Indian women after rise in rape cases

When Mehak* hears a thud outside her house, she immediately gets anxious and starts searching every corner of her Delhi home for intruders. After years of living in the city, she has become paranoid, especially since the internet is flooded with news of rape cases in India.

“I think it started with the Calcutta case. As more and more horrific details of her rape and murder came to light, I thought about how a person in their right mind could break a woman's bones for pleasure. I imagined the pain she must have felt,” said Mehak, a student who wishes to remain anonymous. “I am scared and feel unsafe.”

On August 9, a 31-year-old second-year postgraduate student at RG Kar Medical College was raped and murdered in the college's seminar hall. The details of the case shocked the nation and led to widespread protests and candlelight marches demanding justice for her. Although the country was united in its demand for justice, many women across India continued to be victims of rape. These reports have left women feeling fear and uncertainty.

Following the doctor's case, dozens of women in India suffered the same fate. On August 9, not only the doctor-in-training in Kokata, but also two other women were brutally raped in Uttarakhand and Amethi in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. A nurse was raped and murdered in Uttrakhand while her body was mutilated. In UP, a 13-year-old girl was allegedly raped by her father. Two days later, a girl in Punjab was allegedly raped by the family members of her brother's girlfriend.

The next day, four similar cases were reported. In Maharashtra, a male guard allegedly assaulted two minors in the school toilet. A government employee allegedly raped a minor Dalit girl in Uttar Pradesh. A 16-year-old girl was allegedly raped by a bus driver, a conductor and others. In Uttrakhand, a 14-year-old girl died in Muzaffarpur, Bihar, after being subjected to gang rape and subsequent murder.

On August 14, another 14-year-old girl was allegedly gang-raped by her friends near her home in Thanjavur, Tamil Nadu. A Class 9 student allegedly raped a 3-year-old girl in Mumbai. In Odisha, a junior doctor was accused of raping two patients at SCB Medical College and Hospital. A 63-year-old widow was gang-raped in Sirohi.

On August 15, three minors were accused of raping a young girl in Siliguri, West Bengal, on India's 78th Independence Day.

The next day, a minor girl was raped in Ballia, Uttar Pradesh. In Bhopal, another minor girl was allegedly raped at home by a blackmailer. On August 17, a minor student died in Sonbhadra, Uttar Pradesh, allegedly assaulted by her teacher in December 2023. Another minor was allegedly raped by a 60-year-old man in Beohari, Madhya Pradesh.

On August 18, a 3-year-old girl was allegedly kidnapped and raped by a garbage man in Jodhpur, Rajasthan. A 22-year-old woman was allegedly raped by a biker in Bengaluru. A Dalit nurse was allegedly raped by a doctor in Moradabad, Uttar Pradesh. Three minor girls were raped in Punjab. An 11-year-old girl was allegedly raped by a 22-year-old man in India's capital Delhi. A minor girl was raped in Andhra Pradesh. Two days ago, a schoolgirl in Punjab was allegedly raped in her home by her school bus driver. On Thursday night, a 14-year-old girl was allegedly raped by three people in Assam.

Just yesterday, a tutor was arrested in Uttar Pradesh for sexually abusing a seven-year-old girl. In Maharashtra, a 16-year-old boy who worked in a school canteen was arrested and remanded in custody on charges of sexually abusing a seven-year-old girl on school premises. In Tamil Nadu, a teenager was arrested for sexually abusing his 11-year-old sister. In another case, a man was arrested in Chennai today for sexually abusing his six-month-old daughter.

Except for the rape and murder in Kolkata, none of the cases this month have sparked comparable outrage. The same outrage occurred over a decade ago when a 23-year-old physiotherapy intern was gang-raped and tortured in Delhi. Although there have been numerous rape cases in the country to date, none of them has attracted the same level of attention.

And what all these cases have in common is that none of the victims received justice. According to the latest statistics from India's National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), about 45,000 rape cases were investigated in 2022. In the same year, an average of nearly 90 rapes were reported per day. Over the years, the number of rape cases in the country has only increased. While some are reported, many others remain unreported due to social status, stigma and other reasons. In the cases that do go to court, the number of convictions is low, which weakens women's trust in the country's government.

Shreeja Rao, an Ambedkarite activist, told Maktoob, “Nirbhaya was not a one-off case of extreme violence; it has happened many times before, in fact almost every day in India. The systems in this country refuse to give them equal attention,” she said. This is the promotion of oppression. This is what happens when social institutions and people from these groups believe that some heinous crimes do not deserve equal attention because of the identity of the victim. Our cultural norms ensure that outrage, attention and even justice for crimes against vulnerable communities like women, and especially marginalized women, depend solely on the identity of the victim.”

Rao believes there has not necessarily been a “surge” in rape cases in India. “Every day, countless rape cases go unreported. Many marginalized women from lower castes are never mentioned by the media. This problem has always existed,” she told Maktoob. “Marital rape is not even considered rape under the law and is a testament to how regressive cultural norms can create flaws in real systems. This is a much bigger problem than just the case that is in the spotlight. We need to be outraged not about one case, but about the larger systems that enable rape culture everywhere.”

She said that women in India could never be safe given the current cultural systems. “This is a terrifying truth that I have experienced, seen and heard countless times from the women around me. Fear and terror are woven into the fabric of a woman's existence here,” she said. “It is a constant reminder of how unsafe we ​​are. Whether it is the fear of walking alone at night when you don't know if you will get home safely, for example, I and every single woman I know have been harassed in broad daylight on crowded buses and trains. Even in the supposed safety of our homes, domestic violence is an ever-present threat hiding behind closed doors.”

In Delhi, Mehak has started avoiding people out of fear. “I didn't know that many other women feel the same way. I keep asking my friends, 'Is it just me or are the men around me suddenly scarier?'” she said. “It's not that the Sabzi Wala hadn't spoken to me before, but yesterday when he asked me if I was transforming, I was so scared. I couldn't find the right words to say something to him or at least lie.”

Maktoob spoke to many other women to find out if they felt safe following the rise in rape cases in India. They had similar “horror stories” to tell. And most of them said they were scared.

Over 1,000 miles away in Bengaluru, Nighat Nazir has stopped going out for a few hours after sunset because she doesn't feel safe. “This is a so-called developed city in India, but there have been so many cases of harassment and sexual harassment here,” she said. “Women are not safe here.”

At 11pm, while Nazir was on her way to a friend's birthday party, she saw a man sitting on a parked bicycle on a deserted street outside her house while he waited for her taxi. He called to her and pointed to the saddle of his bicycle, telling her to sit down. “I was really scared and stopped going out in the evenings,” she said. “Many of my friends and colleagues do the same: they either go out with male companions or avoid going out altogether.”

Radhika Ganesh, a cultural activist, said women are not safe anywhere. “However, India today is even more unsafe because of the patriarchal mentality propagated by right-wing conservatism,” she said. “I believe oppressors and sexual predators are emboldened in this environment. There is complete impunity when people in power abuse women and get away with it or, worse, are rewarded for it. Isn't that enough to make abusers think they can get away with anything? We are ruled by a system that relies on religiously sanctioned patriarchy.”

As the country took to the streets demanding justice for the gruesome rape and murder case of controversial Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh and self-styled godfather Asaram Bapu – two high-profile rape convicts – he was granted parole. This temporary release raised serious questions about the timing of the decision and the priorities of the Indian justice system. When Ram Rahim was on 40 days of parole in 2022, he started staying online Satsang. Among the supporters who sought his blessings were leaders of the Haryana Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), who also sought his blessings.

Such incidents are nothing new in India. In 2022, 11 men sentenced to life imprisonment in the Bilkis Bano rape case were released by the Gujarat government before the Supreme Court ordered their re-arrest this year. These men were welcomed with garlands and sweets by the right-wing Hindu group Vishwa Hindu Parishad. In 2018, Hindu Ekta Manch, led by BJP state secretary Vijay Sharma, organised rallies in support of the rape accused in Kathua (Jammu).

Radhika said, “We have made systematic progress – on paper, we have tightened laws and law enforcement systems. But none of this is worth anything unless we have law-abiding people in power. In this environment, all these laws and systems cannot protect women from vulnerable identities, especially women.”