Harsher sentences may play some role in stemming crimes but most importantly, changes to legislation need to be made.
JUBAIL, SAUDI ARABIA: To make women tourists feel safe in India, the country’s railway porters, taxi drivers and tour guides will soon display badges on their chests declaring “I respect women”. This ‘brilliant’ and ‘visionary’ idea has been floated by the Indian tourism ministry. Badges will be printed in Hindi and 10 international languages, including English, French, Arabic, German, Italian, Japanese, etc.
In recent times, India has seen an unprecedented upsurge in offences against local and foreign women, with rape and molestation being widely reported. However, if someone in the tourism ministry thinks that by sporting a badge, a stream of respect for women will flow out of porters and taxi drivers, then they should start looking for another job.
This is a serious issue for Indian legislators, law enforcers, religious leaders, educationists, sociologists and the vibrant civil society. They need to look for real reasons for such heinous crimes against women.
With a vocal media, an increasing number of rape cases are being reported, though the ones reported to the police are only four out of 10. Harsher sentences may play some role in stemming these crimes but most importantly, changes to legislation need to be made to make it easy and fast to implicate and sentence rapists.
This deep-rooted issue will not go away with the display of a badge; what is needed is a concrete long-term vision and strategy.
Masood Khan
Published in The Express Tribune, July 24th, 2013.
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