By Hiranmayee Mishra
(Hiranmayee is a writer, a researcher in Women’s Studies, teaching social science for last twenty five years. She is presently working as Director, Women’s Studies Centre (UGC) in an Autonomous College in Odisha.)
Finally the Apex court has confirmed death penalty for four convicts in Nirbhaya gang rape case. Five years for a judgment in such a rarest of rare case is a long time.
Justice Mishra has rightly mentioned that it created ‘ a tsunami of shock’. It is equally important to look at the language of the bench where it says that the convicts treated the victim as an “object of enjoyment”. This is unfortunately how our society treats women who constitute half of the population.
Attempts to rape, molestation, acid attacks, honor killings, – these all are done with intentions to crush the confidence and demean all the contribution of women towards families, societies and the state at large.
I felt shocked to see people still fighting to prove that death penalty is not acceptable even in such a case. I wonder why our legal system does not provide for chemical castration for sex offenders.
It’s high time that the Parliament brings such a law and I’m sure this would remind the sex offenders how hundreds of raped women of this country live after going through such an incident. And this would hopefully restrict the potential rapists to think many times before committing such a heinous crime.
Any civilised person should feel outraged and ashamed at the statistics of the atrocities on women in our country. Delhi still reported 5-6 cases of rape each day in last five years. Exemplary punishment and quick verdict are the only two measures which possibly check this situation.
Rape is the worst ever crime in a civilized world, and there is an immediate need for change in the attitude of people of this country.
No punishment is higher in comparison to the difficult and disrespectful lives the victims are pushed into for no fault of theirs.
(The opinions expressed by the author are solely his/her own and do not reflect the views of OdishaLIVE.)
