On Sunday I wrote that the epidemic of sexual abuse and sexual assault in India, dramatized by the recent deadly rape of a 23-year-old on a bus, should lead Indians to rethink their strict gun control. Now Britain’s Guardian newspaper reports that a lot of Indian women feel the same way and are applying for that nation’s notoriously hard-to-get gun permits.
Of course the Guardian disapproves, applauding increased political attention to the problem but saying “The rush for firearms will cause concern”. It went on to quote an unnamed official that in response to the women’s permit applications “We had to patiently tell them that one needs to have a clear danger to one’s life to be given a licence. However some … said that with even public transport no longer safe in the city they just cannot take chances.”
Nice of him to tell the women patiently that their estimate of the danger to their lives is not sufficient to worry him much. But I say Indian women should be allowed to decide how bad it is for themselves instead of relying on the condescending opinions of Western journalists and arrogant male Indian officials.
Categories: Bureaucracy, Foreign affairs, Government, Politics, Public Safety, Social issues
These heinous crimes such as rape and murder can not be stopped by issuing gun permits as guns are expensive and perhaps few tiny minority of rich women can afford. Millions of women at a lower economic strata, no education etc. Rapes and incest often committed by relatives or familiar to vitims.
Biggest problem is utter insensitivity shown by the police, and lack of enforcement of laws and such a poor rate of court verdicts.
There are many Politicians in India who are corrupt and literally wanted by the police are responsible for not doing this anything about enforcing laws.
Then sexist attitudes in the Indian patriarchial society existed for centuries and in the past decades corruption and lawlessness has made evry thing worse.
Take the example of the octogenerian prime minister Manmohan Singh did not even open his mouth for more than a week and then when the heat was turned by the protesters, comes to the microphone and mumbles few words like a zombie ( perhaps sounding like Alzeimers’ patient) and the president of the ruling party Mrs. Sonia Gandhi who is a woman nods her head in front of cameras. So you get the picture how rotten the ceratin aspects of life are in India.
But there are signs of progrss and hope. Thse protests are heartfelt expressions of angry people.