interest. She did not ask for any brutality or rape. She denied
being part of any murder of people in Behmai yet she lived like queen.
Whether you call it larger then life image or not, but Phoolan never
believed in submitting herself to the fancies of these upper caste
thugs. She became a legend in her life time who lived life with
dignity and self respect.

But her legendary status was used by political class for their own
reasons. She was converted into a docile homely woman who is very
caring and very epitome of ‘Bhartiya naari’ i.e. Indian womanhood. She
would tie Rakhi to many of these politicians who became her brothers
and used her for political purposes. She got married and entered to
parliament. Her status was used by the ambitious political class. A
strong woman who fought against brahmanical patriarchy was therefore
merged in it by the corrupt political class.

Politicians will thrive. The victim and their families will live life
of marginalization. For a few days the media will make big stories and
politicians know it well. Nothing will happen to them. Their
‘pativrata’ wives will not come for the rescue of bartered woman. They
will stand by their corrupt husbands and relatives. That is what
brahmanical value system tells us that nothing is bigger than blood
relations…’ jis desh jaati main janm liya balidan usee per ho jawaen,
which means you must sacrifice your self for your region and caste and
defend it at any cost. At the end of the day even if we get out of the
political debate of Rita Bahuguna and Mayawati, it is important who is
good or bad, just find out who are the people facing charges of rapes
in various jails of the country. Who are the victims? May be Rita
Bahuguna can find the answer. Many of the shudra critique of Bahujan
theory suggest that the violence perpetrated on Dalits are done by the
shudras. They ignore the fact that Manusmriti was not made by the
shudras. They forget that brahmanical violence may not be physical but
more institutional and through knowledge. Rita Bahuguna has added
Joshi in her status and her only quality to become president of
Uttar-Pradesh Congress was her being a Brahmin. Just by having a Dalit
cook at house does not resolve the crisis as she said. What she said
was not an outburst but a continuous assumption of our patriarchical
political thought that does not want to address the root cause but use
the incident for political purposes. A counter social cultural
revolution of Dalits-bahujan is the only alternative to brahmanical
polity of India in which women are inherent partner in the movement
otherwise, rape and molestation of women will always be a tool to not
only spread terror among the marginalized sections of society but also
used by the very exploiters who use it as a political weapon.
Unfortunately, it is the bankruptcy of our political parties that they
think to revive their political fortune on an incident which is a
shame and need a sensitive approach to deal with.

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