What is happening to India? What’s wrong with this country? Every day sexual assault after assault is being reported by our news media and we are getting horrified by these incidents. It sounds very shameful and weird that a new rape is taking place every 22 minutes in India. Are these modern-day Indian statistics destined to end in our coffee table discussion or a harsh reality? Nobody doubts that India is a rising superpower. Its economy is booming. Since 1991 after the economic liberalisation, its socioeconomic structure has gotten stronger in this Twenty-First century. Its growth rate was phenomenal in the last two decades. More and more people are crossing that so-called below-poverty line and the number of middle-class people in India is now the highest in the world. India even claims that this country has the most young people in the world. Don’t you feel proud of all these developments that India is currently going through? Our society, our education level and the standard of living are all progressing ahead. So, all the developments and growths we have had in the last 65 years, have nothing to do with the fact that a lot of dark patches are still there deep inside our society. The good sign is that these sexual assault cases are now being brought to light either by the news media or by the victims themselves. It’s a burning topic for discussion in India and around the world. Since the December 2012 notorious gang rape case that made the national and international headlines, the world is now calling India especially New Delhi the rape capital of the world.
Sometimes I wonder whether we are really progressing as a society or walking backward to the Middle Ages. Maybe it is because of the women of India who are now becoming more educated, getting free from social barriers, and being even more courageous to report their sexual assaults to the authorities and that is why these new complaints are adding up to the statistics even more. On the other hand, there is also a possibility that the typical mindset of Indian men towards women is getting more and more freakish day by day. As an Indian man, should I feel ashamed of these incidents? Of course, I am, because as a common Indian, I am also feeling the heat. I am a typical urban guy and gradually I am sensing that all these incidents are also showing their effects within the society itself. The mutual respect of men and women towards one another has also been coming under tremendous stress and that is now very much evident in our day-to-day life. Even younger women are getting more and more suspicious of middle-aged men in the streets, trains, and buses and even throw strange glaze towards all kinds of men as if every man irrespective of his age, is a possible rapist. Young women have also got such a scary impression that older men are more dangerous than young men. When such an incident is brought to our notice, our skeptical male mindset doesn’t accept its reality. We think that it is either an over-emphasized story or a twisted truth. India is a land of nuclear families with love and respect towards our elderly people. Indians are brought up with this rich Indian culture and traditional values. But this new phenomenon of downgrading our mutual respect towards one another has been staining that clean and robust Indian culture and traditional values that we have been very proud of to date.
Humans are nothing but social animals and they also have animal instincts. Humans like all other animals also need to use sex for reproduction. In the animal kingdom, you will find that there are very simple rules in place for the sexual reproduction process. Male animals fight with each other and whoever wins the battle, becomes the alpha male animal and then he mates with the female animal. This process of reproduction in the animal kingdom varies from animal to animal but the basic rules that nature has written for animal reproduction and survivability, are almost the same as the best animal genes are carried with to their successors. We call it survival of the fittest. However, humans are very different from animals in terms of both physiological and social structures. Some animals too live in social structures but that doesn’t come into comparison when it comes to human society. Humans have developed over time, a very very complex social structure in every part of this planet with their language, knowledge, technology, and culture. Now humans do not choose their life partners only by their physiology rather it is subject to many different complex criteria and thus that has also developed a very complex human psychology. But deep inside our body, our genes still drive us to select the best life partner as far as possible. A woman still loves men with good physic and handsome looks. A man still loves beautiful women with good health and body and considers that a young woman with a beautiful and healthy body means she will carry, give birth, and take good care of his child. It is the gene that tells a man in his subconscious mind to look for a beautiful woman with big breasts and wide buttocks. A beautiful face means that a woman is still young, big breasts mean that they will produce enough milk for her child and wide buttocks mean that they will ease up the child's delivery with less complexity. So, in his subconscious mind, a man always gets attracted easily to a beautiful woman with a beautiful body. When a man considers a woman a sexy woman that means he also wants to mate with that sexy woman. But does it mean that men always look at women’s bodies with shameless eyes? The answer is No because our culture, education, conscience, and ethics always prevent us from acting in such a way within a society. Our society also doesn’t allow us to do so and thus all men are also aware of that fact and behave accordingly living within a society.
Indian men are no different than Western, African, or other Asian men when it comes to human genes and it has nothing to do with skin colour. But the cultures are different. We the Indians are so proud of our culture that we give the best respect to our women. India is a Hindu-dominated country and the most powerful and respected Hindu Gods are women. Then why the most number of female molestations and physical assaults are taking place in India? Some feminists would also say other than their usual explanations that since the women of India have improved so much in every field shoulder to shoulder with men, Indian men now have become more jealous of women and thus that jealousy often results in physical assaults. I would rather oppose that theory because the improvement of the status of women in India is very much helping our country progress ahead but that doesn’t mean that Indian men have suddenly become anti-women. The answer lies deep beneath the social root of Indian society. We now live in a modern world, especially a modern India, and many modern catalysts are responsible for these kinds of mishaps.
Bollywood is the second biggest film industry in the world. The difference between Hollywood and Bollywood movies is quite significant. In Bollywood movies or even all kinds of Indian regional movies, the hero sings and dances to impress the heroine and often teases her in public to get her attention and acceptance. He constantly teases her with songs, and words even with physical touches, and the heroine constantly rejects him and refuses his offer. But the most ridiculous part is that in almost every movie, the ultimate result would be in favour of that hero. The heroine ultimately accepts him as her life partner and also accepts all his mischief with a smiling face. No matter if it is a top-class or a third-grade movie, these movie scripts are always written in the same manner which ends up in a happy climax. Our society, our people, and our government love these kinds of movies and so does the censor board. Since our society accepts these kinds of movies and our people love to see these kinds of movies, all the movie producers also want to make them for good business and profits. Good business and profit also mean good tax for the government. So, there is an official acceptance or social stamp always attached to these kinds of scenes in all these movies and we are being raised watching these kinds of movies from our childhood in India. What kind of general impression the general public gets from these movies is that, if it is possible in movies then why not possible in real life? After all, movie scripts are also written based on or inspired by the society itself. So, if an Indian man teases an Indian woman and she rejects or refuses constantly that doesn’t mean No to that Indian man rather he thinks that if he continues to tease her no matter how she reacts, ultimately he will succeed and get his girl with her smiling face, just like a Bollywood movie. Now Indian society has started to realise that these Bollywood and regional movies have played a crucial role which ultimately helps increase the number of eve-teasing in the Indian society. I hope the government also listens to that call.
India has been transforming itself from a rural agricultural country to a well-developed and urban industry-based modern country. The rural Indians are now running in great numbers towards cities for better earnings and a better life. But the rural cultural background they are coming from which they have been experiencing their entire life, is completely different than that of the lifestyles in the cities and they often end up in deep cultural shocks. In the greater part rural India, the most popular entertainments are cheap liquor, third-grade movies, and rural sports. They generally listen to Radio but most of rural India doesn't know what Television is and many distant parts of India do not even enjoy electricity. Rural life in India is very hard and complex with restrictions in social barriers which are based on casts, religions, etc. Poverty is another factor they also have to deal with in their day-to-day life. But whenever they go to a modern Indian city, they have to live in slums with very low-quality infrastructures around them because a labour is still very cheap in India compared to the Western countries, and low earnings don’t allow them to afford high-quality living. The other factor is that they also have to save money for their families back in the rural India they came from. In these slums, they often have to live in a group without their women companions. Sometimes they feel a little bit of freedom from their social restrictions but despite their new freedom they also meet with the modern culture, modern clothing, food habits, way of living and the modern standard of living the urban elite enjoys in modern cities. They also feel as if they have been deprived of money, better living, similar social status, and sex by none other than our society itself. City brothels do not solve their problems all the time. This sense of injustice in their lives sometimes helps grow anger, loss of ethics, confusion, and frustration in their minds. I must say that Bollywood movies also play a huge role in their minds because Bollywood movies also show that all kinds of elite, rich, and powerful people are bad and the underprivileged people must stand against them even with force and that is called heroism. This vast labour force often gets confused and sometimes results in committing crimes. Their poor education and low-quality social background sometimes overshadow their minds for ethics and the sense of the aftermath of their crimes.
Indian politics sometimes is also well-connected with powerful businessmen and the underworld. Some politicians, businessmen, and underworld criminals think that their power comes from money and guns and if they have money and guns, they can do anything they want as well as evade Indian laws very easily. They want everything they see and they think that they will get whatever they want by their power of money and guns. Their hunger for more money and power, lust for something, and everything don’t just stop ever and they think that they will fulfill their desires either by hook or crook. This nexus between politicians businessmen and the underworld sometimes successfully prevents our law enforcement systems and judicial system from acting upon these crimes. If any female molestation or assault is reported by the victim accusing another person who belongs to a nexus of this kind, that powerful nexus always shows the confidence that it can easily save the accused from justice with its power and money. But that also now seems to be very hard for them in this modern India.
When a female molestation or sexual assault happens to a woman, our stereotypical male-dominated society often blames that woman for that very crime for which she wants justice. Some people blame her clothing and others even do not hesitate to question her attitude and character. Every time the blame goes back to the female victim instead of the criminal who committed the crime. Our society thinks that the victim herself should be held responsible because she must have provoked that person to commit that crime. Had she not dressed like that, had she not gone to that place, had she gone to that place at that time, had she gone to that place without any trusted or elder male companion, that crime would never have happened at all. Sometimes politicians also ask questions about the clothing of modern women as they think that modern-day female clothing does not cover up the body curvature of a woman completely and that might act as a provocation or a catalyst that increases the male instincts and that might hamper the law and order in the society. When politicians ask a lot of questions about the presence of the victim at the wrong place at the wrong time even knowing that these kinds of questions could impose a character certificate to that victim, it is understandable what prompts them to throw those unreasonable questions. Those politicians think that over over-publicity of these crimes would hold those politicians themselves responsible for the lack of law and order in those areas or states. Those politicians even think that these bad issues might be taken up by other political parties. Sometimes they also come up with some conspiracy theories that those crimes must have been plotted by opposition political parties to malign the ruling parties. They just want to avoid moral or social responsibility and wash their hands from these issues as quickly as possible otherwise they think that these uncomfortable issues might affect their political career or vote bank.
Modern young people of India love to wear modern clothing but the older generations of India still love traditional clothing till date. Although these young modern people come from different social backgrounds. Most of these young people of modern India have been raised watching their parents wearing mostly traditional clothing. So, most of these young Indians are still not used to seeing modern clothing of other young Indians as normal culture. In Western countries, any kind of modern or ultra-modern clothing is considered normal in general opinion because those are nothing new to them. India is currently going through many cultural transitions which might last in our future generations as well. So, that kind of cultural acceptance might take some more time in every part of India. Even though we are currently living in the information age of satellite television, mobile phones, and the internet which have opened our world of information and knowledge, I think the news media as the fourth pillar of democracy is doing a great job improving and purifying the standard of our society in India but I also think that education and general awareness will also have to play a greater role in our society to overcome these obstacles.
As India is becoming a modern country day by day in terms of infrastructure development, education, health, transportation, industralisation, etc., so are our societies. India is not a single society but a union of societies just like our states and union territories. Our societies have different religions, cultures, languages, eating habits, cuisines, clothing, festivals, etc. But what unites us as a country is that we are the citizens of India. But what about our values? During ancient India, the Middle Ages, foreign occupation, and even just a few decades after independence, many Indian values are now considered irrelevant or no longer acceptable these days. For instance, there was a time in India when if a husband dies, the wife is accustomed to dying with her dead husband together. This practice of Hindu widow burning with her dead husband as “Sati” was considered as a sacred value or duty which must be done voluntarily or by force. Child marriage was another such practice. But thanks to our respectable Indian social reformers like Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar, Raja Ram Mohan Roy, Swami Vivekananda, B.R. Ambedkar, etc., the values of Indian society have changed from time to time. Someone can say that those were social prejudices and not values. But whatever our society or our parents teach us as the right thing to do or consider as the right culture to follow, all are values, aren’t they? We Indians have changed and so has our society, isn’t it? Living together, inter-caste marriages, etc. are no longer considered wrong things in our society anymore. Coming to the present subject of this article, do you think our mothers teach our boys to tease, molest, or even rape girls as the right thing to do? Absolutely not! Even though our mothers teach us to respect women and respect female gods, sometimes our boys become naughty or sometimes become criminals. But what factors play in between? Sometimes money, sometimes deprival of something, sometimes curiosity, lack of knowledge, lack of a sense of consequences, sometimes overwhelming sense of lust or sexual urge, shift from a sense of ignorance to a sense of vengeance, sometimes copycat behavior to become unique in the society or maybe a lot of other reasons that play crucial roles behind the scenes of those small or big crimes. I am neither a socialist nor an expert on psychology. Whatever I am discussing in this article, are my personal thoughts. So, I am not going to deep inside and explore human psychology or present social structure. Simply I think that our parents as well as our schools, colleges, and universities should play a greater role in moulding our values and our conscience from our childhood to our adulthood so that we can complete this journey of Indian civilization, social, developmental and industries transformation so that India can become a truly developed nation in every aspect from the social development indicators to the living standards of the Indians in India.
