In the last few days, we have seen a huge surge of activity on social media with people running amok with hashtag campaigns and protesting against the Jammu rape incident. It even included people who were otherwise tight-lipped about contemporary issues, and they jumped on the bandwagon to condemn the cruelty. Emphatically, it’s a pleasing sight to see more and more people participating in the social and political discourses of the day. Genuine dissent has always been the beauty of our democracy. However, it becomes seemingly dangerous when we shed the ‘genuineness’ and the remaining dissent is propelled by sheer political motives.
To highlight one such hypocrisy, let’s roll back the timeline to February 2017 where another blood chilling incident took place in Kerala. A leading actress in the Malayalam film industry was sexually assaulted by a group of men in a moving car, over the instruction of Dileep, a leading cctor in the same industry (according to the charge-sheet filed by the police). Dileep was arrested and was sent to jail for almost 90 days, and after three consecutive bail pleas, he was eventually out an bail. After the initial hullabaloo and protests by the Keralites, things have calm down and his bail judgement was widely welcomed by a huge number of people in our society. Hundreds of people had then gathered around the sub jail to welcome the rape accused, shaming us as a society. Today, his new film is going to be released and a good majority of movie-goers are bracing themselves to watch a first day first show of the movie. The media houses have done a pretty decent campaign for this movie, and unprecedented support and adulation were showered on the actor by the educated folks of Kerala.
The actor has allegedly pumped in a lot of money to change the social media narrative to his tunes. And clearly, the consciences of some people are up for sale. Money and influence are like that, they buy up everything that is human. The left leaning media outlets in the state, which is now vehemently trying to bring politics and religion to the current rape incidents, could have taken a stringent stand against the movie promotions of the actor accused of rape. They could have restrained from falling for the piece of pie the producers and actor would have offered them, but, everything is fair and square for the two-faced champions of liberalism.
The hypocrisy is that the same people who support Dileep, despite knowing that the court has not yet vindicated him, are running around with #JusticeForSalma (Name Changed) tags. These justice seekers should know that the accused in Salma (Name Changed)’s case are also not convicted, they are just accused like their favorite actor. If you think it’s perfectly alright to back and cheer for Dileep then you don’t deserve the right to point fingers at the accused belonging to other rape cases.
Our country will progress only when our society start identifying ‘rapists’ as ‘rapists’. There is no White rapist, Black rapist, rich rapist, poor rapists, Hindu rapist, Muslim rapist or Dalit rapist. Rapists are a different despicable group which should be reprimanded by all sane human beings.
Last, but not the least, “Rape is not a political tool”. For everyone, who have sensed a field day out of the gruesome rape incidents and vehemently campaigning to put the onus on their political rivals, you are doing a gross injustice to the daughters of Bharat who had undergone horrendous sufferings at the hands of these monstrous rapists. Let’s unite as a society and seek justice for all rape victims. Let’s force our law makers to revive our obsolete justice system to embolden the people’s trust in the system.