The recent spate of sexual crimes against women in Delhi got me thinking. Has it always been like this like this in Delhi or has there been an increase in crimes against women over the past decade? Purely from memory, I don't recall the early 90s having such a spate of rape incidents. Has it really increased of late or were such incidents going unreported in the past?
As per statistics from the crime record bureau, the number of incidents of rape in Delhi have more than doubled since 2002 increasing from 320 to 706 (120%)!! There has been a 26 % increase since 2011. Over the last 15 days of 2012 there were 45 rapes and 75 cases of molestation.
It's clear from the statistics that there has been a massive increase in sex crimes in the recent past. What has caused this shameful increase? Is it the influence of western culture as our political leaders infer? Or is there a more home grown reason?
Blaming western culture is quite ridiculous because the west is the most equal of societies with minimal crimes against women. If anything we should be learning from the west about how to treat and respect women. Blaming the west is nothing but an ill-disguised attempt by a patriarchal society to keep women shackled. Girls out late in the night or wearing skimpy clothes is not an excuse for rape and men should be able to restrain their urges. If men from other parts of world can do it, why can't Indian men?
I would not be surprised if it is our own Indian culture (the corrupted irrational social customs that exists today) that is to be blamed. Female feoticide has resulted in dangerously low sex ratios in north India. With the exception of Himachal Pradesh, no state in north India has sex ratio above 900. Delhi, Haryana and Punjab have the worst sex ratios and is it mere coincidence that these states are also the 'leaders' in crimes against women? Has the skewed sex ratio resulted in frustrated men without partners?
I would also assign blame to Indian attitude towards interaction between boys and girls. Socialising and dating is taboo in most Indian cultures. Teenage boys and girls are kept segregated in schools and any interaction in public is frowned upon. The result is that boys do not learn how to behave with the opposite sex. Girls are like some sort of exotic species to them! We should reinforce equality of the sexes at an early age instead of creating gender ghettos due to physical differences!
We need to introspect about our social customs. Are we actually going backwards? Are we becoming more rigid and less in tune with the modern world? What India needs is a demolition of the gender ghettos and a liberation of the sexes.
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