The news of encounter of the four rapists of Hyderabad this morning came as real bummer to me personally. Only last night I drafted one third of a very long article as to why our reaction to the rape case was ridiculous. The bummer was that I cannot publish that article now as the environment since the news has totally changed than before. Ironically I stopped working on that article after 3 am & by then the whole “encounter process” had already been set in motion.

So the four rapists are dead. The rape victim and her family have got the justice they deserved and that too within 10 days. The news says the police brought the accused to the crime scene even before the sun was up where they had to shoot the accused to foil their attempt to escape. Everyone knows the real truth behind this whole “encounter process” and still everyone is celebrating, celebrating the police. All segments of the nation is gleefully lying as one to protect the potentially very much debatable actions of today’s morning. People are happy. They remember the brutality of those four that was reported just last week. All seems fine now. And that’s okay too. Being happy is never a bad thing. Although this was a revenge form of justice, it was the crime that united a nation as diverse as India to even lie to support it. I was also watching the news at around 9 am with my super excited family on TV, observing the anchor delivering the same piece of news again and again with the highest level of energy possible. While I watched the news, my eyes were constantly filling up with tears of empathy seeing the reaction of the victim’s family and people from all walks of life, and at the same time I was sad. Sad and more afraid than ever before.

I’m weird all right, but anyone would seriously very naturally wonder what the heck is wrong with me to have such a reaction when absolutely everyone is so excited. Note – excited, not necessarily happy. So before going into the details as to what forced me into writing this article and explaining myself, let me start by sharing exactly what I was feeling.

What are the people celebrating? People are supposedly celebrating the death of the rapists. But why? Not because they are dead. No. People are celebrating, what they are absolutely sure of despite all the official statements, that this was a staged encounter by the police which served justice to the accused, at the spot of crime in a very dramatic turn of events. And public loves the drama. I am just happy that four very harmful people of the society have been eliminated from the society. My reason of happiness is different than that of the crowd that showered flowers on the police. My views are my own. The crowd’s reaction is part of a mob mentality. So do I think the police did wrong? Let me explain that. The commissioner of police involved in this encounter has his name attached in another very similar case of encounter where his team had neutralized acid attack accused in a uncannily similar fashion. I am happy for the fact that there is such motive to serve the people in that IPS officer, that he went out of his way to serve justice to the wailing family of the victims when in both the cases it was evident that the encountered men were directly involved in unprovoked crimes against innocent women. If anyone wants to justify his actions, he’d say if they would not be encountered, the legal justice system will take up indeterminable amount of time to punish the rapists and even then some of them might have the scope of escaping justice purely on the basis of technicalities. Do you realize that this justification basically points out the failure of our legal system? Do you realize that by celebrating the actions of the police today, we are actually celebrating the failure of the legal system of our country?

After the 2012 Delhi gang rape case, it took our country seven whole years to stage another nationwide protest for the safety of women. Meanwhile the statistics changed from a woman being raped every 20 minutes in 2013 to a woman being raped every 15 minutes according to a 2019 report in our country, that’s one more woman raped every hour. It is already so tough for us to be able to create a nationwide spur over such real issues in our country where our media and politicians are so busy creating divide and virtual problems and then discussing them. The fact is that this encounter by the police, most probably unknowingly only, but has absolutely killed the momentum of that protest without a shred of real solution. And that is what makes me sad.

The 2012 protests led to the government taking a number of steps to better ensure the safety of the citizens, women in specific. Funds were dedicated, fast track court systems strengthened, dedicated hotlines were released, certain laws were modified. The whole legal system was strengthened as a whole and the leaders were made to feel the heat. Today, that Nirbhaya fund lies unutilised. Many of the hotlines dedicated to women safety have stopped working. Political and religious people involving in crimes against women are more than ever. And yet, this time, not even a single step has been taken by the government to strengthen the legal system, not one (comment down below if I am wrong). Despite all that, the protests were in a way to only pressurize quick justice for the one victim, instead of any demand of resignation from any government or to create any better justice system. Although there were some who were questioning the government, but sadly the democratic institutions of our country, specially the media have become so weak and biased that those voices were not at all channeled properly. Having no media is better than having a TRP inspired media. To just show the relaity of the media I will like you to ahead and watch the following video before proceeding.

I know this is a video from a youtube channel which is rather leftist but still I request you to pay attention to the content only as I can show you tonnes of similar videos and proofs showing how vague our media has turned.

I heard a news anchor say today that because of the encounter, people will restrain from committing such heinous crimes now fearing that they will be executed within 10 days. I am sorry but that’s not how crimes like rape work. 98% of reported rapes in India were committed by people who knew the victim. A large no. of them were under the influence of alcohol. In today’s society rapes are a result of when the animalistic instincts or desires of a person overpowers his basic human intelligence. Such crimes are usually not very pre planned or with any ulterior motive unlike murder or burglary, that the attacker may sit down and think of the possible consequences of the crime before even committing the crime. Obviously if rape was not a recognized crime with laws to prosecute the convicts, the no. of such cases would have been much larger. But an attacker would not restrain more because he might be shot in 10 days instead of being hung after rotting in jail and going through all the mental (& probably physical too) harassment of trying to appeal for mercy and repenting his deeds that has landed him in this situation.

Times are tough now . But tough does not mean impossible. Our fight was to be more assured that another girl does not have to face the same fate as the Hyderabad victim, our fight was for women empowerment as whole. This encounter killed the protest without providing any solution to our cause. The thing is, not all rape accused are covicts, and not all accused however evidently guilty will be met with the same fate. Because not all law enforcers will take that route for various reasons, unfortunately both good and bad. And they should not. Not at least without a law in place that has such provisions. If there is a law for that, it will be passed only after a healthy discussion in the parliament which would work to fix the loopholes to ensure that no innocent can be framed and fall prey to police brutality. If this encounter tradition continues without a law, before you know it people will start getting killed at the hands of the law enforcers for any range of unlawful reasons (like this) too and then something as honest (supposedly) like today’s encounter will also start looking fishy real quick. I am all for quick justice when there is ample proof. But who decides what is ample proof? Taking the law in your own hands is not the solution because everyone has their own hands. A correct step towards quick justice is fast track courts or maybe some law enabling even faster justice. But it needs to be a law first. Not what some law enforcer feels opt. The multitude of honesty level of the law enforcers in our country and elsewhere does not need any debate. Professionalism is important to ensure justice in a broader sense as true justice needs to be uniform.

Apart from the unlawful power the encounter culture gives the men in Khaki (or camo), we need to analyse it’s effect on the general public too. News like today’s makes people feel okay with the concept of ultimate instant justice which is not right. This will only give raise to various kinds of crimes everywhere including but not limited to domestic violence, rapes, molestation & harassment. People must not feel it’s okay to react in the extremest way if they feel like it, however genuine their reasons be. Our urge to react angrily and not intelligently is just another one of our animal instincts which needs to be controlled, not promoted. If we start doing that, we are gonna fail as a civilized society in no time as we will lose the decency that makes man a social animal.

Trying to sum everything up, I am sad not for any of the rapists who might have been less guilty than the other or their humanitarian rights. Their is no doubt that they lost all their humanitarian rights when they committed the crimes against that defenseless woman. But I am sad that the world did not actually get the reassurance that the news stories of their confessions were true as they were confessions to the police and not in a law of court (read this if you feel like disagreeing with me ethically). Being optimistic that the confessions were true, I am happy that they are dead. I am sad that this very temporary solution is making the people blind as they have turned into a mob celebrating the news with potential molesters and rapists amidst themselves. I am sad that there was no vigilant policeman or aware willful civilian near the toll plaza where her scooty was punctured. I am sad that even after the encounter infinitely many more toll plazas remain unguarded. I am sad that there were not enough CCTVs in deserted areas that gave the criminals the confidence to dump the body without being seen even when the dedicated Nirbhaya fund remains unutilised. I am sad that the current government is actually taking adverse steps to teach youngsters about their sexuality rather than promoting it (read this), and we are silent on that. I am sad that the administrators here believe that banning porn is the way to avoid crimes and even their execution of that ban is so bad that after a rape the victim’s name was trending on Indian version of popular porn website. I am sad that we could not use this nationwide protest and spur to create any safer environment in the future. I do not want women around me to be unsafe and feel unsafe. And no woman can feel safe knowing her attackers are gonna be killed real fast and real dramatic after they commit a crime against her. We waited seven years since 2012 to revolt while women continued to feel unsafe because of the constant crimes against them which did not get national attention. And this encounter just blew all of that in one go.

PLEASE keep the protest alive. It’s okay if you are satisfied and happy with what happened today but it did not help our fight at all. Our fight is for a better, educated and secure society & that fight is nowhere near over yet.

Please comment and share your views on this. Please also point out any factual errors you find in this article and I will be happy to correct that. But please try not to debate just for the sake of it but rather take the discussion forward. We really cannot afford to give up on this at all.