Jyoti: The girl who fired up a nation

I don’t know if it has occurred to you, but each time we address her as Nirbhaya or Damini, or any of the other dreadful names coined by newspaper subs, we are doing the young lady disservice. Because buried under the pseudonym is the primitive belief, a belief that we actually want to get away from: That the rape victim’s identity must be protected to save her and her family embarrassment. This, when the nation is gradually coming around to accepting that there is NO shame for the victim or her family, the shame belongs entirely to the rapists and their families. In fact, it is the primitive thinking that discourages women from filing rape complaints, and this allows rapists to get away with it. We simply have to change the goalpost, so that more and more women seek justice, rather than cower at home. 

Am happy that Jyoti’s parents have changed that, even though it came three years late. The poor folks are still searching for justice and closure, the ‘juvenile’ assaulter will walk free this weekend, but at least their daughter shall be remembered and honoured by her real name.  

Is being creepy a crime?

We still don’t know all the facts of the Jiah Khan death case, perhaps we never will, this one looks like Aarushi Part 2. What seems to have been established so far is that it was suicide, not murder, and that the principal abettor of the suicide was one Suraj Pancholi. If convicted, the dude will be jailed for a few years, but that’s a long way off.

The point I want to make on this date is: Pancholi may have been a poor partner, a coward, a creep, an insensitive lout. And chaps such as these need to be dumped immediately. But can he really be charged with abetment? Is that fair? Relationships often don’t work out, couples uncouple, there is inevitably a degree of bitterness, and then life moves on. Now if Jiah was an overly sensitive soul, a fragile individual who completely fell apart as a result of the break-up and could not accept and deal with betrayal by a creep, and chose to kill herself, can the boyfriend be accused of abetment? Is that fair?

I don’t think so. Unless proved in a court of law that he encouraged her to commit suicide, he must be let off.  

A five minute journey that takes a lifetime

This little film from Conde Nast Traveller beautifully captures the India-Pakistan border crossing at Wagah. I had expressed similar sentiments in my diary published in Outlook earlier this year, but this is Fatima Bhutto, so she could cross the border, unlike common man me. Anyway, I like the way the film has been shot, must watch.

Click here.

PS: Am taking a break for Christmas and New Year. See you on the other side. Insha Allah.