Of What Consequence?

It has not been a week yet, since the death sentence was pronounced as punishment for the perpetrators of the brutal gang-rape and murder of the December 2012 case. While much of the nation confused in its categorization of retribution and justice, falsely rejoiced the fact that "justice has been done" for the departed soul, a few of us still lamented that this was hardly any start. Retribution is a punishment meted by law for the crime. Justice on the other hand, should have been a condition where no crime would have prevailed. The difference has a consequence. I will tell you why.

WATCH THIS- We won't speak out. It's our fault. (Image from internet)

I live now, just for an inconsequential period of six months, in a dark, remote corner of the country- Kashipur, Orissa. A place that should have gained popularity for its stellar beauty, now ignominiously known for its anti-mining agitations. A place that should have seen flourishing success of the tribal arts and crafts, now lamenting the wanton criminalisation of the same innocent tribal people. The nearest police station is 3 kilometres away. It is also situated quite close to a jail. A prison that was constructed with funds meant for tribal development. Did you note the poetic justice here? The government allocates funds for tribal development, also imposes non-bail able warrants for absolutely no offence or dissent and then puts the same tribal population behind the bars of the tribal development infrastructure- the jail. Can somebody suggest to the same government that these tribal people can do with better facilities for education and health, water and sanitation, livelihood and agriculture??

I speak now, to for an inconsequential audience of friends and family, who mostly come from a background that has hardly suffered the lack of economic development. Myself, included. We have access to schools, hospitals, internet cafes and even enough coffee day cafes that we never be deprived of such facilities in our whole lifetime. We will never be asking ourselves the question, "If I died would that be of any consequence? Would the authorities sit up and take notice?" There would be surely someone to at least issue us a death certificate. I will tell you who has not. A teenage girl who was found raped and murdered, about 30 kilometres away from my village, last evening. Her body was dumped by the side of a path, with her hands mutilated. Her body was left to rot until the police picked it up two nights later, by when the worst accounts report that wild scavengers had gorged her face.

I question now, knowing well that it would be inconsequential within a given period of time. There will be enough scams, political upheavals, T-20 wins and Bollywood breakups to make us forget why I ask them now and for whom. When stories of rape filtered in from Delhi and Mumbai and Kolkata, the entire nation sat up and took notice. Oddly, they were all instances of gang-rape, what about the others in the metropolises who were raped by (JUST?!) one savage beast? What about the gang-rapes happening in the towns and villages of our country? Can those journalists cover the attrocities that happen beyond there luxurious urban centres? And definitely, who is going to take action against the perpetrator of the rape of this 16yr old girl from Renga? Yeah, where is Renga? Renga village is in Kashipur Block. Kashipur Block is in Rayagada District. Rayagada is in Orissa. So remote, that telephone networks fail us. Just like how roads fails us here. Just like how electricity fails us here. Just like how the Goddamned Government fails us here.

But this is only representation what is reported. The rapes that go unreported are many. And even of those reported, conviction rates vary from 8% to 23%. Only the North-east, especially Manipur and Mizoram see above 50% conviction rates for rape cases. (Source: Google)

I point now, at that government that is the very personification of the inconsequential.  Most of us (thankfully, hopefully and fortunately) come from families, societies where we may have escaped the trauma of molestation. But there exists a huge, uncounted, unreported (and sadly, uncared for) population of women, children, and even the aged who have been victims of molestations of various degrees and various kinds. To recount statistics from the web reports would shock and leave no warmth in the human body. Cold news breaks on my twitter feed that a 12 year old rape victim committed suicide in Jharkhand 3 days ago. For a 12 year old to not just go through the excruciating pain of rape but to contemplate and commit suicide- what pits has our society come to?! And when I ask this question time and again, I am met with the same rhetoric of parents and upbringing to moralize and sermonize the perverse male. WHY? I will tell you. Because the government has no role in safeguarding its women and children, and even men, for that matter. Because, rather than repair the systemic faults, we will all have the courage and patience to sit through at least another 25 years, when the whole new generation would have been brought up with a better and holistic mindset. Because we can expect every one of the living Indians in another 25 years to not have a single perverse and violent thought. Because we simply do not know/care about what happens in those godforsaken corners of the country.

Graphic, though it maybe. Does anything move our hearts as much as The Brutal?! (Image from internet)

I mock now, the inconsequential measures of a stupid country. Women-only banks, did they prevent my sister from getting raped and murdered in Renga? The half-hearted acceptance of the Verma committee report and the absolutely unworthy Ordinance of six months ago, did they help to prevent the photojournalist from Mumbai being raped? The fully covering clothes, the Khap Panchayats, the admonishing mothers, the moral police of the Senas, the curfew-dropping fathers- I laugh at you all. Infants are being raped in this country. There is so much toxic, vile and malice in some minds here, it could tear apart any idea of a secure existence. When the CRPF and the military comb these hills for Naxal presence, do they see these elements too? With so much of State force around, a girl bled to death by the path last evening. How her parents must be aching now? How she would have cried for mercy? How it terrifies me now...

I outrage now, fully aware that I AM INCONSEQUENTIAL to the milieu of voices that are already outraging, against rape. I outrage against the pathetic state of the policing in the country. Four lakh and twenty thousand vacant seats were yet to be filled in the entire police forces as of December 2012. The national average of police personnel deployed for one lakh people is a pathetic 137. States like UP and West Bengal languish at 92 and 94 respectively! Even if the posts were filled, how hostile do the police treat persons who come to register complaints. I shudder to think of it. Months ago, just over a casual conversation a police man roughly remarked to me in Haryana, "How can we stop rape? Do the rapists call us and inform us before the act?!" His snigger triggered venom in my system. I had enough bile to spit on him and point out that it is precisely because he and his brethren slept (or whiled away time) during duty hours, the creepy man preys on the passing woman. But I didn't, I couldn't. I outrage against the many governments which have not had the capacity to reform its police force, who not only reek in patriarchal bias, but also accept accountability of nothing!

I hurt now, from the multiple inconsequential rape reports that have come to my notice in over all the years of my conscious being. This colossal pain, shock and numbness cannot translate into anything but my helplessness and a timid prayer to never meet such a fate. Or a fiery demand to have the grit to fight such scumbags. The same helplessness with which my rural peers reluctantly give up on their dreams to study further or work far away from home. For they know that they could meet the same fate as the girl on Park Street, in the private bus or at Shakti Mills. When peril lurks in the dark (literally for there are no road lamps here, not even roads to begin with), in the dense forests, where even the loudest screams would fall short of a trembling whisper, no police, no leader, no journalist is going to come to save her. Why, they would even say that it is not their duty to save her. Something inside me died yesterday, to know that nearby somewhere a soul was crushed, her dreams shattered and a valiant battle was lost.

You tell me now, does this have a consequence??

(September 20th, 2013)

Reports of rapes abound our newspapers everyday. Hardly any of them translate to meaningful debates or actions. An outrage, a protest, some condemning remarks by the leaders. Is that all? NO! We shouldn't stop at that. There needs to be a systemic change. Make it a votebank issue, make it an issue amongst your peers, make it an issue with your local elected representative. Don't let your discontent, anger and/or fear muffle your voice to become inconsequential.

WATCH OUT.

A Road Like This

  There is a road, after the fields and the huts.

The road was there even from the hamlets, but the sun had cracked its surface and the rain had dug its holes.

Between these hills, when you chance upon this road, it is a pleasant surprise.

After the stench of poverty and the dirt of the underprivileged, the road arrives.

By the sides of this road, there are mango trees and mango trees.

Call them mango giants. They join their heads at the top. Conspiring, wisely, I think.

Their branches, like outstretched hands link through the length of the road.

When the road happens to you, you enter a new world.

The thick burly trunks of these mango giants secure your fragile dreams.

The gentle green of the leaves ripple with your laughter.

Every step on the road, the stones beneath murmur about your presence.

When the sun peeks to see what is happening beneath the mango canopy,

It sees naughty children clinging by the branches.

At the start of the road, everything else stops.

Even those raindrops rest on the branches, not falling to the ground.

So protected is this road, that little tribal angels come here to rest.

The hills beyond, smile benign, a little sly about their well kept secret- this road.

Twenty trees on either sides look at this road, like the proud parents of a tarred track.

When the mangoes fall in summer, it awakens the naughty spirits of the nearby hamlets.

The wind that travels past this road carries its stories to the grandparent of the tribes.

The road is beautiful, the secret so starts. The stones still gleam from the goodness of the world.

Those outsiders who gaped at the black beat, so shaded and green, sniffed the scent of the ripe mangoes.

The road gets seasoned with every visit.

The mango trees grow older with every season.

Yet when you walk on this road, the stories don't intrude your solitude.

One this road, you are the regal traveller. The trees know this.

This is that path of silent bliss.

In hindsight (much much later than when the above passage was written):

There is immense breathtaking beauty in Orissa. Somehow the compelling stories of disappointments and tragedies are miraculously cured by the stoic hills and the inanimate trees. All sorrows are latched to the passing wind. And maybe that is why it rains so heavy over here. The wind had to unburden itself of the many stories of false promises and stolen happiness.

It is not exaggerated or exotic, it is a spirit that is deeply tribal. To forget all miseries and live for the joy of the day. And perhaps, my hundred days here have helped me silently latch on to that resilient aspect of living in the remote, uncared parts of the country.

For all the complaints about an unwilling government, almost like a step-parent ill-treating a child in its foster care, there are enough reports to show how ultimately these tribal people have won their battles. Or succumbed courageously in their fight, to just claim their rights. Yet, as the tolerant Mother Earth bears the weight of all the world's troubles, these people too dismiss their problems and toil everyday with an innocent smile. How, I wonder, how?

And why did I have to write about a road? There are moments in one's life, where everything seems like an afterthought, when everything is relegated either to the far past or the unseen future. This road is a place like that. It is a small patch on the road to Chandragiri from Kashipur, but it seems to be a patch from another world.

Where the pressing troubles of land displacement, poverty, unemployment, migration, food scarcity and disease seem like mere myths riddling the human world. Not unlike the crystal waters of the pristine Himalayas that are promised to us in a water bottle. This road just pushed all that I had known about Orissa to a distant place.

Incidents of violent repressions, noisy factories mining their wealth out of these gentle hills, deaths that claimed children who did not have much to eat, the terrorised victims of mosquitoes and Maoists, electricity projects that propelled thousands into darkness- all of the stories of the tribal people were kicked to the oblivion. For every time I passed by this road, the world seemed to be at peace. Just the silent coo of the bird and the gentle wind nudging the sides. And that, ultimately is what the tribal spirit actually is. Just to stay for the present, in the secure folds of Nature.