women

“A Man doesn’t lie while dying.”

-By Rahul Kayarat

And that’s how this documentary piece reels you in with a gut punching story and visual of a man’s final tears of ensuing death. A step chosen by him to end it all. That is how this documentary begins. With the end of someone else’s story, their battle. Not 5 minutes in and you are enthralled to know more. And the rest 68 minutes are followed by a deep understanding and eye opening narrative of the Martyrs of Marriage, victims of false 498A cases.

Dictionary definitions of the words "Martyr" and "Marriage".
Still from “Martyrs of Marriage” by Deepika Bharadwaj (click on the image to watch the documentary)

498A is a provision which was laid out with obvious good intent on the society and the people inhabited, as all laws are meant to do, by abolishing unlawful demand of dowry and bring to justice the act of harassment on or towards the wife in a marriage, by either the husband or his family or both. Fairly after the ruling of the provision a lot of good came to the women of the country. Where this went sour is the blatant inequality seen in the words penned in the amendment itself. What was realized by some is how this law and the small loophole this law contains can be used to get a crutch out of others to milk out something without which nothing in the country runs, money.

Queue the families of Makhdoom, Avadesh and Manoj Kumar, who tell the tales of these martyrs who succumbed to injustice by falsely being accused of 498A. Them and their families, who thought bringing a woman home in the ritual of holy matrimony would put smiles all around, she not only stripped them off that happiness, but also took with them their dignity, pride and a life that will never be gained back. Seeing their families suffer because of a problem they thought they invited lead them to take the extreme step no human should be forced to go through, just to clear their name off some charge sheet and give an escape to their families, which as a matter of fact was the last wish in the notes few of them left. Is the cost of breaking free from the chains of stigma and depreciation from the society for something a person didn’t even do an actual life?

Yes, 498A drives the accused and the families crazy because it is written to be a cognizable, non bailable and non compoundable offence. What’s crazier is that it can be complained against an ‘n’ number of people, and no investigation ensues whatsoever, meaning it is of law that the woman’s verbal statement is to be taken as evidence of 100% credibility and the accused, no matter if there’s 20 of them or if one of them is a 8 month old child (yes, a real world example mentioned in the documentary) are to be immediately arrested. Some cases even include people living overseas being accused of daily abuse, people who haven’t stepped in the country for years.

Now, how can something related to a false accusation be talked about without including lawyers and the judicial system? The documentary mentions the whole 498A false cases scheme as a provision turned into a racket. It is something which the lawyers defending for the women are very much in on for a quick share of the money received. The “racket” is not that hard to understand. Petty cases which occur between married couple, sometimes even related to the woman’s in laws, turn into a 498A case. They usually go this route thinking this would end their problems as they have leverage now, but it quickly turns into an unwanted divorce. Things like greed and lawyers putting things into their minds turns things into an actual lawsuit, one which proceeds to rot the relationship even further but harm the man and his family even more so.

Shot by Mansi Thapliyal for BBC

As it is clear from the stories of people like Chandan Mukherjee, Hussein Ali, Chetan S Kanu and Partha, not only are these false allegations a crack in the married life of a person, it takes away their reputation, dignity and credibility as an individual in the eyes of the society, especially in front of such a hive minded one which we happen to live in. This in turn affects the quality of life and opportunities given to them. If one, after such allegations chooses to be brave and fight them to prove his innocence, then he’s looking at least at 10 or more years of his life being scrutinized due to the constant visits to police stations and court houses, and of course the delay in the case getting picked up by the system to be heard. That is the sad truth of the Indian Judicial System. Chetan who actively fought his truth after a false 498A after 14 years of marriage faces trouble finding work even after being a reputed scientist. On the other hand is Chandan, who lost the rights to see his son whom he got the chance to love and caress only gor a few months. Not to forget the humiliation faced by the likes of him and Partha, being picked up by police officials in front of their families, neighbors and colleagues, and being roughly interrogated in a demeaning way, pushed into a cell with people who are probably murderers.

One of the even worse negatives of these cases is that neither party can get remarried till the cases are cleared off their names. Even though a man has enough evidence to prove his innocence, who’s going to listen to him once a woman says he’s a bad person? That’s how systematically weak this provision stands. After being trapped, there is no way left for him to escape other than to comply with the demands of the woman. As a lawyer part of the documentary who has had experience dealing with these cases states, there hasn’t been a single case in their whole career where they saw the case being settled without some sort of agreement where money is exchanged. A man has to bear all the loss one way or the other.

Other than taking us on a ride through the hardcore reality of a law misused, where people end up losing lives because of the mental exhaustion and toll on them and their families, the director and producer of the documentary, Ms. Deepika Narayan Bharadwaj, who is an Independent Journalist and a Documentary Filmmaker, throws at us hardcore statistics and a load of other issues persisting men rights, some including how there is no law for paternity fraud and how a married woman cannot be tried for Adultery (IPC 497). There exist no laws that protect a man from marital abuse, which in grounded reality, very much exists. It throws a light on the false rape cases, on how as harassment is bailable, the alleged victims file for a fake rape case over the father-in-laws, destroying even the smallest of reputation they have left in the society. Delhi Commision for Women published a report in 2014 stating about 53% of the rapes reported in the city in the year prior were flagged as “false” at a later point.

Rape Cases Statistics by Rukmini Shrinivasan for The Hindu (2013) (Source: BBC.com)

This eye opening documentary, which ran on Netflix for 2 years, brings awareness to an important issue, which needs to be talked about more and found a solution for within gender neutral grounds, without making it about “men vs. women”. You will not realize the 1hr23mins of your life pass by as you’re sucked into the core of the unseen and unheard issues that happen right in front of us every day without us realizing until it affects us or one of our loved ones. If you don’t believe my words, feel free to check out the comments section on the YouTube upload of this documentary where hundreds have written their pieces of life and how they or their relatives are going through the grinders of fake 498A allegations. The comment section will prove to you a side of “MeToo’s” that are under looked by everyone because they are categorized into the gender that is male.

You can watch Deepika Bharadwaj’s Martyrs of Marriage here –

Real Feminism VS Pseudo Feminism on Social Media

  • Mohit Bhoite & Tanvi Vishwakarma

Hello readers, today we are going to talk about Real feminism Vs Pseudo feminism on social media, we all know that today social media is the best platform to spread something, anything can go viral in seconds doesn’t matter if its positive or negative information. Feminism and feminists are adapting according to trend and they made their way to social media and spreading the word for Equality but as bad comes with good there are some pseudo feminists also who just want clout by posting negative content.

NAREEVADI- THE HOT DESI TADKA

Nareevadi kya hai?

If we talk about feminism in Indian context, there are several meanings to it. In simple terms, it means women demanding rights equally to men.

‘The Hot Desi Tadka’

This is used sarcastically because stereotypically women are objectified as a sexual object and believed that they belong to kitchen, so let’s taste the new desi tadka.

Let us talk about some famous Instagram pages that are made in india, we have a lot of tea to spill.

  1. Shethepeopletv

This is exactly what the page looks like.  The page aims every single issue associated with misogyny and gender stereotype. From addressing the former to giving out their opinion, the page has everything to deal with.

  • Bebadass

Modern Nareevadi kya hai?

BeBadass is an Instagram page and an organization which encourages Real feminist’s who really want to work for society and empowers them, lets us take look at some posts.

As we can see in this post that there is no definition of beautiful and so called ‘perfect body’. They also post about women who are working towards upliftment of the society and more.

For some people the concept of feminism is not clear yet, feminism is a social political moment that was started for quality among all the genders and sexes some misunderstood it as ‘Only for women’. The base of feminism that it has started for women who has faced atrocities and has no equal rights, In India there are a lot of figues which inspires us Savitri Bai Phule, Prathiba Patil etc. are empowered womens who has done a lot for country.

Pseudo Feminism

There are feminists and then pseudo feminists come along, pseudo feminists are the people who thinks that only women deserve all the rights and they don’t want equality they just want women to be empowered. Nowadays pseudo feminists just post nudity on their social media accounts to gain clout. No content about empowerment and equality, showing body is feminism according to them.

Let’s check some social media accounts

1. Nikita Yadav @nikitayadavvv

In this post it was video of Nikita Yadav and Komal Pandey wearing garbage bags, in the caption it is written that they are breaking a stereo type which is not making any sense, how you can break a stereotype by wearing a garbage bag which is not even creative, and they call themselves feminists.

There are a lot of blind followers and pseudo feminists who follow them and encourages this act.

Same Nikita Yadav posted a video on her social media naked and said “Mujhe kapde peheneko mat bolo, logo ko mask peheneko bolo” Spreading awareness about wearing mask is good but why this pseudo feminist connects everything with body? Are they out of content?

Now it has become trend among pseudo feminists to post half naked pictures in name of freedom and awareness.

2. Moose Jattana

She calls herself an activist she was also a part of farmers protest and a lot of protests. She is a NRI and lives in Australia and is famous for mocking religions and men without any reason, recently she was fed up in a controversy where her inappropriate video got viral as she was calling it women empowerment a lot of Real feminists slammed her.

This pic was uploaded on Instagram handle of Moose Jattana which shows Maa Kali a Hindu Goddess is wearing mask and crying and written on it ‘Fight Beti Fight’ and we can also see a comment where are girl is saying that how this pseudo feminists everytime target only one religion.  

We all know that social media has some limitations as Slacktivism, it can be used to start a campaign but that doesn’t last for long time there are millions of users on social media some spread positivity and some spread negativity. There are a lot of feminists who are working really hard for equality and upliftment of the society but due to some pseudo feminists they are getting hate. There are some feminists who are working towards making internet a good place to spread the words but some pseudo feminists spoil it, this new generation only wants clout and they are willing to do anything for that, some feminists understood feminism as showing body only, and at end of every debate they say ‘Because we bleed’ this is not the answer for every argument.

In conclusion we hope that people follow some mature and real pages that will help a person who is really working hard for to make this world a better place.

How an ‘EYE’ can change someone’s life?

  • By Haritha Ravi and Unnati Kapoor

We’ve been told to cover our bodies as it is our job to protect ourselves. Men are not taught to keep their eyes to themselves as “Men will be Men”. We are taught to cover it up, to sit properly. We’ve been made to realize that we are sexual objects at a very young age when we do not know what sex even is. We all remember being told to sit properly, dress appropriately when there’s a male member of the family present in the house; we have to protect ourselves from our own blood. We are told to trust no one, not even our friends or relatives because in most sexual assault cases the alleged are someone close to you like a neighbour, a relative or a friend.

(source: Tumblr)

Dear men,         

Why do you get fascinated by our breasts? It is the same as the one your mother used to feed you with. Why do you desperately try to get a glimpse of my cleavage when I’m sitting on a bus or a metro minding my own business?

How do you feel when I have to send the photo of the number plate of cabs and autos when I’m travelling alone knowing that there is a possibility that I’ll be raped or sold off for my body? How do you feel realizing that you are depriving me of my freedom, my freedom to move, my freedom to work, my freedom to dress, my freedom to speak? Because I don’t know what will seem like an invitation to you? To violate my body and my mind with your eyes.

I can’t be submissive because then you will take advantage of me, I can’t be bold and outspoken because then it would hurt your male ego. 

I can never do anything without thinking about how you will reciprocate it and that’s the truth about being a woman.

This is to the guy working in a little leather shop in Jaipur, why did you feel like you had the right to touch my breasts under the pretense of adjusting the strap of the bag I had my eye on. It wasn’t like I was wearing provocative clothes or that I have big breasts, I was just 16 years old with underdeveloped breasts, so what was your motivation? Did you think that it’s okay to take advantage of me because I was technically still a kid? Are petite girls your fetish? I’ll never know. 

(source: Tumblr)

Eve teasing is described as staring, stalking, passing comments, and inappropriate physical touch. Perceived consequences of eve-teasing include tight restrictions on girls’ mobility, inability to attend school or work, girls being blamed, and causing family problems as if it’s the girl’s fault.

History of Eve Teasing

The problem first received public and media attention in the 1970s. In the following decades, more and more women started attending college and working independently, meaning that they were often no longer accompanied by a male escort as had been the norm in traditional society. Also seen during this period was a marked rise in the number of women coming forward to report cases of sexual harassment, due to changing public opinion against this practice. Also, the severity of these incidents grew as well, in some cases leading to acid throwing, which in turn led to states like Tamil Nadu making it a non-bailable offense. The number of women’s organizations and those working for women’s rights also increased and during this period reports of bride burning increased. (source: Wikipedia)

Not much has changed in that last 50 years, eve-teasing and acid attacks are still very common in India. As we have seen in the movie Chhapaak, an acid attack affects the entire life of the person. It makes them question their existence because they cannot relate to who they were before the attack.

Are we stupid to hope that these people, these situations will ever change?