Much has been written and told about Gurmehar Kaur from the Delhi University and the whole country now knows about her views and she has probably a pacifist who wishes to bring an end to wars and that’s all fine because that’s her opinion. Similar to her opinion there are others who too have an opinion and they are entitled to their opinion too, be it Sehwag or actor Randeep Hooda or others. There should not be a big fuss about ‘opinions’ until one does not subscribe to an anti-national viewpoint.
Next part of the tale is about the use of abusive language, death and rape threats against Gurmehar on the social media, which is of course highly deplorable and needs to be addressed according to the law of the land and whoever has done it should be booked and brought to justice, there are no two thoughts about that too.
The media is constantly focusing on this story, bringing Gurmehar’s plight to the nation and all that being done in-line with the ‘modern’ spirit of journalism. Little twists and alternate narratives are being suppressed.
We have another girl student in her twenties named Prerna Bhardwaj also from DU, somewhere in the hustle bustle of azadi, death, rape threats, tweets, etc. her story was lost or to be very precise, was made to be lost.
Prerna Bharadwaj, a student of Political Science at Kirori mal college, New Delhi was at the protest ground last week against a seminar where Umar Khalid (who faces grave charges of sedition) and Shehla Rashid were invited to the Ramjas college. During the protest, Prerna Bharadwaj who belongs to the ABVP (just as Gurmehar belongs to AISA) was protesting on the campus. Suddenly she was physically assaulted and molested by the left students union AISA & SFI.
Prerna was horrified by this gross behavior and the outright hooliganism afflicted on her. She reached home and presented her traumatic ordeal to her parents as “I went home and cried, and cried for hours, my clothes were torn, my mother came running she was horrified to see the sight I was in. She expected the worst she kissed me she cried too. She enquired what happened. My father heard the noise he came in the room too. I told them some boys from the left tried to molest me, they hit me on my chest in front of everyone today.” But she bravely continues further “…. how can I tolerate the insult of my nation, how can I tolerate abuses on the people in the uniform when I myself am an NCC cadet and wear uniform! How can I bear somebody tearing clothes of my friends….. How can I stay quiet when they call terrorist a shaheed?”
There has been a big hue and cry and anger for the threats and bad language used against Gurmehar Kaur which is right, but in contrast what about Prerna Bharadwaj who was actually sexually assaulted. No one even bothers to talk about it.
Why is the media silent? Why not one of their reporter do a cover story on Prerna Bharadwaj and tell the whole world the trauma she faced? Why is this not a talking point or a discussion or a debate agenda, after all has the modesty of a woman not been outraged?
Is Prerna Bharadwaj less of a woman? Does our duty of protecting women ends, does our spirit of journalism gets exhausted when the victim belongs to ABVP and not to a left aligned group?
Watch the video below and see for yourself- is the NDTV host showing the same empathy to ABVP Member Prerna Bharadwaj which they showed to Gurmehar? Does Prerna’s molestation hurt less ?
ABVP filed an FIR for Gurmehar Kaur, can AISA / SFI have the courage to file an FIR for Prerna Bhardwaj?
Why has Javed Akhtar or Naseeruddin Shah or Raza Murad or Pooja Bhat or Rahul Gandhi or for that matter even the Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal did not express their sympathies or sadness for such an incident as they expressed their support for Gurmehar Kaur, why is DCW silent? Eventually there are many such agonizing and harrowing questions that need to be answered by all these stake holders including the MEDIA.
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