Following on the footsteps of Anna Hazare, the leading anti-corruption crusader in India, fasting as a pressure tactic started gaining popularity, first in India, then throughout the region. Most famously in Nepal, Dr Govinda KC was successful in getting the government to overturn politically-motivated appointments at the Institute of Medicine, Maharajgunj, the government-run hospital he was affiliated with. As such, Hazare’s unique method for progressive social change can be considered a tipping point in the popularity of fasting as a protest tool.
More recently, the rape of a 23-year-old-woman on a public bus in the Indian capital galvanized the entire country to come out in protest against the heinous practice that the Indian government had for long hesitated to tackle head on. Now the case of Sita Rai (name changed), the 21-year-old migrant worker who was robbed by immigration officials at TIA upon her arrival from Saudi Arabia and later allegedly raped by a police constable, seems to have turned the tide in the battle against rape in Nepal.
Young activists have been protesting in front of Singha Durbar and the PM’s residence at Baluwatar for the last couple of days, demanding justice for Rai and strong punishment for the two immigration officials. On Friday, those picketing the PM’s office were also demanding proper investigation into the alleged suicide of Saraswati Subedi, a domestic help who was found hanging from the bathroom ceiling at the place of her work at Anamnagar a couple weeks ago. In the wake of Rai’s case, there has been a series of articles and radio and TV reports expressing outrage at the government’s apathy in investigating rape cases and punishing the perpetrators. We fully support this grassroots-level movement for justice for rape victims. Such a mass-based movement was long overdue.
In the case of rapes, Nepali laws still put the burden of proof on women. She has to have visible injuries to mount a credible case. If she had been ‘inappropriately’ dressed at the time of the crime, it counts against her, as much as her ‘character’. If a woman who has been raped is deemed to be of ‘loose character’, she is believed to have invited the crime on herself. Despite the socio-economic changes the country has witnessed since the 2006 Jana Andolan, Nepal is still a deeply patriarchal society, with social, economic and political structures bent heavily in favor of men. The incidents of rapes and violence against women that pour in from around the country on a daily basis are testament to this bitter truth.
Only if the state sends out a clear message that any kind of violence on women will be met with strong retaliation will these crimes decrease. This will not be possible without giving more teeth to the country’s legal instruments against gender-based violence to close the loopholes that allow perpetrators to get away with token punishment. A country where over half of the population has to live in perpetual fear of violation of their ownership of their own bodies cannot be considered a true democracy.
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