For more than an hour I have been sitting on my dining table trying to bring myself to write. (Had to move away from the writing table with its stack-high papers replete with the unspeakable nauseating “news” and the ping of the computer routinely providing updates.) I must say that the change of locale has left me no better, and I am still struggling with not retching into a tea towel. I have for all this while, been telling myself in the headmistressy voice that remains with me, long after I left school, to think of life-affirming happenings such as Prince Harry and fiancée Meghans’ decision to accept no wedding gifts.
So if some Sheikh wishes to gift the couple a penthouse, yacht or treasure chest of jewels, he should send the worth in cash to their charities; one being in Mumbai’s slum by the name of Myna Mahila Foundation. Thus donations in lieu of gifts but…but this epidemic has preyed on the mind leaving it hanging by a thread. Before beginning was further enraged to learn that there has been a “ban” clamped on newspapers to name the “supposed” rape victim. Yes, rape—rape of children has become an everyday affair, so much so, that with the spiralling statistics there should be a page devoted entirely to molestation, mutilation and murder under a newly christened running head captioned “Rape Page” akin to “Sports Page”.
And why this sickeningly, politically cautious word “supposed” rape, “alleged” rape? Little girls are being raped—one needs to even have go to a doctor for verification; gashed, bleeding private parts, bodies bearing slashes, torn and slit by wanton paws and yet one still has to wait it out for forensic reports to “confirm” the rape. And the “ban” forbidding the poor victim from being named ?! Does making someone nameless make her vanish into thin air or does it lessen the crime if that’s what it can be called, since the identity has been swept under a carpet grown lumpy with so many pre-pubescent females stripped of their names.
Before one talks of the Kathua case—yes, yes, yes “case” pertaining to the region of Kashmir not the faceless girl belonging to the Bakrawal nomadic community who, come winter, would make their annual descent to Jammu’s forests to graze their horses, sheep and goats heading back before the onset of spring to their mountain abode— to touch on some other back-to-back rapes. (How violating to the senses does that sound!) A couple of weeks ago the body of an 11 year old girl was found in Surat dumped behind some bushes with the “official count” of 86, I think, cuts, slashes, tears; to her private parts, as well.
The identity, unlike the little apple-cheeked Heidi from the Himalayas, unknown. Prior to this a 17 year old girl was about to immolate herself since a legislator from Uttar Pradesh had “allegedly” raped her and the police, therefore, did not think it worth their while to register a case against the politician. What were they doing while the girl was pleading with them for justice—slurping their sugary milky tea in smoky glasses, scratching their pot bellies with the buttons threatening to pop out, grazing their itchy, perspiring crotches, twirling their macho moustaches into a fine, symmetrically perfect from both ends, twisted coil?! And what about the visual of the 244-day-old baby with her innards torn into shreds with tubes inserted all over her body, in a bid to save her life? What kind of a person, could imagine inserting himself in an infant? Person, naah! Fiend, Savage, Beast—these again too mild! Satan himself, made his way perhaps. (One matter is clear—in my house the TV in the lounge is always on, fixated solely on one news channel or the other, so much so, that I remain dumbfounded why it has not blacked-out, lost consciousness with its 24/7 nineteen to a dozen talk ’n’ show— is going to be put on permanent mute since the Significant Other needs it on—being a creature of habit.) Now to return to the eight year old blissfully grazing her horses in a Jammu forest.
Heidi, remember the little girl, living in the Swiss Alps, a Wordsworthian child—well, that is what, at this moment, I deem fit to call her, that is, until her real name is restored to her. Heidi lured “reportedly” by 60 year old Sanjhi Ram, who was ill at ease with Muslims temporarily using the area which “belonged” to Hindus and so decided it was time to teach “them” a lesson? The highland lass taken to a temple, drugged, raped by four or five or more men breathlessly waiting for their turn while going orgasmic simply watching the one before the other thirstily thrusting himself into the frail child’s body? The theory of demographic shift in the state inducing one to go to such lengths? The threat of numerical invasion by members of another religion so potent that the only means to forestall, put the kibosh on, was by repeatedly raping a small girl, for what was it, four non-ending days and nights in a shrine?! Then the “supposed” (there we go again) role of a police officer—wanting his share of the pie, his Hafta? Officer Deepak Khajuria? Whisking off his metal belt bearing the badge of law enforcement, an insignia to protect the people—a Hippocratic oath of sorts—to go in for the kill? The defilement arousing the juvenile “participant” yet again…The final rape, before the mountain lass was strangulated, and banged on the head with a rock, to doubly assure her death.
A Parade of Paedophiles. The only way to stop this motorcade is a tortuously slow death, starting perhaps, by tearing out the fingernails and culminating in castration.
Dr Renée Ranchan writes on socio-psychological issues, quasi-political matters and concerns that touch us all