As I like to travel to foreign countries, it was one of my dreams to go to India because I heard it is a really beautiful country. But I think it will just remain as a mere dream. Why? There is so much sexual violence in India. It was not even long time ago that a 23-year old girl died after being brutally raped. It became a nation-wide issue briefly, and there were big protests against rapes in India.
But situation has not been changed much after the protests. Still there are many articles about terrible crimes against women. Moreover another rape case of an American tourist became a national wide issue again. I think it’s time we should do something for protecting women in India.
There have been many rape cases in India continually, but people did not pay much attention to them. But things changed when the infamous 23-year-old girl rape case happened. After that, there was immediate reaction. Tourist number dropped by about 25%.
India government was so concerned about their national ‘rape’ images, they decided to make laws that give harsh punishments to rapists. Also they have decided to open all-women police offices in some areas. But it seems like they don’t function very well. I think we should consider why these cases happen so often and get rid of the root causes of them.
Socially in India, men have a higher social status than that of women’s. Men have more power than women, thus there are many crimes against women. For example, they have high sex crime rate. The National Crime Records Bureau reported that there were more than 25,200 rapes in India in 2011.
It’s about one rape in every 20 minutes. What is worse is that victims are not willing to report this to police. Still traditionally victims are blamed for the sexual crimes. For instance, when they report it to police, many people blame the victims for not wearing proper clothes.
Also, sadly there are many child sex abuse cases in India. According to the Asian Centre for Human Rights (ACHR), 48,338 children reported that they were raped between 2001 and 2011. Even experts are expecting that there should be a lot more unreported cases.
Besides sex crime, there is also rising domestic violence that India mwomen suffer from. In 2011-2012 there were 592 cases registered, and 2012-2013, it went to up to 3,175 cases. Vikram Patel, a psychiatrist and joint director of the Centre for Global Mental Health, says suicides of Indian women happens often because of relationships that include domestic violence.
Also women in India are suffering from acid attacks. It has been concentrated on women because acid destroys what women care for: their beauty. In many of these cases, the women were attached because they refused to date these men. It did not even classify as special crime a few months ago so there is no accurate record of it, but it has increased from 2002 to 2010.
Why women have lower social status in India? I think there are two main reasons for this. One is a dowry. When women get married, the bride’s family has to prepare the dowry. It’s a big burden.
There is a saying that Indian father spends most of his fortune on his daughter’s wedding. It is a common practice to go for an abortion when the foetus is a girl. As a result, there is severe gender imbalance in India. Dowry is forbidden by law.
The other reason is a socially accepted idea in India. It is accepted as a virtue that women should stay at home. It blocks the entry of women in public affairs. Consequentially men work and earn the money, so they have more power and women are subordinate to men.
I know that India government had tried to fix these problems.
However it’s been too long a time since women had lower social status in India; it is not easy to fix those problems. For the sake of women protection, there should be dramatic changes in Indian society. India government should make more laws for the equality of sexes and educate people to accept this.
Also companies should hire more women so that women could achieve financial independence from men. I hope they will make significant change as soon as possible. So one day in India, women can travel alone without worries and threats.
The author, Sunju Min, is a student at Hankuk University of Foreign Studies in South Korea.
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