South Asia Citizens Web

Of all the promises made in the Constitution, the most important are the promises of the ’right to life’, the ’right to dignity’, the ’right to personal liberty’ and the ’right to bodily integrity and health’. However these promises are yet to be redeemed for women. Rape and other forms of sexual assault, domestic violence,dowry death and honour killings — the most brazen violation of these rights — are a real and daily danger for most women.

India does not have a uniform protocol for medical treatment and examination of survivors of sexual assault, making responses ad hoc and unpredictable, and in the worst cases, degrading and counter-productive. This is reflected in the continued use of the so-called “finger test,” which Human Rights Watch documented in a 2010 report.

Come to a New Year’s gathering that’s different. Stand in solidarity for the pointless loss of life of a young woman and countless other girls and women across our country. We will ring in the new year with songs, poems, discussions ... or in silence, depending on what people want to do.

Claim the streets as our own. At night. In the daytime. Whenever we want. With everyone we want. Join us, and stake your claim over this city and its public spaces. Our Nights, Our Days - Come join on 31st Dec at PVR Anupam at Saket [New Delhi] 10.30 pm to 1 am

According to Human Rights Watch, more than 800 Hazaras have been killed since 2001, but the local sources show that almost 1,000 have died with 3,000 suffering injuries

The trauma of the Delhi woman who was raped has ended with her death. The atrocity roused middle class anger all over the country. Emotions ran high around this atrocious act of some drunken men and the demonstrators made demands such as death penalty for rape and castration in public. This outburst is understandable given the cruelty of the perpetrators of the crime. However, one can ask whether this will become one more case of reacting to a single case without taking cognizance of the malaise that leads to such crimes. It became a high profile case because it happened in Delhi. That does not reduce the atrocity of the crime. But for change to occur in favour of women one has to go beyond this single case and deal with the issues involved. One has to remember that what happened in Delhi is not an exception. It received publicity because it happened in the capital but many more cases are hushed up regularly or are not reported. According to police records during 2011 India witnessed 228,650 crimes against women, 24,206 of them of rape and 35,565 of kidnapping and abduction.