When 20 Year Old GurMehar Kaur Gets Trolled And Rape Threats For Speaking Out

So a 20 year old girl puts out an opinion and people who can’t take it start to abuse, troll and give her rape threats by picking up a line from her year old four minute video seeking peace between two countries. Wow.

Little Backdrop for newcomers

Ramjas college which comes under Delhi University is in similar news which embroiled JNU few months ago. It all began with college’s literary society organizing a seminar against which ABVP ( Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad) started protesting violently. The literary society of Ramjas College had invited Umar Khalid, Jawaharlal Nehru University student leader, to be part of a two-day seminar titled, “Cultures of Protest”. In the protests ABVP not just beat the students but also teachers and few journalists apart from throwing bricks and pellets. Read this Newslaundry piece for more on that.

After the violence Gurmehar Kaur, a 20-year-old student of Lady Shri Ram College, Delhi put up this post which went viral instantly. And why not? This had all things that a viral post demands. First, girl standing up to stone-pelters (yeah, ABVP indeed pelt stones like Kashmiri protesters; an act which ABVP usually talks against!), not any other girl but daughter of a Kargil martyr fighting against violent mob that has painted everyone as ‘anti-national’ against their idea of ‘nationalism’. Obviously this needed to be ‘neutralized’ and how does right wing does it? Their age old technique of digging people’s past lives and looking for a controversial fig leaf came handy. What they found was a year old video of the girl seeking peace between two nations with use of placards. Watch it below.

If you’ve seen the video, you’ll notice the beautiful message of peace that we all seek. After all, peace and not war benefits India (and Pakistan) in the long run. But then, you forgot, they needed a fig leaf. And here it was.

Pakistan did not kill my dad, war killed him.

From 4 minutes of the video, this line was picked up and used to troll her, laugh at her and pass rape threats to a 20 year old. I need not repeat to you how she is daughter of someone. Oh wait yeah, daughter of a father who lost his life in a war fighting for India so we can threaten his daughter with rape. Irony. From Cricket star Sehwag to bollywood actor Randeep Hooda to many other trolls on social media, everyone was having their way of fun by vilifying the girl. Note that this vilifying marathon snowballed after entry of Sehwag, who otherwise keeps mum on political issues into cracking humor at the cost of a young girl.

You can read more on her vilifying from everyone including few journalists and ministers of the state here.

And while everyone abused, trolled, laughed and even gave her rape threats; the 20 year old stood her ground, spoke with sense without hate, malice or resorting to language that could demean her father, a Kargil martyr. Don’t know who won from the slug-fest but one thing I know for certain. The India that I dream is made of people like her who keep their poise, speak without hurting the other, stand up for fellow beings (in her case fellow students). The India that I take pride in lives in her not in people who want a 20 year get raped for a opinion (or for any other matter). I don’t know in whose dreams of an India does rape feature as light humor to be thrown at anyone who don’t agree with you. The tradition I know doesn’t even wish for enemies to go through rape… More on that some other day.

Thanks and respect to the 20 year old who choose to speak unlike many of us who choose the silence over speaking against an issue. It’s not about winning but putting across your point, not to defeat the other but to raise the bar of debate in the fabled largest democracy. The largest democracy that doesn’t understand the difference between abuse and Freedom of Speech!

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