IS  UP  SAFE  FOR  GIRLS?

By Brij Khandelwal

Agra July 21 (IANS)

Samajwadi Party supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav’s response to the increasing incidence of rapes in Uttar Pradesh has drawn caustic comments from social activists here.

Yadav two days ago had reacted saying sexual crimes in a state with 210 million people were not as alarming compared to some other states. Earlier too, Yadav had been taken to task for his casual comment “ladke hain, galtiyan ho jati hain.”

A retired police official (not wanting to be identified) told IANS “the actual number of crimes was much higher than projected, as most middle and upper class families hesitated lodging formal complaints. Of late of course the trend has changed and now more young girls are coming forward to speak out their minds.”

Political workers have called Mulayam’s comment in bad taste and one that would only encourage the rapists.

The Samajwadi Party is adopting an ostritch-like stance, not reading the writing on the wall, says activist Shravan Kumar Singh. “In last few days alone, four persons gang-raped a young dalit girl in Mathura district. In Meerut, a mother and her daughter who had gone to collect fire-wood, were abducted and raped repeatedly in a forest area by six persons. In Firozabad late Saturday night a 12^th standard girl was forcibly taken to a desolate place and gang raped. A youth in Aligarh district raped a girl. The boy, a polytechnic student tied the 13 year old girl with her dupatta and raped her after threatening her life with a pistol. In Allahabad too a 10^th standard girl was raped by a truck driver and cleaner,” he pointed out.

The situation is hardly safe in the Agra region for girls who are going out for studies, say the worried parents.

The city of love is turning hostile to the safety of young girls.

Girls are not safe in Agra, say the senior citizens. The predicament is two-fold: more and more girls from the vast rural hinterland and the smaller towns on the periphery of the city are venturing out for work or studies.

"The pomp and glare of the city life lures many who become targets of abuse by predators at large," says Naresh Paras, a human rights activist. The right to education for all and the attraction of free meals, free books, bags, uniforms and even cycles, have facilitated mobility proving  a great motivating factor to bring girls out of their conventional mindsets and backgrounds. "But this trend has also created a whole lot of social problems, failed love affairs, murders, attacks, rapes and cheating and invariably its the young girls who have to suffer," Naresh adds.

While civil society activists blame the political class for callous indifference and complicity in some cases, senior police officials at several interactions recently have targeted changing life-styles and loosening parental grip on children.

Why is the city of love turning into a sex and crime capital of west UP?   Many locals blame the police, others target the changing moral values. "Its a combination of factors and all of us are partly to blame. With  freedom and mobility come a set of problems as predators are on the prowl everywhere," says a woman activist Padmini of Naari and Baal Vikas Samiti.

From April to July, more than a score young girls have become victims of  physical molestation or brutal rapes,  many lifted while sleeping out of their homes with parents in the dark of night. "The girls are brutally raped and then to hide their identity either murdered or mutilated. Of late there have been so many incidents of girls being thrown before running trains. Why the law enforcing agencies are not waking up to these new challenges," asks school teacher Meera Gupta.

"In recent years there has been high migration from the smaller towns and villages on the periphery. These impoverished people live in slums and underdeveloped areas without facilities, exposing the girls and women to crimes," explains activist Madhukar Chaturvedi.

Flesh traders with regular supply of girls from Nepal and other areas bordering Bangladesh to the centuries-old red light areas of Basai, Mal ka Bazar, Seo ka Bazar areas are sustained by the migrant population. "A large supply comes from Bangladesh. In Agra alone there must be at least a few thousand girls from the east married to locals, reflecting the imbalanced sex-ratio.

A random visit to the family courts and the Mahila thanas, gives a fair indication of the rotten state of affairs. You now have young married women revolting against an oppressive system propped up by insane and inhuman mother in laws, or relatives and in most cases drunkard husbands. "One does see a rise in promiscuity also, perhaps fuelled by media or internet. Young girls having affairs and even indulging in pre-marital relations or participating in drink-drug parties, have no qualms about what they describe as the decadent moral values," a human rights activist Megh Singh Yadav says.