justice & safety

‘The rape and murder that has shocked the nation to its core was brewing over decades as a manifestation of leniently dealt crimes against women on a continuous curve, gender disequilibrium in society, unsafe working conditions, rapists’ sense of impunity empowering them to exercise power and control over women, and the list is long. Swift justice and sustained safety remain non-negotiable for turning the tide around

- RAHUL KAMBLE & SURAJ KUMAR

The year was 1973 when a 25-yearold nurse at the KEM hospital in Mumbai was sodomised and strangled with a metal dog chain that pushed her to a vegetative state for the rest of her life. Five decades apart, a 31-year-old post graduate resident doctor of Kolkata’s RG Kar Medical College was raped and throttled to death last week, with a post-mortem report suggesting inhumane agony. Both happened in hospital premises where the women were employed. Both had brutality writ large. Has the state failed them, and us, again? Unfortunately, it takes bestiality of the highest order to stir the collective Indian conscience. The last time it happened was in December of 2012, when the entire nation put its weight behind ‘Nirbhaya’ — a moniker for ‘the fearless’. Twelve years down the line, the brutal rape in Kolkata has created a matching stir, and exposed the irony behind the moniker coined back then — implying that ‘fearlessness’ of women comes at a cost, and a heavy one!

Constant vulnerability