As a woman nothing affects me more than the news I come across everyday about the rape cases. I feel like my own body being violated. It physically and mentally disturbs me. I still have not fully read Sita’s story. In fact I don’t ever read the details. It feels too close. I know I could never feel Sita’s ordeal in the truest sense. I will probably never meet her and will get to tell her that I am with her. But I know one thing I can do, is raise my voice against this injustice. Equally depressing is our Nepali government very conveniently ignoring this case and many more similar cases. Think about it, what if Sita was your own daughter, sister, mother or your very close friend? How would you feel? How would you feel about being forcefully touched, grabbed, and humiliated? How would you feel?
We are living in the 21st century but things really have not changed. Those who say west have it much better- aren’t any better off either. I realize, this is an ongoing fight. For the right to live the way we want to live. For the right to be where we want to be; for just any basic rights that any other humans are bestowed with. Why can’t women do the same?
Why is it anybody’s headache – if a woman wants to dress a certain way, wants to hang out till late night? If a man could do it, why can’t a woman do it as well without the fear of being raped and abused? When we are talking about punishing the criminals of this horrendous act- why is the discussion hijacked by the ‘kind’ of woman a woman is. Why does it have to matter? Why is it diverted from the crux of the matter and the matter is; a man raped a woman and that man needs to be penalized. Today the Indian woman succumbed to death from the gang rape. And what did the Indian government do? This incident only exposed Indian politicians’ sexist prejudices against women. Such a shame. How many women will have to be victimized, how many of us will have to die before men respect the boundaries. Just how many?
Whether it was the most recent gang rape case in India. The 7-year-old little girl’s case in China; the woman kidnapped at gunpoint- raped and killed in the US. Millions of women, who get abducted, abused and sold in prostitution or even the case of Sita who got robbed and raped by a policeman. When is it going to stop? And what government is going to do about it? We want answers, we want actions being taken. We want criminals punished. We want justice for women.