On October 20,2011 Keenan Santos and Reuben Fernandes went for dinner with their female friends at Amboli Bar and Kitchen in Mumbai’s suburb of Andheri West. They were stabbed to death by a group of men after they objected to the indecent behaviour of one of the men towards their female friends.
“After dinner, the group of friends had gone to a paan stall at around 11 p.m. The accused was also present at the paan stall and after these boys asked him to back off, a scuffle broke out between the three men. The accused then went away, but only to return with a group of four men, two of whom had knives with them. The accused and the other men stabbed Keenan and Reuben. Keenan died that very night,” said V.D Bhoite, senior inspector at D.N Nagar police station in Andheri West, in an interview. He further added that the four men accused are in 14 days of police custody.
Mumbai as compared to Delhi was till 20th October 2011 considered being a safer place for women. Anger has erupted in Mumbai and across cyberspace over the killing of two young men after they tried to defend their female friends from a man who allegedly harassed the women on a night out.
The murders have received large spread attention in the local newspapers but the disillusionment with this new reality is spreading fastest on social-media sites like Facebook and Twitter, with people demanding stricter laws to tackle harassment of women and eve teasing.
Eve teasing is defined as a “euphemism used in India and sometimes Pakistan, Bangladesh and Nepal for public sexual harassment or molestation of women by men, with use of the word "Eve" being a reference to the biblical Eve. Though the problem received public and media attention in 1960s, it was in the following decades, when more and more women started going out to colleges and work independently, which means they are often no longer accompanied by a male escort as had been a norm in traditional society, that the problem grew to an alarming proportion. Soon the Indian government had to take remedial measures, both judicial and law enforcement, to curb the menace and efforts were made to sensitize the police about the issue, and police started rounding up eve teasers. The deployment of plain-clothed female police officers for the purpose has been particularly effective; other measures seen in various states were setting up of Women's Helpline in various cities, Women Police stations, and special anti-eve-teasing cells by the police.
The death of a female student, Sarika Shah, in Chennai in 1998, caused by Eve-teasing, brought some tough laws to counter the problem in South India. After this case, there has been about half-a-dozen reports of suicide that have been attributed to pressures caused by eve teasing. In 2007, an eve-teasing resulted in the death of Pearl Gupta, a college student in Delhi. In February 2009, female students from M.S. University (MSU) Vadodara assaulted four young men near the family and community sciences faculty, after they passed lewd comments on a girl student staying in SD Hall hostel.
In the Indian Penal code the word eve – teasing does not exist. Eve teasing is an attitude and a mindset, a set of behaviors that is construed as an insult and an act of humiliation of any female.
Though Indian law doesn't use the term 'Eve Teasing', victims usually seek recourse through Section 298 (A) and (B) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), which sentences a man found guilty of making a girl or woman the target of obscene gestures, remarks, songs or recitation to a maximum jail sentence of three months. Section 292 of the IPC clearly spells out that showing pornographic or obscene pictures, books or slips to a woman or girl draws a fine of Rs.2000 with two years of rigorous imprisonment for first offenders. In the case of a repeated offence, the offender may have a fine of Rs.5000 with five years imprisonment imposed. Under Section 509 of the IPC, obscene gestures, indecent body language and acidic comments directed at any woman or girl carries a penalty of rigorous imprisonment for one year or a fine or both.
The 'National Commission for Women' (NCW) has also proposed No 9. Eve Teasing (New Legislation) 1988.
According to me eve teasing or any kind of harassment meted out to women is a violation of their basic right to live with dignity. There is an urgent need for some questions to be answered: Will women forever remain targets and victims of eve teasing? Will their rescuers continue to be unwilling martyrs to a dead cause?
Before these questions are addressed, one needs to explore and analyse why, irrespective of the dress they wear, or, their ages, their looks, their educational, professional and marital status, never mind the time or place, women in Kolkata and elsewhere are being subjected to all kinds of harassment from obscene telephone calls, stalking, and last but not the least – eve-teasing.
Over the last couple of decades the instances of such harassment have increased.
· On August 1, 2007 Sanjay Soni, a young man, tried to molest a girl inside a shared auto rickshaw in Lake Town in the presence of her father who was escorting her. When the girl tried to resist, the father asked the auto rickshaw driver to stop and began to bash up the culprit. A crowd gathered and beat up the man who was saved from being lynched by the timely arrival of the police.
· On July 30 2007, Tabassum (name changed), a student of Class VII, studying in Cartauche Public School in Park Circus, was returning home in a bus on route 45. Unable to bear with the advances of a middle-aged man standing behind her in the crowded bus, she raised an alarm. Her co-passengers remained mute spectators. The bus driver stopped the bus when he saw an on-duty sergeant. Some bus passengers came forward to back Tabassum only when the police began to question her.
· In 2005, Reema Bose (name changed), was returning from the hospital at the end of the day from Deshpriya Park. As she walked along Motilal Nehru Road, an auto rickshaw suddenly appeared by her side. A few young men inside were guzzling beer. They began to throw bargains, whistled, teased and threw obscene comments at her. When nothing seemed to work, one of them got off the rick and tried to pull her into the vehicle. A mobile police van arrived in the nick of time and saved Reema. It was eight in the evening. (Reema narrated this incident to me.)
Women's rights activist Maitreyee Chatterjee says that even a burqah cannot guarantee safety. "Section 354 of the Indian Penal Code which mentions the arrest of a culprit for attempt to outrage the modesty of women does not have any condition about the victim's dress," she says. Filmmaker Anindita Sarbadhicari says that eve teasing and molestation are acts of perversion. "It is foolish to think that molesters get turned on by the victim's dress. Then why are there so many rapes in Islamic countries?" asks Sarbadhicari.
Eve teasing, like rape, molestation and sexual harassment, is generally understood in feminist theory to be an expression not of unbridled lust and desire, but of power. Eve teasing is a form of sexual harassment indulged in by men, never mind their intelligence or their education. Eve teasing is a crime committed against women everyday but the criminals are not punished and they continue violating a women’s privacy assuming they have a right to do so. It is an offence every woman faces in her life and not just once and ignores the offence and accepts it as a price she has to pay for being a woman. Since not much importance is accorded to the offence and the offenders are not punished it encourages them to continue their behaviour and even escalate it too more heinous offences like assault and rape as they know they can get away with it.
On Facebook, a page has been created under “Zero Tolerance Campaign” against what is proverbially (and ridiculously) deemed “eve-teasing.” Campaign coordinator Maitreyee Achadhat said that the page is a “forum for discussion and awareness on the issue.” She said the campaign is not only in the light of the latest incident in Mumbai but for women anywhere in the country.
“The problem of eve teasing in the country is getting out of hand. Women everywhere, at least once in their lifetime, have either been groped or pinched or had to bear lewd remarks from men,” she said in an interview.
A Facebook group – “Keenan Santos” - already has more than 46,000 members. Public frustration over the lack of strong laws to counter misbehavior and harassment is a strong theme.
Coming back to the incident on October 20, 2011, I am left wondering what can be done to avert such dastardly acts of killing people who have to defend women and their dignity when they are socialising in normal civil society. At 11pm in a crowded place how can these goons have so much of courage to openly commit such a crime? What was the public around them doing.. standing watching a free movie..??? It is such apathy at times on being a witness to violence in a public place that sends chills down my spine. Are we not free and safe in our own country, town, city to move around with, without fearing for our life or dignity. Tomorrow it could be either one of their mothers, sisters, wives, or girlfriends who could be the recipient of such harassment.
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