By S Paul
This refers to the editorial in GP dated 9 April 2025. A very appropriate and timely observation by the journal. We are a culture and a land where we worship Shakti, Knowledge and Prosperity as females of Devas called ‘Devis’, but are greatly vicious towards our women. The ungodly tradition of male domination still prevails despite so many constitutional provisions of making the female of our society equally capable as male. Rape is a bestial way of imposing male domination on a captured hapless female. A rape victim gets violated not only physically but mentally. It is very traumatic for them to reconcile with the fact that they are no longer physically ‘whole’ and, in some PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) may affect their whole life. The punishment for the perpetrator of rape is merely jail for minimum 10 years and may extend to life imprisonment along with a fine. Only in extreme cases, the punishment can be a death sentence. (Section 376, Indian Penal Code).
How is that ‘extreme’ defined? It depends upon the interpretation by the judiciary and the quality of argument of the prosecutor. I feel every woman raped has suffered the ‘extreme’. It becomes more ‘extreme’ when the victim is an underage girl child.
For most of those men, this meagre punishment can be said to be ‘to have your cake and eat it too’. The perpetrator fulfils his lust and then on public expense gets to live in incarceration, not in solitude but in the company of other committers of our nation’s moral turpitude. In such a company, how is he expected to repent and become a refined citizen? He only becomes part of a crowd of offenders of law in jails which are getting overcrowded. Tihar jail in Delhi has 14,000 inmates against the 5,200 that it is designed for. The statistics of the kind of criminals shows that the highest are murderers at 35 % and next is rapists at 23 % of jail occupancy. The murderers also include those who raped and murdered their victims. Every day we learn through the media that hundreds of rapists are given jail terms from 10 to 20 years. Their percentage occupation would soon exceed those of murders. In executing the management of jails and to reduce the crowding, some among the criminals, mostly rapists, are released earlier for so-called good behaviour. Can we imagine how a victim would feel if faced by her violator roaming around free in society?
True justice would be done if the rapist also carries a physical and mental scar for life as does the victim. All the rapists ought to be devoid of their testosterone. Medically or surgically, they should be emasculated. Having thus rendered unable to procreate, their ilk may be usefully employed in selfless jobs or vocations.
