In Kolkata, amid ongoing investigations, a civic volunteer has been arrested.
A trainee doctor walks into a seminar room after a 36-hour shift to rest, the only place available in the absence of a duty room. The next morning she is found dead, her body bearing marks of grievous sexual assault. A junior nurse finishes her shift and goes to change. She is sexually assaulted and choked nearly to death. She lives for 41 excruciating years afterwards in a vegetative state. Separated by decades and cities, the fate of these two women — the 31-year-old doctor in Kolkata’s state-run RG Kar Medical College who was found dead on August 9, and Aruna Shanbaug, assaulted in November 1973 in Mumbai’s KEM Hospital — shows that when it comes to women’s safety, not much has moved in India despite the loud assertions of “nari shakti”.
In Kolkata, amid ongoing investigations, a civic volunteer has been arrested. Issues flagged year after year have surfaced — CCTV cameras that don’t work, absence of on-call rooms with wash rooms, ill-lit areas that women staffers prefer to avoid after dark and inadequate security measures that have made doctors increasingly vulnerable to violence. The larger failure is the chasm between intention and outcome when it comes to women’s safety. Promises made in the aftermath of the horrific December 16 gangrape incident in 2012 have largely been reduced to lip service: The 100 per cent increase in the budgetary allocation of the Nirbhaya Fund for 2024-25 notwithstanding, data shows that between 2013, when it was set up, and 2022, less than half of the allocation had been used. Society and institutions will need to keep up with changing realities. According to the All India Survey on Higher Education, in 2020-21, the ratio of women to men studying medicine was 1:1. In nursing, there were 310 women for every 100 men. Yet, implementation of the Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition, Redressal) Act, notified in 2013, has been half-hearted: In May 2023, the Supreme Court called out “authorities/management/employers” for failing to ensure a “safe and secure work place” for women.
If this is a moment for the administration of RG Kar Medical College to confront questions about its responsibilities towards students and staff, it also calls for a wider introspection. There is a fundamental problem in the way issues of women’s safety are addressed. The clamour for capital punishment, or “encounter”, as TMC party general secretary Abhishek Banerjee has suggested, shows a tone-deaf reliance on instant justice. There is no consolation that can mitigate the pain of the bereaved; no atonement for acts of senseless violence that cut short lives full of promise. The only lesson that can be taken away from this is to make good on promises of empowerment and equality and a commitment to the due course of justice.
© The Indian Express Pvt Ltd
First uploaded on: 14-08-2024 at 07:39 IST
