Legal punishment is not the problem
In India, 32,000 cases were registered in 2022. This meant about 80 rapes took place every day. The reported cases are probably only a tenth of the reality. Rape is the most common crime, not the rarest. The problem is not inadequate legal punishment. It is above all a cultural failure. The rape victim is not seen as a victim, but as a cause of shame for her family. This came out clearly when Prajwal Revanna, grandson of former Prime Minister Deve Gowda, allegedly filmed 2,976 video clips of him/her forcibly sexually assaulting several women. Given the family’s political influence, no one in the constituency dared to complain to the police. Only when the video clips went viral on social media, the scandal came to light.
The rapist must be boycotted
Rape victims deserve sympathy and support. Rapists should be immediately ostracized. Instead, victims are ostracized by their communities. Victims and their families leave their villages to escape humiliation and social scorn. Traditional Indian society views rape victims not as victims of horrific crimes, but as reprehensible women acting in porn clips. This humiliation is too much for many families to bear.
Why is rape common in the country?
Revanna allegedly kidnapped a woman to silence her. The police rescued her, but he/she and his/her family will continue to bear the pain for the rest of their lives. his/her son-in-law says, “Now the whole world knows about us. How can we go back to our village and live? We are poor people who struggle every day to earn a living. The area where we lived will never accept us.” Powerful political families are not alone in getting away with rape cases except in exceptional circumstances like video clips. Most victims do not complain due to fear of the police and also due to social consequences. This is the real reason why rapes are so common in India.
Being seen as shameful women
Women who complain to the police are not seen as heroines who bring the bad guys to justice but as shameful women. In North India, rape is often described as ‘ladki ko bada kiya’, which means the girl has been made bad. The rapist is not called bad. Traditional society treats women as objects, so a rape victim is seen as a spoiled object whom no traditional man would marry.
No wonder a woman who was repeatedly raped by Prajwal did not tell her family until the video clip went public. She wanted to hide the truth from her family too. After the Nirbhaya rape in Delhi in 2012, a new law was enacted, tightening the definition and punishment for rape. Did this reduce the problem? No, the number of reported rapes increased from 24,923 in 2012 to over 32,000 in 2022.
Only 30 percent are proven guilty
The J.S. Verma Committee on rape noted that across the world, harsh punishments were not the preventive measure. Rather, it was the promise of sympathy at the police station and quick, sure convictions. In India, regrettably, the police have little sympathy for victims and many times, victims are raped again (with Dalits being the worst treated). Cases drag on for years and the conviction rate is only 30%. Above all, traditional society ostracizes the victim rather than the rapist.
Death penalty will increase the number of victims killed
In medieval England, poor people would often steal animals from the flocks of big landowners. So, their landlords made it a law to hang for the theft of any animal. This led to a popular saying – ‘You can be hanged for a sheep, but also for a lamb.’ That is, you can commit a bigger crime if the punishment is the same. Right now, only a few of the rapists murder the victim. If the death penalty is made mandatory, every rapist will have a strong reason to take the life of the victim. he/she can be hanged for rape as much as for murder.
This cannot solve the problem. Faster convictions and women police officers handling all rape cases will help. But above all we need a change in social norms where rape victims are not seen as damaged goods but as tragic victims. This cannot be enforced by law; society has to take the lead.
