Sunday, December 27, 2009

Is dress code the answer to eve-teasing?



The reason they stated for taking this step is that they think that western outfits make women more vulnerable to eve teasing. Like many students who protested against this decision, I too found the idea ridiculous.
First of all I’d like to tell those people who are under the above misconception that girls who wear Salwars or Saris too have been victims of eve-teasing. I don’t remember me or my friends ever dressing provocatively but I can state umpteen cases where we faced indecent behaviour from men on the roads.
Vulgarity is in the mind so even the girls wearing right attire can attract wrong attention. I accept the fact that, what women wear does matter. If a woman wears a daring outfit, she will arouse attention even in the most liberal surroundings, forget the traditional ones.
But the restrictions that have been put on women are outrageous. Instead of punishing the wrongdoers the ignorant heads of the institution are trying to impose a dress code on girls stating safety as the highly unacceptable excuse. If this be the case then how do they explain the fact that though women in the west are less conservative when it comes to clothes but still cases of eve-teasing or crime against women are far less there as compared to here?

Monday, December 7, 2009

Why is Eve Teasing so common in Bangladesh?



When I first heard of this incident where a group of boys in Dhaka followed some young girls and then almost ran over one of them in their eagerness to attract their attention i was shocked. The injured girl (just ten years old!) was shown on TV and it was reported that she could be in hospital for several months-it was very disturbing to say the least.
What upsetting is that culprits are now free on bail.....

Studies show that 32 percent of the eve teasers are students, 35 percent are anti-social while the 33 percent are middle-aged men.

An increasingly large number of college going girls and other women taking public transportation in all metropolitan cities in Bangladesh have resorted to carrying pins, pen-knives and even daggers as a deterrent. Other has taken self-defense classes and don’t hesitate to hit.
In Bangladesh, every 51minutes a woman is street harassed; every 21 minutes one women is molested. Eve teasing is something that a woman has to contend with everyday.

Is this what our country is coming to?
I know we have no laws strong enough to either darter eve-teasers or to prevent rash driving...but what about public outrage? There was another incident in Dhaka where a man deliberately played dirty clips on his cell phone while sitting next to a girl in a bus. He kept thrusting the phone close to her face.....finally the girl stopped the bus and took the man to the police. Not a single commuter came forward to help her....in fact even the police were reluctant to register the complaint! They felt that she should have simply slapped the man instead of complaining to the police.
It is no big secret that the police don’t take eve-teasing incidents seriously. Eve-teasing is so common that the police are terrified of the flood of complaints they might receive if they did register the complaints! Shame on them.