Full transcript
0:00So a girl was raped in a park in Delhi
0:02and our response was to shut the park.
0:06When women face violence in public
0:07spaces, why is it that our response is
0:09to restrict their freedom even further?
0:11Take a look at today's achievements
0:13gloriously in our country in Uttar
0:14Pradesh. Two police officers and two
0:16CRPF personnel called a w woman to a
0:19farmhouse and took turns to rape her.
0:21They've now been arrested in Bihar after
0:22that Jammu incident. Another incident in
0:26Samastipur where men surrounded and
0:28harassed a girl who was out with a boy
0:30in Delhi. After that 17-year-old was
0:33raped on her birthday in a park, the
0:36nearby women's college, LSR moved its
0:40classes online, the Delhi Development
0:41Authority decided to control entry to
0:43parks after sunset. So the message being
0:45sent is that when there is violence
0:48against girls, girls must stay home,
0:49classes will move online, access to
0:51parks will be restricted. So the men who
0:53actually inflicted that violence, not
0:56only did they take away that one girl's
0:58freedom, the loss is permanent now for
1:00all girls. India's problem really and we
1:04keep asking why does this happen? Why do
1:05we have a problem of sexual assault in
1:07India is because we have a deeply
1:09unequal society
1:11and in that unequal society from birth
1:14the value of a girl is judged based on
1:16her virginity which is her market value
1:19for marriage. So irrespective of her
1:21talents and her ambition and her
1:23achievements and her dreams, her final
1:26goal is to be owned by a man and only a
1:28good virgin girl can be married. So a
1:32girl who steps out, god forbid, late at
1:34night dressed provocatively with a man
1:36has obviously decided [gasps] to gamble
1:38away her virginity
1:41and her eligibility for marriage. And
1:42therefore now any two bit chap on the
1:44street decides he can help himself to
1:46her. Men are never required to justify
1:49their clothes, their company, their
1:50ambition, their location in the context
1:52of social morality. And women have to
1:54constantly live in fear.
1:57What if I miss the bus? What if I end up
1:59in a dark street? What if the street
2:00light goes out? What if the library is
2:02shut? What if I don't get an auto? What
2:04if the metro is not available? And of
2:06course, the Indian classic, what if I'm
2:07raped on a bus? We keep coming back to
2:09that classic on a regular basis. Society
2:12has a sthing anger, a sthing, deep anger
2:16for girls who dare to break the rules,
2:18who go out to study, for tuution in a
2:20t-shirt with a boy. Oh my god,
2:25the hatred for those girls who symbolize
2:28an ambition to unshackle their necks, to
2:31break the chains, to live in a world
2:33where perhaps they don't need a husband
2:35or his Tawi's approval to survive.
2:39Men hate those girls. Those girls
2:41threaten their very existence, threaten
2:44the value of their existence. And women
2:47who have access to money, women who have
2:49access to wealth are able to insulate
2:51themselves because they buy cars. They
2:54choose different routes. They book
2:55camps.
2:57They hire drivers. They hire security
2:59guards. They choose a more expensive
3:01place to live. They decide because they
3:03can. They decide when they can go out
3:05and when they don't want to go out. A
3:06study done in India in 2019 on um urban
3:10mobility showed that on the day that
3:12they were asked 53% of the women uh in
3:15urban India said that they had not
3:17stepped out of their house but that
3:18number was only 14% for the men. So
3:21obviously women and men don't have equal
3:23access to life outside the home. Half
3:25our population are not able to
3:27participate. You can put a guard at the
3:29gate but you cannot change the mindset
3:31in our society where men feel entitled
3:34to decide where a woman belongs and then
3:37they feel entitled to punish a woman who
3:38has gone against their personal
3:40decision. If we intended to solve the
3:43problem as a country like really
3:45intended to solve the problem like we
3:47really meant it. There's enough research
3:48to tell us what to do because there is
3:50all of this like oh how do we stop the
3:51rapes from happening? We don't know how
3:53to stop the rapes from happening. We
3:55know how to stop the rapes from
3:56happening. We just don't want to do
3:57anything about it. First of all, we have
3:59to give women their spaces back, all
4:02their spaces at all times of the day,
4:03which means make the buses more
4:05reliable, the streets well lit, the
4:07parks well-maintained. Appoint women to
4:09solve these problems on a roadby basis
4:12across the country on priority. Ask the
4:15women who use the spaces what they need.
4:17Where do they need the lights? Where do
4:18they need the help? What needs to be
4:20solved? And measure the outcomes clearly
4:23by the numbers of women who can travel,
4:25by the ones who can work, who can spend
4:27time outside their home in leisure. So
4:29they're going out of their house after
4:31dark to enjoy themselves and not because
4:34they have no choice. These numbers,
4:37these outcomes can actually be measured.
4:39Second, we have to teach consent and
4:41equality on everyday principles. From
4:44childhood, boys must be told that girls
4:47are full people.
4:50These are full citizens of these of the
4:52country. They are full people. A woman
4:54decides what she wears, where she goes,
4:56how she studies, when she comes home,
4:58how she comes home, and who she spends
4:59time with. The refusal does not require
5:01an explanation. And being in public is
5:04never permission to touch her, to
5:05threaten her, to interrogate her.
5:09For boys to believe
5:12that women are entitled to consent and
5:16to autonomy, men have to believe it
5:18first. And the men who are the
5:20politicians, the men who are the judges,
5:22the men who are the cops, the men who
5:23are the teachers,
5:26they have to believe it first. We have
5:28to decide that we will punish violation
5:32of consent, harassment and rape anywhere
5:36in this country. Whether we are
5:38eyewitnesses, employers, teachers,
5:40members of the law and order, members of
5:42society, if we see someone harassing a
5:45girl or a woman, we will step up and we
5:47will stop it immediately. We will treat
5:49it as if someone is sitting down when
5:51the national anthem is played. We will
5:53get that angry. We will stop it as soon
5:56as we see it. And that is the only way
5:58to go forward. And I think that there is
6:00a fundamental fault line in what people
6:02have understood.
6:05Women in India are asking for safety.
6:07We're not asking for protection.
6:13That difference is the fault line in our
6:15society because men believe
6:17that they have to bestow on us their
6:20protection
6:22and they will bestow their protection
6:24only on women who are deserving of it.
6:26So women who are good girls, who wear
6:29modest clothes and who are home before
6:31dark and who use polite language so as
6:34to not cause culture shocks, that women
6:37and girls will earn your protection.
6:40So we've created a society where women
6:44need to be protected from men by men who
6:48will decide whether or not [snorts] they
6:51will protect you. And that entire
6:53concept is false because we're not
6:55asking for your protection. We're asking
6:58for safety and safety and the right to
7:00life is guaranteed to us by the
7:03constitution of India irrespective of
7:05our gender also irrespective of our
7:07clothes and our choices and our company
7:09and our location. We still have a right
7:12to life. You don't get to decide that.
7:16And that is the concept of autonomy, of
7:20equality, and of consent
7:23that we fail to recognize as a society
7:26and as a country.
7:30We will see these knee-jerk reactions in
7:33Delhi. There will be cops crawling the
7:35streets for the next 6 days until they
7:36they all just move on to do VIP security
7:38again. They will close the parks and
7:41they will like put banan dark windows on
7:45cars and other knee-jerk reactions that
7:47we have done. Police shooting people in
7:50the foot.
7:52But the real work, the real work is when
7:55the men in power decide
7:58that we are equal.
8:00And here's the thing,
8:04the girls are already going out of their
8:05homes. The girls are studying. They're
8:08becoming scientists. They're becoming
8:09doctors. They're becoming lawyers.
8:11They're becoming judges.
8:13They're not going to go back into the
8:15box.
8:17It's a matter of time.
8:20The men are going to have to get with
8:22the