Female vigilantes in India join forces to fight rape

Mandakini Gahlot | Special for USA TODAY

NEW DELHI — Eight young women dressed in red tunics and black scarves make their way along a narrow lane in Lucknow's Madiyav slum in northern India as young men move quickly out of their way, avoiding their eyes.

The girls reach a house at the corner of the lane: Two go in and emerge with a young man. Preeti Verma, 17, has a hand around his neck and pushes him toward the girls who then pummel him with slippers and their fists. No onlookers intervene.

"He had been stalking one of the girls in Madiyav," said 25-year-old Usha Vishvakarma, leader of this band of vigilantes who call themselves the Red Brigade. "We warned him twice, even complained to his parents, but he did not stop."

What started in 2011 as a small support group for women subjected to sexual harassment and worse has grown in numbers and status after the gang rape and murder in December last year of 23-year-old student Jyoti Singh in New Delhi, Vishvakarma says.

That attack provoked national headlines and prompted protest marches across the country against what demonstrators said is a major problem overlooked by authorities. The issue gained urgency after several more brutal assaults this year, including the gang rape of an American woman in June.

The attacks led to an extraordinary public debate over mistreatment of women — a long-standing problem that has rarely been discussed openly and receives little attention in India's courts.

In Lucknow, the capital of India's largest state of Uttar Pradesh, the Red Brigade arose as a response to a seeming lack of law enforcement against attackers, Vishvakarma says. The Gulabi, or Pink Sari Gang, formed in another area of India to do the same.

Although focused on their own village for now, Red Brigade members have been meeting with girls in surrounding villages and hope to expand their vigilantism. Today, the Red Brigade has more than 100 members ranging in age from 11 to 25 in the small city of Lucknow.

"After the gang rape and murder of Jyoti Singh, a lot of young girls here were very scared," Vishvakarma says. "Many of them came to us asking to be a part of the group."

What draws the young women is not just the self-defense classes that the group holds but the promise of meting out justice — something that had been denied to many thus far. The Red Brigade patrols streets looking for men harassing or attacking a woman.

"First we warn the man to desist from harassing women," said Jyoti, 16, who has been a Red Brigade member for two years. "If it doesn't stop, we pay a visit to the man and if he still persists, we then publicly humiliate him."

The police in Lucknow sometimes support the Red Brigade in its efforts but worry they go too far.

"They can call us if there is a problem," said Navneet Sikera, the deputy police inspector general of Lucknow, who believes that the girls should not take the law into their own hands. "There is no need to take risks and beat up men."

Members believe they have been driven to take matters into their own hands.

"Three years ago, one of my colleagues tried to rape me, and when I went to the police to file a complaint, I was told not to overreact and to keep quiet about it," says Vishvakarma, who adds that the incident took its toll on her and forced her to retreat into a shell.

It was only after intense support and encouragement from friends and family that she was able to regain her confidence again, she says. The incident also left her feeling that women had to take desperate measures to protect themselves.

"I spoke to a lot of women in my area and everyone had a story about being sexually harassed," she says.

In a country where a woman is raped every 20 minutes, the group's extreme measures have won quiet approval from some. Ramesh Kumar Avtar, a father of four daughters, says he has encouraged his children to join the group.

Kavita Krishnan, a leader of the protests against mistreatment of women, says the Red Brigade is an example of the "collective assertion of women's rights" now taking place in India.

India's legislature quickly introduced harsher punishments for sexual crimes following the December attack including the death penalty if the victim dies. The new law also broadened the definition of sexual assault. Krishnan says it isn't enough.

"It's a little bit like putting a Band-Aid on an open wound and hoping that it will heal," Krishnan says.

The number of rape cases in India more than doubled between 1990 and 2008, according to the National Crime Records Bureau, without releasing the exact numbers. And many cases go unreported due to the social stigma attached to rape — particularly in rural India, says Krishnan.

In Lucknow, the streets of Madiyav are dark at night given that streetlights work rarely here. A group of Red Brigade girls approach an ice-cream vendor. A few boys along the way move to the side respectfully.

"Earlier, we could not step outside our houses after 5 p.m.," Vishvakarma says. "Girls were getting raped right next to their houses, but now this area is much safer — because of our work."