The two men involved in the recent rape case of the five-year-old admitted that they had been drinking for hours and had even watched porn on their cellphone before assaulting the little girl.

The men who gang raped a 23-year-old in a bus last December (the Delhi rape case that made national and international headlines) had also admitted that they had been drinking at home, before hitting the roads.

Now, it’s easy to play spin the bottle and pin our rape epidemic on alcohol alone, but I am not talking about the rape epidemic here. I am talking about what the above examples indicate; the fact that India has a drinking problem.

Statistically speaking the number of Indians who drink is still relatively low – about 32 percent. According to the National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences (NIMHANS), less than 13 percent of them drink daily. But the problem here is not the number of people who drink; it’s the way in which they drink.

The standard international unit of alcohol is about 30 ml of spirit. However, the study conducted by NIMHANS proves that the drink poured at home measures somewhere between 60 ml and 270 ml. Vivek Benegal, the principal investigator of the study, says, “Drink to intoxication seems to be the goal.”

So, we basically drink to get drunk — a country on the binge of an alcoholic breakdown.

Growing up, I remember how the maids used to talk to my mother about drunken brawls back home. Their husbands would work all day, come home, get drunk and beat them up. What’s even worse is that people from across the class spectrum are following suit — no, not the beating, but the way they drink — downing drink after drink at a party or at home , or partying hard with co-workers after work.

The genteel tradition of one chhota (small) peg everyday is fast being drowned out in a culture that worships excess in every sphere.

And to achieve this excess, we have mixed the American tradition of getting hammered, with the English miner’s serious drinking after a hard week’s work, and created a dangerous cocktail.

“Almost 30 percent of people who go to a doctor have alcohol related conditions,” said Benegal. Another study, conducted by the Indian Alcohol Policy Alliance, estimates that 19 percent of hospital beds are for alcohol related patients. According to Johnson J. Edayaranmula, the executive director for the Indian Alcohol Policy Alliance, a study conducted in prisons in Kerala showed that 57 percent of those in prison came there because they committed a crime under the influence of alcohol.

“The same study was replicated in many prisons across the country,” he noted. “The figures were almost the same.”

In post-liberalization India, getting smashed has never been easier since the average age that people start to drink is is only getting younger with time.

There was a time when alcohol was both expensive and not freely available. And how’s that? Edayaranmula solves this mystery for us.

“Accessibility has increased,” he said. “You will not find a public institution like a hospital or a ration shop or a post office wherever you want but you will find that a liquor outlet is everywhere.”

You are right Mr. Edayaranmula, in fact there is a liquor shop at every corner of the city.

So how can we control this?

Dry days?

For your information, that doesn’t work either. Take Gujarat for example, where drinking has been prohibited since the year 1960. According to the study by NIMHANS, almost 17 percent of Gujarati men drink on a daily basis. I know it’s a small number —in comparison to the national average—but isn’t drinking prohibited in Gujarat?

And this drinking does impact their families, not to mention, it creates a flourishing bootleg industry with smuggling rings.

Besides India is too profitable an alcohol market for anyone to seriously think about putting a cap on it. Alcohol companies promote every major cultural event in the country, even if it’s through their club soda surrogates or airlines.

A friend volunteering at the Jaipur Literary Festival told me that alcohol, not freedom of expression, was the burning issue of this year’s lit-fest; as it turned out that there were two dry days in the middle of the festival.

“Dry days are for plebs,” sneered one celebrity guest as he moved the party (for the favoured few) to his well-stocked hotel room. When the dry spell finally ended, there was literally a run for the bar and all the alcohol finished within an hour or two.

The Sydney Morning Herald said that in the year 2011 India was a 25 billion dollar market for booze. And by 2015 it’s estimated to be a 39 billion dollar market. With 30 percent of Indian men drinking, there’s ample room to grow. And given the size of India’s population, even a 1 percent rise can mean huge profits.

“That 1% rise can be more than the population of some European countries,” said Edayaranmula. And I would like to warn all of you that all these statistics do not include women drinkers. Add women—whose drinking patterns the NIMHANS study is yet to analyse— to the mix and the market’s potential looks even more attractive.

India needs to sober up to its drinking problem. We just cannot brush aside the spiking numbers of alcohol-fueled gang rapes and drunken driving traffic accidents anymore. Anti-drinking campaigns abroad have usually focused on college students, but India needs to focus on everybody.

The World Health Organisation has given India a voluntary target of 10 percent reduction in alcohol consumption by the year 2025. And the best way to achieve this target is to look back at how we drink.

Shraddha Jandial

Image Source [http://theultimateroundtripdotcom.files.wordpress.com/2011/07/mg_0230.jpg]

The dry state policy — a never ending debate, an issue so sensitive that discussion is altogether avoided and opinions often muted. A law accepted on paper but not in head or heart; so easily ignored, so blatantly violated that its relevance has to be questioned.

Gujarat is one of the five states declared “dry” by the government. It has a law in force that prohibits the manufacture, sale and consumption of alcohol within the state boundaries. The Bombay Prohibition Act was the law that enforced this ban in the year 1949, shortly after the demise of the “Father of the Nation”, Mahatma Gandhi. The fact that it came into force during this period of national sorrow, and is so intricately associated with the Mahatma is the reason why it continues to be such a sensitive issue.

So here’s the truth; prohibition has done nothing more than drive liquor underground. As a result, bootlegging is rampant and illegal liquor dens flourish. The Gujarat police seize liquor worth a hundred crore rupees every year. But believe it or not, this is only a fraction of what seeps in. The bootleggers have embraced innovations with gusto and are not easy to nab. The shabbily dressed men who once concealed bottles wrapped in newspapers have made way for well groomed men rolling in SUVs, making a huge business and definitely a huge amount of money thanks to the liquor transit.

What needs to be understood however is that a number of questions have been raised about this law following the Hooch tragedy in the year 2009, which killed 126 people from the consumption of spurious liquor. The reason: A large proportion of people who cannot afford the expensive variety of alcohol turn to illegal and unscrupulous brewers for the much cheaper hooch, a locally made white whiskey.

While some describe the law as archaic and say that it should be done away with, arguing that it is robbing many of a basic freedom of choice, several social activists and Gandhians remain staunch votaries of the law. They argue that due to the ban the state has made great strides in economic and social development as people work hard and party less. However, this argument falls flat when the statistics on illegal consumption of alcohol are laid open for all.

When Narendra Modi relaxed the prohibition norms a few years ago in special economic zones to attract investment, it drew howls of protest. But is this a genuine agreement with the law or an act that only holds based on its sentimental value?

The government has time and again referred to this as a “psycho-sociological problem” and civil society appears only too confused about the correct stand to take. Politicians often come across as lacking the courage to even debate the prohibition for fear of being cornered.

The tragedy of Gujarat is that the politicians in need of funds for the elections ultimately turn to the prosperous bootleggers, thus extending a handle.

Prohibition has also forced a nexus between the police and the bootleggers leading to a rise of gangsters and mafias. The dry state policy has without a doubt brewed a policy of corruption with the police now wanting to be posted in “lucrative” areas. The police are more than willing to auction for these spots and the government sucks up the money from these transfers. The involvement of the police and several other powerful officials has to be Gujarat’s worst kept secret.

The ban on consumption of liquor has led to a whole new series of crimes. The paradox of abundance of liquor in the face of restriction has failed to wake up the government to the obvious reality. Or maybe they have tried hard not to wake up to it.

This law has undoubtedly hampered the state, as it cannot claim a single penny as revenue; revenue that can be used for the betterment of the state and its facilities. However, Gujarat has a parallel income of thirty thousand crore rupees that comes from the illegal trade of liquor. However, the establishment, owing to the law, does not have a right over any of it and loses a large amount. The huge sum of black money generated through this illegal practice cannot be invested in business and continues to circulate in a not so legal cycle.

Allowing liquor may not change the state of affairs overnight, but it may encourage a certain transparency, put an end to the vicious cycle of corruption and reduce the crime rate in Gujarat. The debate on the relevance of a dry status as an obligation to the Mahatma, even when the basic principles of truth, peace and social justice have been long forgotten must ensue.

How much longer can we revel in this false ideological hangover?

Pavitra Parekh

Image Source [http://blog.lib.umn.edu/reife014/myblog2/Alcohol.jpg]

So here’s the bitter truth.

Debates and discussions that roll the country in turmoil after every infringement of the legislation against women are not and will not be of much help; amendments are not magic wands that will improve the condition of women in an instant. A real change will only come about by overhauling the patriarchal mindset of society.

But the question is: Is our society so ready for women empowerment? Have we emancipated the female segment enough to really empower it?

No, that does not mean allowing them to wear the kind of clothes they wish; have they been empowered till such a degree where they’re not answerable to anyone for their. I seriously doubt that!

The moment, when a woman’s freedom will not be time barred, and caged within the four walls of her home from sunset to sunrise, will mark the beginning of her emancipation.

Now analyse this…

The reason why women are ill-treated is not because they are vulnerable or physically incompetent, it’s because they tolerate not only the dominance of the other section, but also the shameful social mindsets that are the root cause of numerous unspeakable atrocities inflicted upon women and children.

All through their lives, women are taught to be polite and adjusting; modern and rebellious behavior is considered rash, impulsive and is not acceptable. No matter how ambitious she is the ultimate destination of her literacy is in a batter of flour.

And the hardship does not end here. She is still treated as an object; brutally beaten, ill-treated and set on fire for money. Crimes against women are that much easier because to be truly masculine men have to carry hatred of the feminine close to their heart. Female fetuses are aborted and baby girls killed after birth, causing an appallingly skewed sex ratio. Many of those who survive face discrimination, prejudice, violence and neglect all their lives, as single or married women. Clearly, many Indian women face a threat to their life at every stage — violence, inadequate healthcare, inequality, neglect, bad diet, lack of attention to personal health and well-being.

The law cannot do anything more than providing society with articles of the constitution be it 14 or 15, or taking penal actions under section 304-B, 376, 498-A. A substantial change will not come from the parliament or any court, but from the castle of the citizen where women are enslaved.

Providing provisions is not sufficient if the woman is taught to be patient and tolerant; a lesson that is embedded into her thinking since childhood and one which that eventually proves to be her weakness.

If she is not allowed to fight her brothers during childhood, how do you expect her to fight society for her rights?

If she is not allowed to complain against her own siblings, how do you expect her to complain against her in-laws, or file a police report?

And so you have it; according to statistics released by the National Crime Records Bureau in the year 2010, every 90 minutes a bride was killed for dowry in India, a number that would have surely risen in the last three years.

Legal experts point out that many such crimes go unreported. And just to reiterate, dowry is not the only crime against women; there are rapes, molestations, child abuse, female infanticide and many others. Due to “family honour” many complaint files are withdrawn and in many cases the police do not give a fair hearing. Medical evidence is often unrecorded making it easy for offenders to go scot free under prevailing laws. More than half (54.7 percent) of the victims were aged between 18 and 30. Most disturbingly, according to police records, the offenders were known to their victims in more than 94 percent of the cases. Neighbors accounted for a third of the offenders, while parents and other relatives were also involved. The law won’t enter your bedroom, the prime minister won’t be sitting in your drawing room to keep a check on how you are treated within the four walls of your own home, and nobody will teach you to break the silence and raise a cry at least for help.

It’s all a blame game. If a woman is teased it’s because she was probably wearing objectionable clothes; if a woman is raped it’s because she was probably mingling with guys. When will society start minding its own business?

A rape victim suffers the pain of rape once by the accused, but society rapes her mind each day. It may just be the women assembled on the roadside to investigate the crime in their own way; sometimes they sympathize with the victim and other times they blame her for being in the company of boys. Such things keep the wounds of the victim green forever, leaving her a victim for life. She is ostracized by society to such a degree that the only escape left for her is death.

Concealing the names of rape victims will do nothing more than worsening the situation so reveal it. Don’t make her feel that oh!! she was RAPED make her feel that it was just an accident that passed away. The society that hides even the name of rape victim how do you think will allow the victims to rehabilitate themselves accepting the reality of their life.

The barbaric gang-rape of a young woman in the capital left the entire country shocked but as outcome all we did was play the blame game; communicating our anger over the failure of the government and the police to check rising crime against women. An outcry after the incident, a candle march after every downer, will not work till you remain a silent spectator to eve teasing.

Just giving sobriquets like “Nirbhaya” or “Jagruti” won’t create awareness in society; changes will only come about by allowing women to be fearless and sowing the seeds of strength and self-reliance in their mind since childhood, instead of making them dependent on their male counterparts. Make them literate and ambitious; give a direction and purpose to their life instead of just treating her like a reproductive animal. You don’t need to be a helping hand, but the lease you could do is teach her to fight.

Any hope of reform, protection, and safety will require the collective efforts everybody in society; primarily by changing the mentality of the population coupled with a reformed and less corrupt system of justice that does not bend the law for criminals. But the journey will be a long one.

Violence against women tends to reflect how they are treated across society. Attitudes, therefore, matter. Those who witness men groping women should confront them. The families of victims of sexual crime should dwell less on the shame they feel they have incurred and more on how to prosecute offenders.

But what’s sad is that to change the attitude towards rape in our country, so many young women have had to suffer and die.

Nistha Choudhary

Image Source [http://www.flickr.com/photos/96547648@N00/285013348/]

Protests in Delhi; Culprit apprehended in Patna

Saturday was a deeply unsettling day for all Indians. After all the efforts and protests after the Nirbhaya case, an even more severe rape case,  if that was even possible, was reported as a five-year-old girl was captured and then raped. Now being touted in the media as Gudiya, she was captured by her neighbour, kept in a room for days and then brutally raped.

The doctors who operated on her even revealed the extent to which she was abused, which is just utterly sickening and disgusting. No wonder people everywhere around the country were protesting for sentencing the rapist to death and also making it a permanent punishment.

The girl was in a serious condition in Swami Dayanand Hospital and then moved to AIIMS hospital. Amidst all this, the public was protesting outside Swami Dayanand Hospital, AIIMS and the Delhi Police Headquarters at ITO; the public outside was screaming for the police commissioner’s resignation.

Protests were also held outside Home Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde’s residence and then moved to 10, Janpath, outside Congress Chief Sonia Gandhi’s residence. Fortunately, the girl has returned to a stable condition, is out of danger and will be in the hospital for another two weeks. The culprit, Manoj, 22 was also apprehended in Patna and has been brought to Delhi for interrogation.

And if there was any bad news to add to all this, it is that between Jan. 1 and March. 31 this year, 393 rapes have been reported. April has seen five other minors get abused by rapists. According to police records, a two-and-half year old girl was raped by a 25-year-old man in West Delhi’s Najafgarh on April.18. A girl who was born just thirty months back was raped.

It’s just so saddening and disturbing to even acknowledge the happening of such an awful incident.

It’s as if these savages have forgotten that the rest of us live in a world where we have sisters and daughters. The feeling of safety was never really quite strong in the capital, but now, it has completely vanished.

All you can do now is worry about your sister or daughter because if such incidents are even possible, then every girl in Delhi is unsafe, not just teenagers. We all have daughters; we all have sisters, so it concerns each and every one of us. What’s worse is that now before girls get to know about sex or intimacy, they’ll have to learn about violence and rape. How will they be able to process that?

With the women rapidly rising in the society, instead of supporting it, men have become frustrated and threatened and are venting their frustration like this or are just so disrespectful of women that the heinousness of the crimes, not thoughts, seem justified to them.

This superiority complex has to be removed from their minds, that mind-set has to go. Is it that hard for men to acknowledge that women are growing in social strata?

Men have gotten away with doing so much wrong and the same is the case with rapes. They think they’ll easily get away with it—and they have, many times—a man charged with crime in this patriarchal society is hardly at fault, while the woman is mostly at fault when she’s charged with anything.

The rapist rapes because he knows he’s easily going to get away with it, and because he knows people will just stand and watch like bystanders.

The Delhi Police did the same by first telling the girl’s parents to just take some money and not release it in public, like it never happened.

Let that sink in for a moment.

To add to that, an ACP slapped a protestor about five times, just because she had refused to move out of the way to allow politicians like Sandeep Dikshit to enter the hospital. It seems like the police officers feel that they’ve already been defeated and just don’t want to deal with rising problems.

With an increasing number of police reports, it seems more likely that the reported numbers of cases are getting closer to the actual number of rape cases. The increased cases must lead to stricter punishments, which should in turn reduce the actual number of rapes. Maybe the numbers were never really any low, they just weren’t being reported. At least women are being braver by reporting incidents which would’ve gone unreported in the past.

What would be the apt punishment for these savages- Death Penalty or Castration?

I honestly couldn’t care less which one gets picked. As if the previously increasing rape incidents weren’t enough, after this troublesome condition, both options seem genuinely viable to me. Harsh punishments are a must; there is no other way to it.

Political leaders and organisations are saying that they strongly condemn the act. What difference is that making, apart from being just a political statement saying that we as politicians also feel disgusted by this act?

Some politicians have said in the past that rapes wouldn’t happen if women stopped wearing short skirts or skimpy dresses. What will they say now? How short were a five-year-old’s clothes?

All they’ve really done is talk and react to such incidents, rather than act strongly, to ensure that such atrocities never happen again. They have the power given to them by the public, and it’s high time they made good use of it.

This incident has caused a lot of mayhem in our society and even more so, in our minds. We knew certain people were heinous and demented, but this is just another level of evil. This whole sick, misogynistic mind-set has to change and the ones in power will have to act strongly and quickly. Otherwise, “safety” will soon become a meaningless word and the rape epidemic will never end.

Akhil Thakur

Image Source [http://www.pardaphash.com/uploads/images/660/Minor-Raped-in-Delhi-Pardaphash-74125.jpg]

Indian-American student wrongly targeted as Bomber as well

Four days after the Boston Marathon Bombings, a wild man hunt ended with the suspects finally being identified and then captured.

The two suspects, Tamerlan Tsarnaev, 26 years old, and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, 19 years old, killed an Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) police officer, injured a transit officer in a firefight and threw explosive devices at the police during their getaway attempt in a long night of violence. One was shot and killed in the shootout, while the other was critically injured and captured.

Identified to be from the Russian region near Chechnya (which has been plagued by an Islamic insurgency stemming from separatist wars) the two were suspected of planting the pressure-cooker explosives that ripped through the crowd at the marathon finish line, killing three people and wounding more than 180.

During their getaway, the two brothers killed a MIT policeman and severely wounded another officer as well. They then carjacked a Mercedes vehicle and even took the driver hostage for some time, but eventually let him go.

Interestingly enough, the driver actually helped the police a great deal by helping them locate the two. His tip eventually led to the shootout in the Watertown area.

According to authorities, the suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was found cornered in a homeowner’s yard, after an extensive house-to-house search, where he exchanged gunfire with the police while holed up in a boat.

Tamerlan Tsarnaev had studied accounting as a part-time student at Bunker Hill Community College in Boston for three semesters from 2006 to 2008. Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, on the other hand, was registered as a student at the University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth. Students said he was on campus this week after the Boston Marathon bombing. The campus closed down on Friday along with other colleges around the Boston area.

United States President Barack Obama said,”Tonight, there are still many unanswered questions. Among them, why did young men who grew up and studied here as part of our communities and our country resort to such violence?” Obama asked.”How did they plan and carry out these attacks? And did they receive any help? The families of those killed so senselessly deserve answers.”

He also thanked the law enforcements services saying the country owed them a debt of gratitude. He more importantly said that the terrorists’ agenda had failed, whatever they planned to achieve had failed because the people of Boston refused to be intimidated or terrorised.

Finding the culprits in four days’ time is certainly a swift capture, India could learn a lot from this.

Sunil Tripathi and Mike Mulugeta wrongly suspected as Bombers

Amidst all this, the social media’s unreliability was again brought into question as word got out that the Boston Police Department scanner had declared the names of the two suspects. Sunil Tripathi and Mike Mulugeta were the names that first circulated quickly on twitter as the suspect names, a few hours before the real suspects were identified.

Both names quickly became Twitter trends, especially Sunil Tripathi. The tweet shown above was circulating quickly, but the problem was that there was no mention of Sunil’s name in the official Police scanner. Tweets became re-tweets, and soon the two names were being spitefully abused on Twitter and Facebook. Sunil Tripathi has in fact been missing since March the 16^th. People even hurled abuses on a Facebook page his parents had set up just to find him.

Reddit has had threads discussing whether Sunil was the bomber. Now those discussion threads have been deleted and banned but where these two names arose from is more than hard to figure out. Maybe people heard what they wanted to hear, but at least the tweeters corrected themselves.

What about the families of the two innocent people? What about all the slander and abuse they received from people worldwide?

How Sunil Tripathi’s parents must’ve reacted after knowing that their son, who’d been missing for a month, was a suspected bomber, is beyond my imagination. They deserve something more than just a public apology on television or Twitter or Facebook, that’s for sure.

In the end the real suspects were apprehended, but again the reliability of online news spread by crowds has come into serious questioning. After all, such false accusations and the onrushing slander and trauma just don’t go away with a single apology.

Akhil Thakur

Image Source [http://resources2.news.com.au/images/2013/04/16/1226621/382242-boston-marathon-bombings.jpg]

Himayat Baig punished for dreadful terrorist act

On April 16^th, a Pune court convicted Mirza Himayat Baig, the only man arrested for the 2010 German Bakery terror attack in Pune. He was yesterday sentenced to death under Indian Penal Code Sections 302, 307 (murder and attempt to murder), 435, 474 (mischief by fire and explosive and forgery) and 120(b) (criminal conspiracy), besides other charges under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act and the Explosives Act.

During the February 2010 German Bakery bombing, 17 people were killed and 64 injured at the popular eatery in Pune. Baig was arrested in September that year. Investigators said they found 1,200 kg of explosives at his home in the Latur district of Maharashtra. Interestingly, out of the eight suspects, he was the only one caught and arrested.

Baig comes from a poor family, who made their living selling fried snacks. He was the youngest son of a halwai (Indian confectioner) in Beed’s Killa Maidan until he met Zabiuddin Ansari, an LeT and IM operative, alias Abu Jundal. According to officers from the Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS), the two came in contact in the year 2003.

In Pune, Baig met the highly influential Akbar Chaudhary, an Indian Mujahideen terrorist, who was later arrested for the Ahmedabad blasts. It was through him that Baig met his Pune blast collaborators.

By 2007, Baig was in touch with the LeT through the internet using fake email accounts. His involvement in suspicious activities had significantly increased after his 2007 arrest. ATS officers said that he set up an Internet café in Udgir where the bomb was set up in 2009, with the help of IM operatives Muhammad Zarar Siddibapa and Mohsin Chaudhury.

An ATS officer said that they had orders to go ahead with the blasts in January 2010. When convicted, Baig pleaded “not guilty” with a happy response to going to trial.

He claimed that he was in Aurangabad for a wedding on 13 February, 2010, the day the bomb exploded at the Pune eatery. Recording his statement in court, Baig said he was a well-educated teacher without any criminal past who was scouting for a job in Udgir, Latur and Aurangabad. He said he appeared for an exam in Latur and had gone there again to get some information about DEd CET on 19 August, 2010, when he was arrested.

He also claimed that all this was a conspiracy against him by ATS Chief Rakesh Maria and Investigating Officer Vinod Satav. His lawyer pleaded for leniency again, on grounds of his poor background, well-educated past and him not being a hardened criminal. He even said that the ATS planted the RDX bombs in his house and then seized it.

He also denied going to the bakery altogether, but the controversy doesn’t end there.

The DIG of Police Ravindra Kadam (ATS) had told a TV channel in Udgir that the prime suspect Mirza Himayat Baig was not present in the city when the blast had happened. Kadam’s statement was clashing with ADG of Police and ATS Chief Rakesh Maria’s statement that Baig had come to the city along with Indian Mujahideen terrorist Yasin Bhatkal on 13 February. However, Kadam later retracted his own statement. So, that brings up some questions.

Then Baig’s cell phone records (provided by Vodafone) showed that he was in Aurangabad when the bombing took place.The investigators said the conspiracy for the terror blast was hatched in Colombo, Sri Lanka, in March 2008 in the presence of Baig, Jundal and Kagti.

Baig had gone to Sri Lanka but the police never investigated there; the investigators never did forensic tests to find any residue of explosives in that internet café. Had they done so, they might have had some concrete evidence.

Despite these inconsistencies, the Pune court supported the prosecution contention that the blast was “a carefully planned and executed attack” calculated to terrorise the general public, causing extensive damage to life and property. Baig’s lawyer claimed that “of the 103 prosecution witnesses, only six claim that Baig was in Pune on February 13, 2010”.

With the defence respecting the court’s decision, Baig’s lawyer will appeal to the Mumbai High Court. On the other end, public prosecutor Raja Thakare argued, “A man is bound to know the consequence of his act. Baig was found to be associated with alleged operatives Mohsin Choudhary and Zabi.”

While a weeping Himayat Baig told the court that he was also a victim of the blasts and pleaded for leniency, Thakare said that this case didn’t deserve any leniency whatsoever.

Whether any such mercy is given remains to be seen, but what about the other five suspects? Will they not pay for their actions? Aren’t they also equally responsible?

Akhil Thakur

Image Source [http://static.indianexpress.com/m-images/Mon%20Apr%2015%202013,%2011:41%20hrs/M_Id_376414_2012_Pune_Blast_case.jpg]

Three people died; More than 180 people injured

The blasts at the Boston Marathon course on Monday has left at least three people dead – including a twenty nine-year-old woman, a Boston University graduate student from China and an eight-year-old boy, who was cheering the runners with his family.

The twin blasts at the Boston Marathon finish line just ended their lives in an instant, and thirteen others —out of the 180 plus injured— had their limbs amputated. In fact, five more undetonated explosives were found around the area.

The attack came from nowhere, and without any threats. Two pressure cooker bombs containing six litres of liquid, BB-like pellets and nails caused all this damage. Every media website was uploading extremely graphic pictures of the blasts— with bloodied people. And the photographers decided to take pictures instead of helping the injured. But that’s not the issue here.

The people who survived the blasts will now go through a lengthy process physical recovery. There’s the psychological battle as well — living with the memories of the deafening blasts, the carnage, and the fear as they searched for their loved ones.

When the papers talked to the people present there, some runners said that they thought the first blast was a shot from the celebratory cannon. By the second, there were no such illusions. When the second bomb went off, the spectators’ cheers turned to scream. The scene on the ground was horrendous. Blood, and unconscious people were everywhere.

The next question that arose was “Who was responsible for this?” U.S. President Barack Obama condemned it as a terror attack and said that the ones responsible will pay for this. On Wednesday, investigators said that they found an image of a suspect who may have planted the homemade bombs.

In fact according to CNN, an arrest was made recently, and the suspect seems to be Caucasian, but that didn’t stop the country from targeting the Muslim community in the United States of America.

The New York Post was quick enough to claim that the prime suspect was a 20-year-old Saudi national while also inaccurately reporting that 12 people had died. It turned out that the Saudi citizen was one of the injured spectators at the race course. On the other hand on twitter, the Muslims and the Sikhs were being targeted.

Tweets with terms likes “towel heads” were being posted. As if the hatred filled treatment the Sikhs and Muslims received after the 9/11 attacks wasn’t enough. Racial profiling was back due to sheer ignorance and hatred or by genuine fear. The situation  after the 9/11 attacks was such that people used to ask to get re-seated on the planes just because the person sitting next to them was a Muslim or a Sikh or looked like one. The harassment they received in other areas of life was quite extreme; and these attacks might bring that mentality back into some minds. But the mentality of instantly associating a group or religion with such actions needs to be erased from people’s minds.

The blasts caused worldwide panic, especially after seeing the United States of America pride over its fool-proof security system after the 9/11 attacks. The London marathon is scheduled for next week, the Metropolitan Police will have to keep its fingers crossed.

The entire world is praying for the injured and hoping for their recovery.

As the Boston blasts show, terror incidents can never be fully avoided. But the crucial thing to learn from the Boston Marathon incident is how things were handled after the blasts. How you recuperate and stand back up.

The evacuation was swift and although they couldn’t save people’s limbs, they did save a lot of lives. India definitely should learn from these swift response techniques.

I read somewhere on Facebook, “If you’re trying to defeat the human spirit, marathoners are the wrong group to target” and that’s what everyone should focus on; keeping the human spirit alive. How we respond to such tragedies is what’s more important.

Akhil Thakur

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The new law may have been passed but safety is still a major concern

BJP’s national general secretary Vani Tripathi got into a frightening situation in Delhi on Thursday. She was going back home at around 9.30 p.m. from a meeting. She was in Greater Kailash, a posh area in Delhi, when a Scorpio car hit hers.

(As told to IANS)

“I was coming back after a meeting in Vasant Vihar around 9.30 p.m. when my car was hit by a Scorpio car in GK.  They (the five men) were all drunk. My car was damaged and even the tyres burst. They then tried to pull me out of the car. My driver locked me inside the car and countered them. I called the police but their arrival got delayed because of the traffic. There were cars plying on the road, but no one stopped to help. I fear what would have happened if my driver was not present.”

By the time the police reached the scene, the offenders had fled the place and luckily Tripathi was safe at the end.

Greater Kailash is one of the most famous places and known to be an attraction point for Delhi people. 9.30 p.m. is a time many people are going back home after work or are enjoying themselves at malls, theatres, markets and other joints. At such a time, a place like GK is full of people and vehicles.

Due to the crowd, not all cars are checked and not all people are stopped or questioned. This gives a chance to men who are potential offenders to get by easily. There was traffic, so there were no cops. The place was crowded but no one even tried to help the woman trapped in one of the most dreaded moments.

Women who are working late shifts or have no other ways to commute on a daily basis rely on drivers or cabs to go home at night. Graveyard shifts also become a problem for women who do not have their own mode of transport. In such a city, women cannot rely on their drivers either. Many cases have been reported where cab drivers have taken women to remote areas to physically harm them or even rob them.

There are security guards in the cabs provided by companies to ensure the safety for women. These people may give some sense of support but even at times they aren’t armed or of any match when multiple men come up to stop cabs and try to pull out the women. These guards are easily overpowered and by the time they report the company, the worst happens.

In this case, luckily Tripathi’s driver was quick and able to ward of the men till the time they fled the scene. The men tried to pull the woman out but the driver locked her in the car and dealt with the drunken men himself.

While cabs may guarantee the safety of women, there are still a lot of loopholes to be detangled. When a man is present in the car; even then women are attacked, there is no sense of security. When a sexual predator can stop a car with multiple people, he can easily attack a woman who is driving her own car.

Many women in the city rely on their own vehicles like cars and bikes to get to places. Traffic cops are present at main points but the empty and shady roads are unattended. These areas are dangerous for anyone, let alone a female who is driving alone.

Some streets have no lights, cops or other women, and usually these streets are used more by people who avoid traffic, including cabs. When office cabs go to places like Faridabad or Ghaziabad they have to avoid long, stretches of lonely roads to avoid criminals.

Why isn’t there security around such places?

The only way the safety can be ensured is if reliable policemen are placed at such places, given that the policemen themselves are morally clean. Security cameras and checks can be increased. Weapons can be given to guards in the cabs to fight someone off in cases of emergencies. Girls should be allowed to keep knives or some other form of weapons for their own safety.

Till then, safety is still a lost cause in the capital.

Ambika Chauhan

Image Source [http://st1.bollywoodlife.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/Vani-Tripathi-1-050413130405140058.jpg]

The president signed the bill today, making it the law

Today is the day that many will let out a sigh of relief. The Criminal Law Amendment Bill was finally signed by President Pranab Mukherjee. The law has now replaced the ordinance that came to existence on February the 3^rd that was to expire on April the 4^th.

This bill had been a controversial debate ever since it was first announced. The anti-rape bill had a hard time being passed in two houses due to the strong opposition regarding the content. The bill had lowered the consensual age for sex to 16 years, this troubled many. The misuse of this provision worried many ministers and the department concerned with the safety of women and children. After the debate, the age 18 years remained the consensual age.

Another issue with the bill was that the term “rape” replaced “sexual assault”. This decision immediately made the crime gender specific, women would not be charged. This makes it unjust for men who are victims of sexual offences.

The bill had an addition of crimes that were not punishable before in the country. This included stalking, acid attack, disrobing a woman without her consent and voyeurism. The law also defined that an absence of struggle does not mean it won’t be considered as rape. Medical care will also be provided to the victims of rape or other assaults for free.

There was also a clause where death penalty was to be given to the offenders in cases where the victim died or was left in a vegetative state.

Although the bill had provisions in some cases, there were many shortcomings as well. The bill had no mention about the victims of marital rape. Domestic abuse is a common occurrence but the bill mentioned no such offence and the punishment for it.

Another provision missing was the lack of precautions and measures to determine false cases alleged against men. In many cases women falsely accuse men of sexual crimes for their own intentions and purposes. There are no measures to protect people from this loophole.

The new bill also removes the word “political” from the new draft. It was stated that rape committed by a person political, social, and economic dominance would be aggravated rape. This was the initial provision that was later changed.

Many might be celebrating that the new law has been passed, but will that be enough to bring a change?

Even after the public outrage over the brutal Delhi gang rape, there was an alarming rate of rape cases occurring all over the country. These changes might install a sense of fear in potential offenders, but many may be unfazed by this.

Will it really make a difference?

Will the laws be followed by the officials properly?

Are the authorities trustable?

These are questions that still haunt many. What will the outcome- only time can tell.

Ambika Chauhan

Image Source [http://www.madhyamam.com/en/sites/default/files/imagecache/w604/rape%20protest%204_0.jpg]

After the horrifying Delhi gang rape, it is now a topic of debate how minors should be treated in such cases

One of the accused in the Delhi gang rape case was a teenager. The 17-year-old was one of the offenders in the case that enraged the public. The teenager was charged with the same number of offences as the five men but was to be tried separately in a Juvenile court. The public protested that the accused was old enough to differentiate between the right and wrong. He knew what he was doing and should be punished with the rest of the accused.

The Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection) Act 2000 declares that the accused can be kept at the reform home only until he turns 18. After that, the accused cannot be sent to jail. This provision in the case of the gang rape accused would have led to his release within six months. The victim’s father and almost all the protestors believed that the minor should be given the death penalty. They believed that the accused didn’t deserve the leniency because he was just as monstrous as the others.

In such cases where the crimes are of such inhuman extent, it is often debated how a teenager or child should be treated. While lowering the age to consider a person a juvenile can be an option, it can be misused. There are instances where the suspects are often mistreated or some policemen take advantage of their power by abusing or falsely accusing a person. In such cases a juvenile could be physically or emotionally harmed.

But lowering the age can also help nab the accused that abuse the privilege and commit serious crimes and get away with it. Like in the gang rape case, the accused was declared as a minor but his true age wasn’t confirmed. False certificates and records can be created in such cases and dangerous criminals can get away with this.

Juvenile aggression is a problem increasing by the day in India. In recent times a pre-teen child was accused of raping a young girl. Many male teenagers get into scuffles that lead to physical harm and even deaths at time. Young children are forced to join gangs or violent groups and end up involved in criminal activities.

Regarding this situation, Punjab and Haryana high court has declared that punishments should be given to the accused based on the understanding of consequences and not biological age. If the accused can differentiate between the right and wrong, he or she deserves the penalties.

(As told to TOI)

“It is the advancement of the mental faculty of juvenile accused, which would suggest whether he is an adult or a juvenile. The courts ought not automatically assume that the statutory definition would confer the halo of a juvenile and give him an undeserving protection and benefits. In a country like ours the age given in the school certificate or the records of the school would only speak of an age imaginatively conjured by the parents at the time of admission. Even though it may form a persuasive piece of material, but certainly no credence and outright acceptability should be afforded to it.”

The court also suggested that a specialized examination should be conducted in this case. This examination will be carried out by experts who will be able to examine the accused. They will check his or her ability to segregate good and bad to show the maturity regarding the deeds.

The court also held that factors like growth and maturity in the psychological and social context would determine if the person should be considered as a child or an adult. The biological age should not be the only consideration.

In our country, fake records and documents can easily be made and produced to the officials. One may get away by proving themselves as minors based on false birth certificates. In such cases it’s not about lowering the age for trial but to evaluate a person’s mindset. Their ability to analyze situations and then act accordingly should be noted and not the papers they have.

In cases like the Delhi gang rape and the other cases where the juveniles were accused of sexual, terrorism, or other brutal crimes, the accused should be evaluated strictly without leniency. If a person is voluntarily committing a crime, the person’s intention should be considered.

The court may have given this statement, but how quickly will this be applied is the main question.

With the juvenile aggression rising, we need stricter laws for the criminals who can be caught at an early age.

Ambika Chauhan

Image Source [http://i.ehow.com/images/a07/g5/pg/explain-juvenile-court-process-juvenile-800X800.jpg]