Tag: enough said

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Enough said

Choose whom you honour

Humra Quraishi wonders why we’re not talking more about the young man who stood by the Delhi gang rape victim. We’re choosing, instead, to focus on rubbish statements by politicians.

For three consecutive weeks, I have been writing on rapes and its offshoots, but there’s little else in focus even now. Pushed aside for the moment are corruption scams and scandals, together with those men who were crying themselves hoarse over black money that others have stashed away. Anna Hazare has been quiet for a long time, and so have his key associates.

In the midst of this, those who are opening their mouths are speaking plain rubbish. The Samajwadi Party’s Mumbai man Abu Azmi wants the young generation to not have boyfriends and girlfriends, and he thinks couples should not step out at night. I wish Abu Azmi would try imposing his ideas on his son and actress daughter-in-law Ayesha Takia. Jumping into the fray are others, so-called leaders from various regions, proclaiming that women should don overcoats and be fully covered at all times! No more jeans and short tops! As per these men, women should be coy, dressed in saris, tending to their homes, submitting to their husbands’ never-ending demands, and doing little else.

What is noteworthy is that politicians of the capital city seem to have matured. Maybe they have been around for far too long to be reckless in their statements. Or because they have sensed the mood of the masses and cannot afford to add to the growing unrest. Whatever the reason, politicians here have not much contributed to these rubbish thoughts by their counterparts elsewhere. There was no overreaction even to Shashi Tharoor’s suggestion – that if the parents okayed it, the rape victim’s name be made official for an anti-rape law to be named after her – and it was recognised to be an earnest statement, not a malicious one.

This one gang rape has opened the clichéd Pandora’s Box. Women are not just hitting  out, they are also trying to connect. But we cannot lose sight of the young man, the victim’s friend, who not just stood by her, trying to save her from the rapists, but even now has the courage to refute the police’s theories, after fearlessly declaring that the cops were not there in time to rescue the girl.

It isn’t easy to go against the establishment, especially the police and the very machinery at their command. But this young man has done exactly that, at a time when he has suffered tremendously after battling the rapists and getting injured in the process, then losing his steady friend.

If any attention is to be paid to anyone’s statements, it should be this young man’s. If anybody is to be honoured, it should be him.

Humra Quraishi is a senior political journaliast. She is the author of Kashmir: The Untold Story and co-author of Simply Khushwant.

(Picture courtesy telegraph.co.uk)

 

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Enough said

Death is not the answer

Humra Quraishi writes on why the death penalty could be a dangerous tool in the hands of the guilty powerful.

Even as I write this column, news reports are coming in of a 17-year-old raped by her friend in South Delhi’s posh Safdarjung Enclave. And just a day ago, there were more reports of women molested and burnt and killed. Yes, we ushered in the new year amidst tremendous hopelessness and simmering anger. As each single day passes, more women are being violated and killed, yet our politicians come up with more stale assurances and do little else.

And in the midst of this, we sit raping the very issue of rape. Politics has taken complete charge – not just between the Congress and the Right Wing, but also between the civilians and the military.

I don’t want to waste this space in battling either. For the basic crux is this – none of the tinkers, tailors, soldiers, sailors, rich men, poor men, beggars, thieves, mantris or their attached santris, has any business or legal right, officially or unofficially, to condone or try to explain why rapes happen and how it could be the woman’s fault. No sarkari ploys or camouflages can shield them when they do this.

It’s even more bizarre to hear these politicians pass those statements that were probably last heard in medieval times: they speak freely of chemical castrations or hangings-to-death. Some Right wing politicians are currently behaving like the kings and queens of a bygone era; but where the latter said, ‘Off with his head1’, these politicians are ‘Off with his pen*s!’

As I have been writing all along, the death penalty or castration orders are not the solution to the problem. In fact, it will lead to absolute anarchy as hundreds of innocents could potentially be hanged or their vital organs harmed forever. With corruption seeping into every single sphere of the government machinery, it’s a well-known fact that even in cases involving thefts, the actual culprits have been seen hobnobbing with the high chairs of power, whilst ordinary citizens are detained and sit languishing as undertrials in the jails and prisons of the country.

So there’s little guarantee that innocents would not be charged with rape and hanged to death to shield the culprits who may be close to powerful persons who can protect them. And we would realise this only years later. In my opinion, it is not just the actual perpetrators who are the offenders in a crime, it is the bunch of communal politicians who help protect such offenders and who wield complete power over the police machinery that are the more dangerous.

This could be just the very tip of the never-melting iceberg. Seeing our track record of the sheer misuse of power and all that it drags along with it, meting out the death penalty to all and sundry could have serious, dangerous offshoots which could rip off whatever remains of our ‘modern, developed society’.

At the cost of sounding repetitive, I want to emphasise that it’s the mind, the psyche of the rapist which ought to be set right before we do anything else to him. But first, we need to set right the minds of all those Bollywood producers and film directors who go about making third rate films complete with cheap item numbers and horribly vulgar dance movements. It’s about time we focus our attention on the very cause of what is turning men into beasts when it comes to women.

Whilst Bollywood flourishes along with the political ruling class, there seems to be no attempt made  to book the film industry under charges of spreading vulgarity or provoking hundreds of impressionable minds to think that women are ‘easy’ in real life as well, that all they are good for is to entertain men in whichever way they desire, and that if a woman says ‘no’, she actually means ‘yes’.

Humra Quraishi is a senior political journalist. She is the author of Kashmir: The Untold Story and co-author of Simply Khushwant.

 

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Enough said

Help victims, not the accused

Humra Quraishi writes on the malaise of rape and how a lack of policing is helping rapists get away it.

Another gang rape has taken place in New Delhi. No, it’s not really surprising, for eve-teasing is so rampant there that no woman is actually safe on the roads or lanes of this city. After dusk, it’s risky for a woman to commute, unless of course, she is a top politician or a senior civil servant or Somebody Important, in which case she has adequate security as she goes about her daily tasks.

And before I write any further, let me mention that even young men and teenage boys are not safe in Delhi either. With this, another point that cannot be ignored is that people’s faith in cop and the policing system is nil. The average citizen is apprehensive about entering a police station to lodge a complaint, because that one act results in a hundred different offshoots, with him or her facing some unsavoury consequences. There are several horror stories to be told about the city’s lockups, the police thanas, the interrogation and detention centres. The worst crimes take place right there, under the watchful eyes of cops.

In fact, there are no records and statistics to show how many cop-rapists and molesters have been hanged thus far. They get away because of all the possible loopholes in this system.

So where do you and I go for help if we are molested or raped or eve-teased? It sure does require nerves of steel to report these crimes, and that’s why most of these crimes go unreported. Reporting them is, perhaps, the last resort for most people.

I am of the definite view that hanging is not the solution. Are we so short-sighted to think that hanging a couple of men will solve all crises, be it related to terrorism or rape? Death isn’t a remedy for such ills. Those off-with-your-head orders were fine when given by rulers of bygone days, because the rule of the law was paramount then. Here, when every fifth or sixth man is trying his level best to grab an opportunity to touch or intrude on a woman’s personal space, how many men can be hanged? We will upset the gender ratio if we hang every eve-teaser and rapist.

Another important point, which most of us ignore, is what we are seeing on the big and small screens today –  obnoxious item numbers, with even more obnoxious lyrics, and our top heroines dance in them without the slightest trace of embarrassment. There are disgusting image portrayals, but there doesn’t seem to be any effort being made to stop this kind of objectification.

Today the situation is so pathetic that we have moved backwards, beyond the medieval ages. If you are planning to move out of your Delhi home after dusk, you to yourself well and try and return before it gets late. Men friends or a male companion cannot be of much help if such a situation happens to you, because rapists attack in groups, and are often deranged with drink that only a policeman can probably stop them.

Humra Quraishi is a senior political journalist. She is the author of Kashmir: The Untold Story and co-author of Simply Khushwant.

(Picture courtesy ibnlive.com)

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Enough said

Confer with those who need help

Humra Quraishi writes about her disgust over international conferences that seek to include only the well-informed, upper classes of society.

I recently received an invite to the World Breastfeeding Conference 2012, and I confess, I was somewhat taken aback to see it. Hosted in New Delhi, it is said to have attracted 900 delegates from 86 nations.

No, I didn’t attend it. I didn’t feel the need to, not because I am no longer in the child-bearing or breastfeeding stage myself, but simply because I have long felt that such meets are hosted only for the ‘upper’ sections of society, or the ‘top drawer’, if you will, which is anyway well aware of the benefits of breast feeding.

Why couldn’t the organisers of this meet – The global Breastfeeding Initiative for Child Survival (gBICS), together with the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare and Ministry of Women and Child Development (GOI ) – hold this meet at some of the rural pockets and locales of the country? Why hold this in New Delhi and why in one of the posh locales of New Delhi? Why not in one of those outlying colonies or bastis and mohallas and jhuggi clusters, whose women may actually need the knowledge these conferences have to impart?

And what hits the most is the fact that Minister of Women and Child development, Krishna Tirath, does not seem to react when children and young teenagers are detained and arrested and harassed by the various security agencies in the police machinery. Why is there little to no intervention from the Government, and in particular, from this Ministry, when such incidents take place?

Stretching my disgust a little further, let me also add that Krishna Tirath should try walking on any of those stretches of New Delhi or commute by any of the public transport means available to the rest of us, and then see for herself what happens. As I have been writing all along all these years, it’s actually tough for a woman to walk on the streets of the capital city without being eve-teased. I am now middle-aged, but even I have to think twice before stepping out of my house in a sleeveless shirt, unless I throw on a long flowing dupatta to cover my arms and chest.

And in the midst of these basic realities, if we hold these fashionable conferences (or let’s just call them publicity-seeking meets), then there’s something, or maybe everything here, that just doesn’t jell together. These discrepancies between two Indias stand out so blatantly.

Humra Quraishi is a senior political journalist and author of Kashmir: The Untold Story and co-author of Simply Khushwant. 

 

 

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Enough said

A fine gentleman

Humra Quraishi writes on the demise of IK Gujral, and what she first thinks of when she hears his name.

I heard the news of former Prime Minister IK Gujral’s demise, and the very first image that floated in my mind was of him and his poet wife Sheila strolling in the Lodi Gardens. They wouldn’t walk formally, like most married couples do, but like two close friends, hand in hand.

It was such a lovely sight to see the two together. This is not a tale of ancient times, but something that happened just about 12 years ago. I used to live in New Delhi then, and I’d go running towards those gardens to try and control my high blood sugar levels. And  whenever I would see this couple, I would stop and stare at them, sometimes for minutes. My own marriage was nearing a stage of collapse, and later it did collapse totally, so whenever I’d see couples in love walking in that romantic way, I‘d stare at them enviously.

But let me not get carried away with my romantic reminisces, and focus on IK Gujral in a wider, bigger way, as his younger brother, artist Satish Gujral has done in his  autobiography, A Brush With Life. There’s an entire chapter in this volume on Inder  Gujral titled ‘Friend and Brother’, and carried several political details and many important socio-political backgrounders. But if you were to know the actual traits of his personality, you must read the entire book, for it certainly brings out Inder Gujral as somebody who was always a class apart from the rest.

To quote Satish, “With my father’s indifference towards the household, the authority to  make decisions had passed on to my eldest brother, Inder. Though he was still in his teens, he was recognised as the heir apparent. He was not the first born child of our  parents, but the first to survive; my father doted on him. Inder had inherited many of his traits.

This affinity of temperament drew them close to one another…the audacity of spirit which Inder demonstrated when he took to politics was undoubtedly inherited from our  father. Inder was only ten years old when, like our parents, he courted arrest. Although he  was kept in the police station only for a night, his actions reassured my father that his son was following in his footsteps…”

The passages where Satish writes of his near-fatal accident in Pahalgam’s Lidder river – which left him severely injured and impaired his speech and hearing – brings out the  supportive role played by his brother Inder. In later years, Satish embarked on his artistic journey. “Inder found an art school in Lahore where I could learn drawing, painting, sculpting and much else…” And later when Satish shifted to Mayo, the bond between the brothers deepened.

“The one thing I could not stomach in Mayo’s hostel was tasteless and badly served food. My father, who knew how fussy I was about food, arranged for me to eat in Inder’s  hostel, which was only half a kilometre away. Joining my brother every day for meals brought us closer to each other. Besides eating with him, I learnt a great deal from him  about literature and poetry, and above all, how personality was moulded by  commitments.

He also sensed that my resentment and frustration at being handicapped was building up to a climatic rage, which, unless channelled into creative pursuits, would be my undoing. It was Inder who infused in me a fervour for social revolution. He felt that this would ease my burden and instil in me the hope of a better world.”

Humra Quraishi is a senior journalist and author of Kashmir: The Untold Story, and co-author of Simply Khushwant.

 

 

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Enough said

‘Amrita Shergill threatened to seduce me’

Khushwant Singh tells Humra Quraishi about his first love affair and how he could never make a pass at women.

I need to get something off my chest. I am disturbed by the upheaval taking place in the sexual lives and attitudes of us Indians. Divorce rates are going through the roof, singletons’ clubs are seeing more memberships. And everybody’s writing books – just yesterday, a newly-divorced friend cooed that she’s all set to make the most of the divorce by penning a book on it!

So it was very refreshing to catch up with Khushwant Singh, and I asked him if he thought sex education ought to be introduced at the school level. His reply was rather surprising. “It may lead to an early indulgence in sex…but then, it’s shocking to know that many adults don’t know a thing about sex, not even the basics.”

He went on, “My friend Prem Kirpal didn’t even know that women menstruate! In his 30s, he was attracted to a woman friend and wanted to get close to her, but she wouldn’t let him near her. The next day he told me that he couldn’t go ahead with her as she was wounded!”

He said that there was “too much sexual frustration in the country, leading to rapes and gang rapes,” and that the concept of ‘love’ in India was limited to “a tiny minority that prefers to speak English rather than Indian languages, read only English books, watch only Western movies and even dream in English.” He then added, with his usual candour, what love and seduction have meant for him. “It baffles me, why do women confide in me the way they do? Total strangers have rung me up to discuss their personal problems. They tell me of their inhibitions, their love affairs, their extramarital relationships. When it comes to women, I am a patient as well as an interested listener.”

And he dwelt on seduction. “Women do seduce. I have been seduced by women all my life, right from the time I was attracted to Ghayoor (it’s she who’d held my hand). Most women have made the first pass at me, led me on, with the exception of two women, where I took the lead.

Even when I was attracted to a woman, I had little confidence to make the first move. I was terribly flattered when women made a pass at me…looking back, I wish I had the confidence to make the first move, for I could have got closer to several women, like Amrita Shergill. In fact, Amrita had threatened to seduce me just to teach my wife a lesson, but she couldn’t carry out this threat because she died a few months later.”

The thing about Khushwant is, he never holds back. I asked him about his first intense love affair, and he said, “I was in college. She was a Muslim from Hyderabad and had to come to Delhi to study at the Lady Irwin College for a degree in Home Science. I was around 17 years old and Ghayoorunissa was three years older than me, and she was my sister’s friend. On one of those occasions when she, my sister and I had gone for a movie, she’d slipped her hand in mine. That alone meant a lot to me…I really loved her. Now she is dead…she died several years ago, and I went to Hyderabad when I heard of her demise, visited her grave and have been in touch with her daughter ever since.”

“Why didn’t you marry her?” I ask.

“I went to England and she went to Hyderabad and got married. I continued to meet her even after her marriage, and I was so in love with her that I was drawn to the entire Muslim community. I believe that when you fall in love, your perception of his or her community changes, you begin to feel closer to that community.”

Humra Quraishi is a senior political journalist. She is the author of Kashmir: The Untold Story, and co-author of Simply Khushwant. 

(Khushwant Singh picture courtesy caravanmagazine.com)

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