By Nilanjana Goswami
The 19-year-old daughter of an RPF sub-inspector was brutally gang-raped barely 200 m from the Habibganj government railway police station and railway platform in Bhopal on the 2nd of November. The victim, an IAS aspirant, was returning from her tuitions at 7 pm when she was waylaid by 4 men?now identified as ragpickers?who then proceeded to drag her to a secluded area near the railway tracks leaving Habibganj railway station. They then?gang-raped her after stealing her purse, mobile phone, and jewellery. In her official statement, the victim further reported that her presence of mind to withhold her parents? identities probably saved her life.
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The accused were hell-bent on knowing the victim’s financial and family background in order to understand whether or not a complaint would be lodged against them. ?The accused continuously slapped me and asked about my parents. They wanted to find out if I belonged to a well-to-do family and whether I would lodge [a]?report with the police. I overheard them debating whether to kill me or kidnap me for ransom. I lied that my mother was a tailor and my father a labourer and that I lived in Vidisha. This reassured them that I was not a threat to them as I belonged to a poor family and would not go to the police. One of them even took pity and brought a dress for me as mine was torn,? she said. Her father is a sub-inspector with the Railway Police Force while her mother holds a position with the Madhya Pradesh police. ?I did not tell them that I was the daughter of a policeman, otherwise they would have murdered me?, the victim stated.
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The accused had, effectively, banked on the prevalent idea of social taboo and the harassment faced by survivors of a lower socio-economic standing to hide their tracks. Having rightly assessed that those with a greater socio-economic status would be less burdened with social stigma and would be in a position to notify the authorities, the accused hadn?t shied away from straight-up murder either. This throws light upon a new dynamic of this aspect of criminality. It further points to the extremely problematic situation at hand in a country where rape is growing to be endemic.
Due to the immense burden of stigma and social taboo that resurfaces after such a crime, many victims with lesser socio-economic means choose to internalize the abuse and fail to lodge a complaint, thus letting the abusers off scot-free. Those who battle these odds to notify the authorities have to face abject harassment at the hands of the very institution that failed to protect them in the form of victim-blaming and slut-shaming. It?s a very dark impasse the socio-political system inhabits by sheltering those who wouldn?t bat an eye before deciding to follow up rape with murder in order to hide their culpability from the law.
Red tape all around
However, the victim?s woes didn?t end just then. It took 24 hours for the official complaint to be lodged due to confusion over the jurisdiction of the crime scene. The victim and her parents were bounced around between Habibganj police station and MP Nagar police station, with each claiming the area near Habibganj railway platform No. 1 fell under the purview of the other. Only after the victim?s family put pressure on the authorities by threatening to escalate matters did both sides concede. However, Anita Malviya, the GRP inspector of police rubbished reports of any such delay occurring on their part: ?Nobody met us immediately after the crime. Habibganj police station informed us about it at 7 pm on Wednesday, and the case was registered within half an hour. We have arrested all the four accused.? This is a classic instance of blame-shifting. Not only does this obstruct and delay the due legal process, it further betrays the problematic casts of mind law-enforcers have while dealing with cases of sexual harassment and rape that are known to be complex, sensitive and require to be handled swiftly and with discretion. However, Bhopal DIG Santosh Singh reportedly suspended sub-inspector R N Tekam, stationed at the MP Nagar police station, for allegedly refusing to register the case.
RPF officials, meanwhile, have emphasized that crimes of such nature were rampant in the locality, which was also notorious for frequent robbery and petty thievery. They asserted that a lot of these could be avoided with the railway authorities? sanctioning of the construction of a wall from the platform to the Habibganj outer station. ?We had written to the railway administration five years back for construction of the wall to prevent unauthorized entry and also to the local administration for demolition of the adjacent slums as it was a security risk. Unfortunately, nothing happened? one of the spokespersons reported. Squatter settlements or slums on land belonging to the railway authorities are a common sight everywhere in India and are often the breeding grounds of anti-social activities like drug trafficking and a hotbed of crimes.
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This incident comes within weeks of the Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh ?Shivraj Singh Chouhan?claiming that the state was way better-placed in terms of women-empowerment than the United States. The official figures, however, are disturbingly far from concurring: a report submitted to the State Legislative Assembly in February 2017 stated that 4279 women (of which 2260, roughly 50% were minors) were raped and 248 were gang-raped in the state from February 2016 to mid-February 2017. This rounded off to 11 women raped per day, and 6 women gang-raped per week. According to a report by the NCRB (National Crime Records Bureau), the figures showed the general trend of the plight of women in Madhya Pradesh. In 2015, the state registered 4391 cases of rape ?the highest numbers in the country. In 2013, the tally stood at 5076, nearly 14% of the total number of such cases lodged in the country.
In further developments, the Chief Minister has referred the case to a fast-track court while the lawyers of Bhopal have, after a meeting, refused to represent the accused involved, according to Bar Association President Rajesh Vyas. Congress leader of the Opposition Ajay Singh and other members have criticized Chouhan?s tall claims of women?s safety in the State. In response to this, the BJP government that currently holds power in the state has started pushing for capital punishment to be legalized against rapists and perpetrators of grave sexual offences. However, none of this will bear fruit if the oppressive atmosphere of fear, shame and stigma around such crimes continues to be enforced. This should be a clarion call for victims to step up and overwhelm the patriarchal political system with their numbers and narratives so that the desperate situation of women in Madhya Pradesh and elsewhere in India doesn?t go unheeded.
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