DNA
 
Mumbai, Mar 24: Laik Mohammed Shaikh, a 28-year-old zari worker, allegedly abducted and raped a 16-year-old girl, living near his place of work in Jogeshwari East. She was rescued last fortnight.

Yatendra Singh, 38, was arrested on March 18 for allegedly molesting a five-year-old in his Santosh Nagar neighbourhood in Goregaon.

There are examples, a dime a dozen, to show that a woman in ‘safe’ Mumbai could be a victim of violence, not only as a grown-up but also at a tender age, or sometimes, even before she is born.

If statistics are not all damn lies, abuse of minors is on the rise in the city. In 2001, 97 minors were raped in the city. The number swelled to 112 in 2006. In the first two months of this year alone, 21 cases of minor rapes have been registered. In fact, rape of minors has outnumbered rape of elderly women (see box).

In some instances, a woman’s sex determines her right to be born not only in north Indian states like the Punjab but even in liberal, onward-bound Mumbai. Even though statistics are not available to establish this fact, but notwithstanding the ban on sex determination brought about by the Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques Act, the practice is rampant.

Some infertility experts are known to indulge a couple’s whim for a boy and, through pre-implantation diagnostic testing tools, impregnate the woman with a male embryo, albeit for a fat consideration. A former office-bearer of a gynaecological association recently tried her best to intervene in the case of a woman who had a daughter and wanted a boy. Unfortunately, given the 70 per cent accuracy of the procedure, the woman ended up with a baby girl.

There many obliging gynaecologists who disclose the sex of the child, to enable an unwanted girl child to be dispensed with.

Indeed, Mumbai’s women are probably safer on the streets than in their own homes. Giving the thumbs-down to the city for its attitude to women within the four walls, crime statistics tell a sorry tale of dowry deaths. Even dowry harassment ranks on top of the pile of complaints filed by women, as indicated by the cases registered under the much-discussed Section 498A of Indian Penal Code for dowry-related physical and mental harassment. (See box)

Other types of harassment have seen an upward trend as well. “If wife-beating was more common a decade ago, gender biases born of religious fundamentalism make life hell for a woman these days,” says Hasina Khan of Awaaz-e-Niswan, an NGO.

Women’s activists say the law is more than adequate to help an abused woman, with the latest Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act adding to her legal armoury. But the problem lies with society they feel.

“The real issue is how good the investigating officer is, whether the witnesses come forward or turn turtle, whether the families support,” says activist-lawyer Flavia Agnes. The reluctance of the police to file an FIR continues to be a big deterrent.

While maintaining that city cops were slightly more aware and easier to approach than in many other cities, former Chairperson of the Maharashtra State Women’s Commission

Nirmala Samant-Prabhavalkar contends that “complaints should be taken seriously even if they are made by individual women and not by NGOs.” There are sensitive police officers but they should be the norm and not the exception,” she observes.

On their part, a senior police officer says, “Very often, women come to us to file a complaint in the heat of the moment. Her complaint fizzles out once the dust settles. So, it amounts to unnecessary work for us.” Moreover, observes a police inspector, “if the complaint concerns a family member, it spoils relations within families forever.”

Information technology has brought with it newer ways to abuse women, such as morphing or superimposing a woman’s face on a nude picture, circulating offensive pictures on the Web, taking pictures of women without their knowledge and misusing it, etc. Police confirm that abuse of cyberspace is certainly on the rise. Samant-Prabhavalkar, who counsels distressed women, points out that with a larger number of women working late and the invasion of the BPO culture, these offences will only go north.

Activists say the need of the hour, is to classify all forms of discrimination against women such as undue restrictions on married women and cyber porn as violence. “There needs to be a perceptible shift in the way society views a woman’s status — she needs to be respected for herself. All atrocities against her will then automatically count as an offence,” says Khan.

Though abuse cannot be wished away, assertiveness is on the rise. More and more married women are now breaking free of their violent homes and filing for divorces with voluble support from their families, even for offences such as marital rape which has only recently gained acceptability.

On the brighter side, families are more supportive. “More families are actually stepping in and taking their daughters back when the in-laws or the husband get abusive,” says Agnes.

What is the official apparatus available to deal with distressed women? Apart from the legal option, there is the Social Services branch of the city police at the Police Commissionarate, which offers counselling and aid. Another cell, for prevention of offences against women, takes up such offences as well.

The Maharashtra State Women’s Commission offers support in the form of counselling for domestic violence or family problems.

A major handicap faced by many NGOs is the dearth of shelters for abused women. In case the family has no wherewithal to take her back, there is a virtual vacuum in terms of societal support. Women’s support groups in the city are hamstrung by the paucity of counselling facilities and shelters like the Worli-based Baap nu Ghar for distressed women.