The tragedy of Nirbhaya , as with all other tragedies is gradually receding from the public conscience. TV channels have cooled down , the papers have shifted the reporting to its inner pages, the father lives with the loss and is seen alongside politicians requesting us to stop referring to his daughter as a "gang rape" victim. The Court promises a speedy trial.
The conversations in kitty parties and corporate dos have long found other crises to mull upon.
But on the streets of India has there been any impact of the Nirbhaya tragedy? Urban and rural India are two ends of a spectrum in cultural and social norms and beliefs. Being a city slicker all my life I cannot comment on the impact in rural India. The wide reporting in all forms of media in urban India has made brave Nirbhaya a household name. I sense a subtle yet effective change in the girls moving around my IT centric neigbourhood. Far from being scared they now seem more determined than ever to face up to the terror of a diseased mind. There is also an increased awareness to taking suitable precautions and adopting to stratagems in tune with the circumstances. This is certainly a good positive change.
In the wake of the Nirbhaya tragedy , the urban media has become more vocal in reporting rape cases. As my friend Malladi Sastry reports in his recent blog the papers continue to carry news of such instances as if a new obnoxious facet of something unique to the country has just been unearthed. It certainly is not in the nature of a "catharsis"- a move to acknowledge and in the process minimize such crimes through a public dialogue.
Are these horrendous sexual abuses something unique to our Country, present because of the loosening of moral values and a change from the strict social and cultural norms that existed earlier? Is it time to go inwards , to revive the spirituality that has been lost in the past decades? Is it feasible in our multi-religious, multi-lingual environment to arrive at a consensus of what constitutes a spiritual remedy to what are heinous depraved acts of a few wayward people, emboldened by a lax legal system?
To me the solution lies in creating a legal environment that delivers justice speedily , effectively and publicly. Did it require a Verma Committee to suggest legal remedies all in a four week time span, when the problem lies elsewhere? The legal statutes as they exist now could have prevented this sorry state of affairs , if it was seen to deliver. I tread on dangerous ground here , for whilst it is all right to comment at length on the two other pillars of the democracy, the third is taboo to any criticism or one has to face the prospect of charges of contempt and attended risks. If the legal process is delayed by the strategies of shrewd lawyers with tacit or otherwise support of a faulty police investigation mechanism , we have the right setting for a delayed justice,which as everyone acknowledges is justice denied. If it is possible for a complex financial fraud by a Nick Leeson (that resulted in the collapse of the Barings Bank) to be examined and sentenced within a few months, why should it take years for a criminal sexual act to be brought to book?
How about a daily monitoring at the Supreme Court level of the settlement of the thousands of cases relating to sexual assault across the Courts at all Levels in the length and breadth of our country? Or perhaps a monitoring at the High Court of each State. Also letting the statistics be displayed on the Net would ensure that there is pressure on all the stakeholders in the legal process to clean up the rot and set up new standards of legal settlement. This may perhaps be the most effective deterrent.
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