Rallying Against Rape

On the evening of December 16, 2012, a 23-year-old Delhi student was gang raped, brutally assaulted on a moving bus and then dumped on a busy road to die. After battling for her life for 12 days the young woman succumbed to her injuries on December 28. This horrific incident, one among the many that have been occurring across India with increasing frequency, has led to an uprising against sexual crimes against women. For decades now India has tolerated intolerable forms of violence on women in public spaces. As enraged citizens lead protest marches demanding justice for the battered girl and other victims, a relook at the rape laws and police reforms, WFS presents news reports and expert opinion pieces responding to sex crimes from different locations across the globe.

THE ADMINISTRATION OF GURGAON, ONE OF India's biggest software hubs, recently passed an order that malls and other such establishments should not permit women to work after 8 p.m., unless permission is granted by the labour commissioner, following reports of a woman employee who was abducted and gangraped from the Sahara Mall. Thus, a "rape schedule" has become official. Simply put, women's access to public spaces is regulated by the threat of rape, with the assumption that women face greater chances of risk when they work till late at night, or access public places after dark. It means that women are expected to organise their life, work and futures foundationally on the fear of rape at work or in public spaces; failing which, they are blamed for having "invited" the violence of rape. A comment by an assistant professor, Centre for the Study of Law and Governance, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi.

* 'It is not acceptable in India for survivors of rape to file tort cases against those third parties who failed to take reasonable care to protect a woman against rape, as they do in American courts.'

Democratic Republic of Congo:
'City of Joy' Awaits Strife-torn Congolese Women
By Jurate Kazickas

THE CITY OF JOY IS NOW open to the women of the Democratic Republic of Congo. The day this recovery sanctuary - the brainchild of Eve Ensler, founder of V-Day - opened its gates to rape survivors was a day of celebration; a day when Congolese women spoke up for justice; a day that saw the performance of Ensler's play 'The Vagina Monologues' in French, during which many local men were first uncomfortable but later laughed and cheered. Thirteen years of ongoing conflict in the country has seen over 5,00,000 women being raped and tortured in the most brutal and savage way. Today, there's a little hope for them in the form of this facility, which runs a six-month programme for its 90 residents and includes psychosocial treatment, literacy and life skills and vocational training. (By arrangement with Women's eNews.)

* "The City of Joy will be a gathering place for the women to find their voices, their vision and their power. And when the women find their power, all of the Congo will change."

Opinion:
Rape Victims' Privacy is Matter of Law, Not Shame
By Wendy Murphy

THE ISSUE OF RAPE VICTIMS' RIGHT to anonymity has surfaced in the case of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, with two leading exponents of women's rights taking different sides. Katha Pollitt, a relative conservative, argues against disclosure, emphasising that it will deter reporting and cause needless harm to people who have suffered enough. Naomi Wolf, ploughing a more open field, believes all victims should be named because anonymity is a "relic" from a time when women suffered shame for being raped. However, the writer, who is an adjunct professor at New England Law/Boston and an impact litigator who specialses in violence against women, feels that both arguments are faulty because not naming U.S. victims has little to do with stigma, and everything to do with the U.S. Constitution that promises privacy rights.

* The very nature of sexual violence, indeed the location of the "crime scene" on a woman's body, is such that a public trial is certain to reveal things that are not only highly personal but likely to be protected by statute, common law and even constitutionally-based privacy rights in the U.S.

Congo:
HEALing Touch For Congo's Women
By Neena Bhandari

KAMINA FEZA, NATIVE OF A VILLAGE 300 kilometres from Kalemie in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), was brutally raped and left to die in 2001, during the war between Rally for Congolese Democracy and the then President of DRC, Laurent-D?sir? Kabila. Feza has survived to tell her tale, although not many are as fortunate. On an average, 36 women are raped each day in conflict ravaged DRC, where gender-based violence is used as a war strategy. But for every rapist that exists in Congo, there is Lyn Lusi, a social activist, who provides a healing touch through HEAL Africa. Lyn's organisation ensures that not only are battered women treated and counselled, they are educated and taught a marketable skill so that they become economically independent.

* 'As the war intensifies the number of women being raped and those reporting rape is increasing... gang rape has become a new form of terrorism'

India:
Rape Survivors: Caught In A Never-ending Nightmare
By Smita Deodhar

INDIAN CITIES HAVE SEEN AN ALARMING rise in sexual crimes against women - just last week the gangrape of a 30-year-old BPO staffer from Mizoram jolted the working women of Delhi. But even as rape becomes one of the fastest growing crimes - between 1990 and 2008, reported cases soared by 112 per cent nationwide according to the National Crime Records Bureau - does India have a competent system to support a rape survivor? No, say activists, lawyers and doctors working with victims, as they list just some of the problems: The humiliating two-finger test that a victim is subjected to as part of forensic evidence collection; the insensitive public health response system that prioritises evidence collection over healthcare needs of the victim; and the lack of proper guidelines or formal training of designated staff for management of rape cases.

* "The victim is made to move from one department of the hospital to another... She has to recount the history of the assault several times; to the police, to the doctors, even, inexplicably, to the clerk who notes her admission on the hospital register."

OPINION:
Mayawati vs Bahuguna: The Violence of Political Rhetoric On Rape
By Pratiksha Baxi

IT IS INDEED LAMENTABLE THAT UTTAR Pradesh Congress Committee Chief Rita Bahuguna's critique - of Chief Minister Mayawati making a spectacle of 'downtrodden caste' women who have been raped by turning a legal entitlement into a state ceremony - deployed the upper caste male rhetoric of rape. But what was the real issue at stake here? The fact is that Mayawati turned a legal entitlement into an act of state ceremony; and those who burnt down Bahuguna's house replace politics with violence. All the citizens have are images of politics as violence.

* 'There are hardly any governmental efforts to assist rape victims, despite an over 700 per cent increase in reported rapes since 1971 according to state statistics.'

India:
Rape Victims Marry Violators: Is This Welfare?
By Eliza Parija

WHILE INDIA IS DEBATING ON THE quantum of punishment for rapists, Orissa is witnessing marriages of rape victims with their rapists. The marriages are not only facilitated by the authorities of the jails - where the alleged rapists have been lodged - and NGOs supporting the victims, but are also propagated as a kind of atonement for the crime committed. Those opposing such 'rehabilitation' explain that these marriages become a route for either escaping punishment completely or getting away with a lesser sentence. Opponents also refer to a recent Supreme Court ruling, which states that if a person commits rape, neither a proposal of marriage nor any other settlement between the rapist and victim, can condone him of the crime.

* "At the time of the rape I hated him. I wanted to tear him to pieces. But I have a different feeling now. I have forgiven him because he has chosen me as his wife."

USA:
An Assault on Justice: Rape Kits
By Elayne Clift

CALIFORNIA IS AT THE FOREFRONT OF a scandal, as Justice Department funds allocated to states to help cover the cost of analysing DNA evidence in rape cases - to provide physical evidence from sexual assault - have been cut. The cause for the revised funding is the unacceptably slow response among local lawmakers and the consequent backlog of untested rape kits. The public and advocates are outraged at the official attitude to a process that can offer investigative leads to identify, locate and apprehend rapists.

* "Every unopened rape kit means there may be a dangerous offender loose on the street. With every new victim you have to wonder whether any of them would have been raped if all those kits had been opened."

USA:
Just Who Are You Dating?
By Elayne Clift

ACQUAINTANCE OR DATE RAPE REFERS TO sexual violence where the victim knows the rapist. It occurs when someone familiar - friend, relative, co-worker, boyfriend or husband - forces or coerces another person to have sex. According to emerging data on teen dating violence in the U.S., about one-in-five female high school students report being physically and/or sexually abused by a dating partner and 58 per cent of rape victims report being raped between the ages of 12 and 24.

* "Be assertive, not victimised... Remember, you can't predict who might be a rapist, so use an individual's behaviour as an indicator of intentions."

Sri Lanka:
Island Dilemma: Is It Marital Rape or Domestic Violence?
By Nilanjana Bhowmick

RAPE IN ITS VARIOUS MANIFESTATIONS - statutory and marital, incest, in conflict situations, among displaced women and those who migrate overseas - has been a continuing topic of research studies presented at the biannual conventions of the Centre for Women's Research (CENWOR), Sri Lanka, the most recent of which was held early this year in Colombo. The discussions, this year, also brought to light the fact that despite amendments to the Penal Code, marital rape is still considered an issue of domestic violence and that the perpetrator can be brought to trial only if judicially separated from his wife.

* 'Within the Sri Lankan context, the reality is that sex in itself is a taboo subject and rape within a marriage is regarded as a private matter in the legal system. The victimised woman takes her cue from the legal and social climate and opts to suffer in silence.'

Bangladesh:
Seeking a Say in Sex
By Lubana Yasmin Palia

SPOUSAL RAPE IS AN UNACKNOWLEDGED BUT serious issue in Bangladesh - one that the government has not addressed even in its recent Domestic Violence Bill. Experts, however, are sceptical that even legislative reform could make a difference in a society that believes husbands are entitled to sex, even forced sex. The need of the hour, they say, is attitudinal change, and awareness generation efforts to bring about that change.

* A 2004 study on women in Lohagara, Narail district, found that 40.7 per cent of the women thought that husbands were entitled to sex whenever they wanted it.

Philippines:
Being Raped Again - In Court
By Rorie R Fajardo

Myanmar:
Rape as a Military Weapon
By Ma Diosa Labiste

Bangladesh:
Why Dhaka's Rape Survivors Give Up On Justice
By Jharna Moni

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