Category Archives: Genders

Genders, Law, Metropolis, Violence/Conflict

We must resist the cunning of judicial reform: Pratiksha Baxi

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Guest Post by PRATIKSHA BAXI

The death of the 23 year old woman following the brutal gangrape rape and assault on a moving bus on 16 December 2012 at a hospital in Singapore early this morning leaves all of us in states of deep mourning. This is a political death. Rape and murder of women is political violence against all women, whether or not, the political class recognises and accepts this. In the course of the last two weeks, many body blows have been endured. We felt a body blow after the political death of the 17-year-old gangrape victim in Patiala who took her life after she was humiliated and pressurised to compromise. The numbing list of such political violence continues.

We have seen the emergence of many kinds of publics. There have been many speeches and writing against the emergence of a retributive public, where the cry for death penalty or castration became a vocabulary of protest, also especially since the media initially focussed largely on this demand. Yet in the last few days there has been a perceptible shift from the focus on forming a retributive public moving towards a passionately reasoned and informed public on what the government needs to do to be accountable to rape survivors, and indeed, to all of us who reject the rape cultures in India.
Continue reading We must resist the cunning of judicial reform: Pratiksha Baxi →

Genders, Language, Media politics, Movements, Violence/Conflict

For Anonymous: Nilanjana Roy

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Guest post by NILANJANA ROY

Photo: Ruchir Joshi
Photo: Ruchir Joshi

That girl, the one without the name. The one just like us. The one whose battered body stood for all the anonymous women in this country whose rapes and deaths are a footnote in the left-hand column of the newspaper.

Sometimes, when we talk about the history of women in India, we speak in shorthand. The Mathura rape case. The Vishaka guidelines. The Bhanwari Devi case, the Suryanelli affair, the Soni Sori allegations, the business at Kunan Pushpora. Each of these, the names of women and places, mapping a geography of pain; unspeakable damage inflicted on women’s bodies, on the map of India, where you can, if you want, create a constantly updating map of violence against women. Continue reading For Anonymous: Nilanjana Roy →

Genders, Movements

Hope

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Some images from Jantar Mantar today.

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Genders, Metropolis, Movements

Remembering the 23 Year Old Who Brought Delhi Together

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Sucheta Dey (AISA) and Kavita Krishnan (AIPWA) just before they spoke at the condolence meeting
Sucheta Dey (AISA) and Kavita Krishnan (AIPWA) just before they spoke at the condolence meeting

This morning, Delhi woke up to the news that the 23 year old Paramedic that the city had taken to its heart had breathed her last at around two in the morning at the Mount Elizabeth Hospital in Singapore. From early morning, sms messages, phone calls and facebook and twitter posts and updates, informed the city about a condolence meeting scheduled for 11 am in the morning at Jantar Mantar. I was there by 11, and realized that a lot of people were having problems getting there because a shameless administration had decided to shut down entry and exits on to reportedly ten stations of the Delhi Metro. Buses were also being diverted. Despite this, a sizable crowd had gathered by around noon. Two minutes silence was observed. Sucheta Dey (AISA, JNU) and Kavita Krishnan (AIPWA) spoke briefly.

Both emphasized the need for a peaceful, dignified gathering to pay respects to the brave fighting spirit of the deceased woman. Kavita Krishnan spoke about the need to combat patriarchy everywhere, in the family, at home, in the workplace, in colleges, schools and universitities. And called for an to end the culture of impunity that lets men think that they can get away with rape and sexual violence. Continue reading Remembering the 23 Year Old Who Brought Delhi Together →

Genders, Politics

Dear Abhijit babu – The Society of Painted and Dented Ladies responds

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Rajyasree Sen in Firstpost:

Dear Shri Abhijit Mukherjee,

I am writing to you in my capacity of  General Secretary of the Society of Painted and Dented Ladies of India. First of all, I would like to state that I was most touched that you have noticed our presence in your midst. For long, we the Painted and Dented Ladies have suffered on the fringes of society, waiting to be recognised – especially by the likes of political luminaries such as you. This honour from a sitting MP, has given me inestimable joy. Not to forget that you are our venerable president, Pranab Mukherjee’s very own son. I stand up in respect, sir.

Read the rest of this article here.

Genders, Movements, Politics

Men against Sexual Violence, Men for Gender Justice

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Statement by Men for Gender Justice, Bangalore

Public Protest on December 30th


Men against Sexual Violence, Men for Gender Justice

As men, we are ashamed over the continuing domination of men over women!!

Women and men are Equal. Men should understand and accept this!!

Men should become responsible, humane and non-violent!!

As protesters are pouring into the streets all across the country and demanding justice for the recent brutal gang-rape of a 23 year old woman in Delhi, we as men who stand for justice and equality are ashamed, as a large section of men in our country are committing abuses against women – rape, sexual harassment, domestic violence, economic and legal discrimination.

Continue reading Men against Sexual Violence, Men for Gender Justice →

Bad ideas, Everyday Life, Genders, Images

Justice for Women Now: Protest in New Delhi

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Sack the Top Cop
Sack the Top Cop

On a day when the Prime Minister put his foot in his mouth by saying that ‘footlose migrants’ were responsible for heinous crimes like rape. On a day when the S.O.P – ‘son of a president / sign of a pervert’ – Abhijit Mukherjee said that the protestors were ‘dented and painted’ women, on a day when yet another gang rape was reported in Delhi, and a young woman ended her life in Patiala because the police harassed her in Patiala following her complaint of rape  – hundreds of young women and men, and many not so young and women and men, gathered under the single banner of ‘Justice for Women Now’ at noon in New Delhi, at the Nizamuddin ‘Sabz Burj’ with an intention to march to India Gate. They were stopped at the intersection of Zakir Husain Marg and Subramania Bharati Marg by several cordons of police. The police were arrayed across two intersections, several layers deep. The gathering was unarmed, peaceful, angry, joyous and disciplined. They were faced by a sullen array of police, armed with sticks and tear gas. The police did not let the gathering move towards India Gate, and the peacable, orderly gathering sat on the street for around two hours. There were several television and media crews.The primary demands articulated by the demonstration included ‘fast track’ processes for the 100,000 pending rape and sexual assault cases, the resignation of the police commissioner of Delhi, the drafting of gender sensitive and non-sexist laws, a call for a special session of parliament and a time bound commitment towards a massive expansion of safe public transport for women in metros. Continue reading Justice for Women Now: Protest in New Delhi →

Bad ideas, Everyday Life, Genders, Images, Language, Violence/Conflict

Bakht Arif, from Pakistan, sings Zinda Lash for Patronizing Indian Politicians (No, Don’t Listen to Honey Singh)

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UPDATED : December 28, 2012

Don’t be a zombie. Never be a Zinda Lash.

No. Don’t Listen to Honey Singh talking about what he wants to do to the bodies of young women.

No. Don’t listen to Sushma Swaraj of the BJP talking about what she thinks is the zinda lash when she talks about the body of a young woman. Continue reading Bakht Arif, from Pakistan, sings Zinda Lash for Patronizing Indian Politicians (No, Don’t Listen to Honey Singh) →

Centre watch, Genders, Law, Violence/Conflict

How Delhi police assaulted my daughter on 25 December: Usha Saxena

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From The Telegraph

USHA SAXENA writes a letter to Delhi chief minister Sheila Dikshit:

Dear ma’am,

My daughter Shambhavi and I and a colleague of mine Reema Ganguly went to Jantar Mantar today 25th Dec to take part in a peaceful gathering there against the gang-rape.

At around 4pm two girls came running up to us in tears and said that the police had dragged away 2 of their female friends to Parliament Street Police Station and they asked us to help bring them back. The three of us joined 9 other women and we went to the police station. When we reached there we only saw male constables. We demanded to talk to a female senior officer and said that the 3 women must be released immediately. The policemen very rudely and aggressively tried to chase us out. We refused to leave without those 3 women and so one male cop ordered some female cops standing in the courtyard to come in and arrest all of us. Continue reading How Delhi police assaulted my daughter on 25 December: Usha Saxena →

Everyday Life, Genders, Government, Language, Movements, Violence/Conflict

An ‘I Witness’ Account of Delhi Police and RAF Violence at India Gate on 23 December: Sangeeta Das

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Guest post by SANGEETA DAS

[The Delhi Police has begun systematically lying about what has been happening in the past few days. We have seen spin doctoring around the unfortunate death of Constable Subhash Tomar. There has been efforts to plant generalized and unsubstantiated rumours about the presence of ‘terrorists’ amongst the crowds at India Gate. We have even seen the Chief Minister of Delhi, Shiela Dikshit and a sub divisional magistrate complain about the Delhi Police trying to interfere and influence that process of the recording of testimonies. Here is an important account by an eyewitness, Sangeeta Das, about the way the police behaved on the evening of the 23rd of December. Please note the kind of language that she says policemen were using. Can we trust the city to be safe in their hands.]

I am appalled at the lop-sided relay of events and incomplete images being telecast by some of the NEWS channels on TV, regarding the incident that happened at India Gate yesterday (this is an account of what happened on 23rd of December) at around 5:30 PM.

I was there. We were all on the other side of India Gate towards the Dhyan Chand Stadium.

I think I need to paint the correct picture for the nation. Except for CNN IBN and NEWS X, most other channels are not showing the peaceful gathering. Thus it gives out the wrong message to the nation, to the politicians, to other women that there was violence. Continue reading An ‘I Witness’ Account of Delhi Police and RAF Violence at India Gate on 23 December: Sangeeta Das →

Empire/ Imperialism, Frontiers, Genders, Mirror Worlds, Violence/Conflict

Play Haze Kay not Honey Singh: Music from Kashmir against Rape for Delhi

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“Justice to the girls who were so innocent,
Justice so our sisters can be roaming free,
Justice to Aasiya and Neelofar,
Justice to the girl from Delhi.”

– a song by HAZE KAY (Rapper from Kashmir)

Haze Kay
Haze Kay

Yesterday, we saw placards on Jantar Mantar that sought to draw linkages of solidarity between young people asking for justice for the gang-rape survivor in Delhi and those committed to the memory of the rape and murder of Neelofar and Aasiya in Shopian and many others in Kashmir.

Today, a Facebook post by Fahad Shah alerted me to a song by Haze Kay – a Kashmiri rapper that made the same linkage of solidarity, from Kashmir, to Delhi.

Here is the song. No further words are necessary. Except to say, call up radio stations in Delhi, and ask RJs to find and play Haze Kay, not Honey Singh.

LYRICS

In the memory of Aasiya and Neelofar and thousands of other girls and women who have been victimized by the crime called Rape ..

intro –

their guns and their clicks , i don’t fear all that .
when the police comes around , i don’t fear all that .
disappeared without a trace , i don’t fear all that .
cause i am from Kashmir so i don’t fear all that. Continue reading Play Haze Kay not Honey Singh: Music from Kashmir against Rape for Delhi →

Bad ideas, Genders, Law, Media politics, Movements

Rape is allowed because most people don’t know what it is: Anonymous

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Guest post by ANONYMOUS

Rape is allowed because most people don’t know what it is.

To say that victims understand it is assuming too much. The immediate affect will be a deep, invisible wound. After years of counselling it will still hurt and terrorise. All the strength in the world, at the individual and existential levels, will fall short. Very often the crime will remain unreported. Rather than empowering women, the legal system will manage so few convictions that it will itself be the greatest perpetrator.

The perpetrators, as in the actual rapists, know as much or as little as the victims. They will go unarrested, unnoticed, unashamed, and this will fuel their psychopathy. They may or may not realise that rape is not about sex but power.

Continue reading Rape is allowed because most people don’t know what it is: Anonymous →

Everyday Life, Genders, Government, Law

Sexual Violence and Sexuality Education – The Missing Link: Ketaki Chowkhani

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Guest post by KETAKI CHOWKHANI

Over the last few days there seems to be sudden explosion in talking about sexual violence and other forms of violence on women. A huge discourse is being created around what rape cultures are and how we are part of these cultures which produce and construct these very acts of violence. Sexual violence has been linked to sexist, misogynist attitudes, remarks and behaviour, and ranging from scriptural affirmations to popular songs. The rape cultures are discussed as existing within the spaces of homes, streets, offices, courts, police stations, public transport, universities and so on. Continue reading Sexual Violence and Sexuality Education – The Missing Link: Ketaki Chowkhani →

Culture, Genders, Government, Sex, Violence/Conflict

Misogyny, Politics and Zombiedom: From Sonia Gandhi to Botsa Satyanarayana

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After Sushma Swaraj called a rape survivor a zombie – ‘Zinda Laash’,  it is now the Congress Party’s turn to field its prime misogynists and women haters. If the stalwarts of the BJP have unleased their righteous blood-lust by calling for capital punishment (which they do routinely for many things)  how can the good men and women of the Congress party allow themselves to be left behind in the competition for civilised discourse?

The Times of India has a report which I am quoting below that spells out Andhra Pradesh Congress Chief Botsa Satyanarayana’s thoughts on women’s safety.

“Andhra Pradesh Congress chief Botsa Satyanarayana on Monday opened his mouth to put his foot right in, saying women are asking for trouble if they venture out at night. Worse, he described the assault on the physiotherapy student as a “minor incident” for which party president Sonia Gandhi had reached out to agitating people. Continue reading Misogyny, Politics and Zombiedom: From Sonia Gandhi to Botsa Satyanarayana →

Bad ideas, Centre watch, Everyday Life, Genders, Media politics

How not to think about violence against women: Noopur Tiwari

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Guest post by NOOPUR TIWARI

Photo: AFP
Photo: AFP

I woke up in Paris last weekend to the news of the Delhi protests. I felt relieved. People are not just watching or suffering quietly anymore, I thought to myself. I wanted to be there too, out in the streets of Delhi. For all those times I had to suffer sexual harassment in Delhi, I want to be part of this churning for change now.

My Parisian friends asked me what was going on. And I told them about the new “national outrage” and the stories that had been stoking the anger. That’s when I realised I needed to make a list. What was informing my idea of what’s going on? These stories making it to the headlines, do they have something in common?

Yes, they do have one very obvious thing in common. They are all “sensational” news items. They are either:

Continue reading How not to think about violence against women: Noopur Tiwari →

Bad ideas, Centre watch, Genders, Government, Law, Movements

A Day at Raisina Hill: Nilanjana Roy

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Guest post by NILANJANA ROY

“We want justice! We want justice!”

I went to the protests at Raisina Hill expecting very little. Despite the anger over the recent, brutal gang-rape of a 23-year-old by a group of six men, who also beat up her male friend, protests over women’s violence in the Capital have been relatively small.

But the crowds walking up the Hill, towards the government offices of North and South Block, from India Gate are unusual. It’s a young crowd—students, young men and women in their twenties, a smattering of slightly older women there to show their solidarity, and it’s a large crowd, about a thousand strong at the Hill itself. There are two small knots representing student’s politicial organisations, but otherwise, many of the people here today are drawn together only by their anger. Continue reading A Day at Raisina Hill: Nilanjana Roy →

Culture, Everyday Life, Genders, Identities, Metropolis, Sex

A City’s Pride

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This Sunday, Delhi walks in its fifth annual queer pride parade. Each year at this time the question arises again: why a pride parade? Transgender, lesbian, gay, bisexual, hijra, kothi, and intersex people still have too many answers to give. While a decision on the appeals against the 2009 Naz judgment still remains pending, stories of continuing violence on the bodies of those deemed different do not wait for the Supreme Court. Queer people continue to have no legal protections against discrimination in the workplace; to be forcibly dragged to psychologists; to be forced to lie, cheat and conceal their lives; to be victims of familial, domestic and public violence and to feel, in so many ways both in their own minds and in the eyes of many others, like lesser citizens.

What this past year has reminded us is that they are not alone. The fundamental pillars of what enables this violence – fear, prejudice, intolerance – seem to have dug themselves deeper into our cities just as the institutions and democratic safeguards meant to combat them seem to have floundered. The ranks of urban residents who have experienced that deeply queer moment of exclusion and otherness – whether or not it speaks the particular idiom of sexuality – have grown. This year, as people once again take to the streets, they must do so not just for themselves but for the cities they inhabit and, increasingly, must protect.

Continue reading A City’s Pride →

Genders

Statement of Indian feminists to Irish Parliament on abortion rights for women

About 10,000 people marched through Dublin today, many of them mothers and daughters walking side by side, holding pictures of Savita Halappanavar who died of blood poisoning in an Irish hospital after being denied an abortion. In a symbolic move, they gathered at the Garden of Remembrance dedicated to the memory of Irish freedom fighters, and walked to the parliament building with banners saying, “Never Again”, “No More Tragedies” and “Abortion Rights Now”.

As the campaign for safe and legal abortion rights for women picks up steam worldwide, Indian feminists join Irish feminists in solidarity.

Dear Elected representatives of the Irish Parliament, 

We, the undersigned, are deeply shocked at the callous treatment meted out to Savita Halappanavar who was refused a medical abortion in a hospital in Galway even though it was clear that her baby was miscarrying and had no chance of survival. We hope that the impact and serious consequences of your vote against the Medical Termination (Termination of Pregnancy in Case of Risk to Life of Pregnant Woman) Bill 2012 have fully registered with you now. 

We call upon you to show leadership and bring in legislation urgently that is in tune with the Irish Supreme Court ruling that stipulates that when a pregnant woman’s life is in danger, including from the risk of suicide, she has the right to an abortion in Ireland. We ask that you not be governed by any sentiments and opinions beyond the human right to life of Irish women. You are no doubt fully aware that women’s rights have been internationally recognized as human rights. We believe it is wrong and unjustifiable for religion to interfere with women’s ability to live full, free lives and have control of their bodies, in any part of the world.

November 21st, 2012 Endorsements to this letter are now closed.

Previous posts on abortion on kafila:

Abortion as a feminist issue – who decides, and what?

Dil Se Nahin Dimaag Se Dekho – Thoughts on Satyamev Jayate Episode 1

Excavation, Frontiers, Genders, Images, Mirror Worlds, Violence/Conflict

Shabbo Kumari patrols the border

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Photo by Poulomi Basu

The Lens blog at NYTimes.com has a photo essay by Poulomi Basu about women guards of the Indian Border Security Force.

Most of the recruits were from impoverished rural areas. If she could observe them not only in training but with their families as well, she would be able to tell the story of their transformation from villagers into soldiers.

The most haunting image Basu has  is the one above.

One of the most riveting photographs shows a dead man hanging upside down, his legs caught in the high barbed wire fence that India has constructed to demarcate the border. Guards had shot the man as he and others tried to enter Pakistan near Attari, in Punjab State, Ms. Basu said. Continue reading Shabbo Kumari patrols the border →

Everyday Life, Frontiers, Genders, Identities, Language

Our search for Charasi Kababs: Saba Dewan

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Guest post by SABA DEWAN

Qissa Khwani bazaar, Peshawar

I was last in Pakistan in 2006 during Ramzan. Rahul had some work in Islamabad, Peshawar and Lahore and I had used that as an excuse to visit my mother’s place of birth. While I had visited my mother’s beloved Lahore a few times earlier this was to be my first trip to Islamabad and Peshawar.

To cut a long story short, on our first evening in Peshawar, post iftaar, we found ourselves in the fabled Qissa Khwani bazaar, the Bazaar of Story tellers. It was here that in 1930 British troops had fired upon an anti-colonial demonstration of non violent, unarmed nationalist Khudai Khidmatgars leaving more than 400 amongst them dead. History has come a long way since then marking contemporary Peshawar as one of the more violence prone cities of Pakistan. Continue reading Our search for Charasi Kababs: Saba Dewan →

Bad ideas, Genders

Petition to Chief Justice of India – Remove Justice Bhaktavatsala of Karnataka High Court

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On August 9, during the hearing of a matrimonial dispute, Karnataka High Court Judge K Bhaktavatsala told a young woman lawyer that she was unfit to argue the matter since she was unmarried. “Family matters should be argued only by married people, not spinsters. You should only watch. Bachelors and spinsters watching family court proceedings will start thinking if there is any need to marry at all. Marriage is not like a public transport system. You better get married and you will get very good experience to argue such cases,” he advised her.

Last week, hearing a case between a separated couple, in which the woman accused her husband of regularly beating her, the judge told the woman, “Women suffer in all marriages. You are married with two children, and know what it means to suffer as a woman. Yesterday, there was a techie couple who reconciled for the sake of their child. Your husband is doing good business, he will take care of you. Why are you still talking about his beatings?”

Justice Bhaktavatsala has shown grave disrespect towards the Indian Constitution, which he is sworn to protect, and which guarantees equal rights to all citizens, men and women. As such, he has revealed himself to be utterly unfit for his high office of responsibility.

Sign the petition asking the Chief Justice of India, Hon’ble Mr. Justice S.H. Kapadia, to remove Justice K Bhaktavatsala from his post for these appalling statements.