Nirbhaya of West Bengal: Mamata’s Lawless Bengal and Media’s stoic silence

On the morning of Republic Day, a sixteen-year old girl was found dead in the Jamuria coal pit in West Bengal. Preliminary investigations reveal she was raped, murdered and thrown in there the previous evening. Several reports claim her body was charred. However, the details remain unknown due to systematic cover-ups from several quarters.

Nirbhaya of West Bengal

Many other stories about major lapses in law and order have emerged from the state in a very short span of time. In Birbhum last November, politically motivated mobs systematically murdered people to ‘regain control’ of certain villages. In Malda, a mob of hundreds of thousands took law into their own hands and rioted. Rahul Kanwal’s undercover reporting showed us how some people were running fiefdoms within Bengal, that law enforcement agencies feared to venture into. These were safe havens for drugs, fake currencies, arms and illegal immigrants. Despite Republic Day being celebrated in Kolkata last week, the Constitution of India means squat to some people and in certain areas of West Bengal.

How rampant lawlessness is, and how conveniently it is covered up, is shocking. Union ministers Smriti Irani and Babul Supriyo were stopped by the state police when they were on their way to the area where the horrific rape and murder took place. The incident took place in Supriyo’s constituency, but he was stopped from calling upon his constituents. The police took no action for five days, and the state government is yet to react. Basically there was a conscious attempt to play down the incident, cover it up, suppress it and make sure people move on.

Here’s what Derek has to say:

Nirbhaya of West Bengal – The Mega Cover-Up

It is believed that the perpetrator is a minor belonging to the minority community. The Mamata government’s appeasement and kid-glove treatment to lawlessness emerging from that community has emboldened its lumpen elements. This isn’t only a game of votebank politics. In many areas, the Trinamool’s cadre has gone through radical Islamization. Clipping the Malda fiefdom’s wings or taking action against perpetrators of heinous crimes belonging to the minority community, would shake the Trinamool’s foundations. Hence, the party is caught in a vicious circle. It lacks the guts and the humaneness to challenge anti-social elements and is happy to play along.

Nirbhaya of West Bengal – Media’s stoic silence

The other cover-up of this incident came from the mainstream media. These are the same people who were full of outrage during Dadri, and are still trying to make the best of Rohith Vemula’s suicide. Every day, they wait for some politician or the other to paradrop and express their selective outrage. But they were nowhere to be found when Prashant Poojari was murdered. They were nowhere to be seen when Sawan Rathod was butchered. How long did they take to tell us what was going on in Malda? Only when the situation reached a point where they had no other option, did they act. And today, they are mum about what happened to this girl.

When the Juvenile Justice Bill was being debated throughout the country, Nibhaya’s mother recounted her daughter’s tale of horror in an interview. The interviewer, Rajdeep Sardesai, broke down. Where are Rajdeep and his ilk today? Where is all the sorrow, the disgust, the outrage? Is it political constraints that stop them, or is it the fact this happened in an obscure part of West Bengal and not at the heart of New Delhi? Maybe it isn’t gruesome enough and less likely to get them their TRPs! After all, their characterlessness is not something new to us.

Nirbhaya of West Bengal: The hypocrisy of the Liberals

No awards were returned after this ghastly act. No crocodile tears were shed in television studios, or on the floor of parliament. No candlelight marches were held. What we must realize is that we will get nowhere in dealing with the rape epidemic if we use it to further our political cause. The media, the civil society and the political class cannot outrage selectively, especially not when it comes to rape

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References:

http://www.india.com/news/india/jamuria-rape-case-smriti-irani-babul-supriyo-stopped-from-visiting-durgapur-by-west-bengal-police-citing-communal-tension-895822/http://hinduexistence.org/2016/01/29/again-a-rape-and-murder-of-a-hindu-girl-by-muslim-rapist-why-bengal-media-and-secular-parties-want-to-suppress-it/http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/bjp-mp-babul-supriyo-stopped-from-meeting-rape-victim-family-in-west-bengal/1/580807.html