Women’s Web is saying Goodbye! Please make sure you read this important notification.
"Girls shouldn’t be on beaches at night” is the response of the Goa CM after the gang rape of two minor girls, when his govt should be hauled up for the increasing lack of safety in the state.
“Girls shouldn’t be on beaches at night” is the response of the Goa CM after the gang rape of two minor girls, when his govt should be hauled up for the increasing lack of safety in the state.
*Trigger warning: This speaks of violence against women and child sexual abuse, and may be triggering to survivors.
After a friend’s birthday party for which they had gathered on a Goa beach, four of them stayed back on the beach, and this is when the incident happened.
Instead of owning up to a failure of law enforcement, Goa CM Pramod Sawant has made this provoking and unacceptable statement and also questioned the victim’s parents, “What 14-year old girls were doing at the beach at midnight?”
In a report by the Times of India in 2019, it is found that Goa, one of the biggest tourism spots, records a rape report every fifth day.
The Colva police have found the culprits and arrested them, though. While the citizens were in agony and anguish from the news, Goa CM’s statement implies that it was the mistake of the victims and their parents to be at the beach, and that parents have failed to control their stubborn children. This, when it should be the parents who should actually question the CM regarding their daughter’s safety.
This statement by CM Sawant is not a new phenomenon. Indian women have been tolerating abuse and are also being blamed for their own abuse, all over the country.
Elected members have in the past made similar enraging sexist comments. Like when Samajwadi Party Chief, Mulayam Singh Yadav stated that “boys will be boys, mistakes can be made”, when Congress leader MP Tapas Pal remarked in a video aggressively that “I won’t spare you. I will let loose my boys in your homes and they will commit rape”, and when RSS’ supremo Mohan Bhagwat said that “Women should refrain from stepping out with men. Such incidents happen due to the western culture.”
“Girls shouldn’t be out roaming at midnight” is also quite a baseless gender stereotype as we all have read of hundreds of rape, molestation, harassment cases that happen in day-light at workplaces, at temples, at their own homes.
Ladies, you’re not responsible for your own sexual assault, not today, not ever. Justifying a shameful act like gang rape with statements like this is saying that Men will do whatever they want have to, You, as women should cage yourself at your home.
Image source: YouTube
Bhumika is an English Majors undergraduate at the University Of Delhi and at this moment actively working with an NGO, as a content department associate that works for normalizing menstruation and promotes menstrual hygiene. She read more...
Women's Web is an open platform that publishes a diversity of views, individual posts do not necessarily represent the platform's views and opinions at all times.
Stay updated with our Weekly Newsletter or Daily Summary - or both!
Please enter your email address