Daily Times

Six years is a long time for justice to be delivered. Especially in a high-profile gang-rape that hit headlines both at home and abroad. Yet this is how long the parents of Jyoti Singh have had to wait.

India’s Supreme Court (SC) this week upheld its own verdict after a one-year review period. That is, the four men involved in the New Delhi gang-rape and murder of the physiotherapy student will still face the death penalty. Of the six initially arrested, one committed suicide in prison the following year; while the one juvenile offender was sentenced to three years at a reform facility. He was released in 2013.

And while Jyoti’s parents believe that justice has been done for their daughter — not everyone is so sure. To be clear, the brutal attack sent shockwaves through Indian society. Women from all backgrounds came on to the streets to call for tougher anti-rape laws. And for women to have freedom of movement without men putting them in their place. Jyoti and a male friend had been returning from a late-night cinema trip. This, according to the men in the dock, was reason enough to warrant what they did to her; including inserting an iron rod inside her to the point that her guts became severely dislodged.

At the time, some women’s groups protested against an international spotlight that was conducive to unfairly stereotyping the poor and illiterate Indian man. Whereas in cases of rape both the law and civil society must stand with women victims. Unequivocally. Thus fast-forward to the present and it perhaps ought to be sufficient that the parents are satisfied that the hangman’s noose is the answer; to make the attackers pay for their crime. A life for a life. All the better to act as a deterrent for the future and to keep women safe.

Except that there does not seem to be much supporting evidence towards this end. For according to India’s National Crime Records Bureau data for 2016, incidents of rape shot up by more than 82 percent as compared to the previous year. Or put another way: in 2016, the police registered 38,947 complaints of rape; representing an increase of 12.4 percent from 2015 when 35,000 such incidents had been reported. Indeed, a breakdown of official stats for 2016 paint a terribly grim picture: every 13 minutes a woman was raped; every single day a woman was gang-raped; every 69 minutes a bride was murdered over dowry; and every month 19 women were victims of acid attacks.

Thus for many, the SC sentencing may have more to do with restoring faith in the judiciary. Yet even if true, it fails to address the escalating numbers. What therefore is needed is a change in mind set. One that frames women’s access to the public sphere as well as self-determination over their bodies and future as fundamental and non-negotiable humans right. This will require sensitising the legal system.

The Indian state may well believe that by awarding capital punishment in the Jyoti Singh case it has done its job. Though this is a blatant misnomer. And it runs the real risk that the aforementioned will once more be overshadowed by those who either insist on seeing all acts of violence against women as a predominantly class issue; or else those who think that killing a handful of men will resolve India’s rape problem.

Either way, this will not do.  *

Published in Daily Times, July 10^th 2018.