Stella
Paul is an India-based multi-award winning environmental
journalist. She receiveed the Courage in Journalism award
from the International Women’s Media Foundation
(IWMF) and the Global Trailblazers Award from the European
Commission.
Shabnam,
a young woman from Northern India’s Haryana state, is
two years away from becoming a law graduate. She sees parallels
between her own rape and that of the 19-year-old Maha Dalit
woman whose brutal rape and torture by a group of men from
a 'dominant' or higher caste in the neighbouring 
state
of Uttar Pradesh triggered nationwide protests.
“She
was a Valmiki like us, from a landless and poor family like
ours. They raped her, brutalized her and when she died, they
burnt her body without the consent of her family. And even
after all of that, they would not allow her family to talk
about it and threaten them to keep quiet. This is exactly
what I and my family have experienced and what we continue
to go through. The only exception is that I am still alive,”
Shabnam tells IPS in Hindi. The 19-year-old young woman eventually
died of her injuries. But just like her, Shabnam also belongs
to the Maha Dalit – India’s most marginalized
and oppressed community formerly known as 'untouchables.'
The
death of the young woman focused a spotlight on the sexual
violence faced by Dalit women in India, who number some 100
million according to a discussion document by Navsarjan Trust
(India), FEDO (Nepal) and the International Dalit Solidarity
Network.
“Violence,
including rape and gang rape, have been systematically utilized
as weapons by dominant castes to oppress Dalit women and girls
and reinforce structural gender and caste hierarchies,”
a soon-to-be-released report by Equality Now, a global non-profit
which promotes human rights and equality, and the local charity
Swabhiman Society, states.
“In
the northern state of Haryana, where Dalit make up around
one-fifth of the state’s population, a deeply-rooted
caste-based and patriarchal society still flourishes. There
are high rates of violence against women – data from
the National Crime Records Bureau in 2018 indicates that nearly
four women are raped every day in this state alone,”
the report further states. Titled “Justice Denied: Sexual
Violence and intersectional discrimination: Barriers to Accessing
Justice for Dalit Women and Girls in Haryana, India,”
the report draws from Swabhiman Society’s experience
of working directly with Dalit survivors of sexual violence
in Haryana over the past decade and highlights insights from
this work.
Shabnam
was a minor when she was gang raped in 2013. Over the past
seven years, even as her case has gone to trial, there have
been several attempts and threats on her life for which she
was eventually granted court protection.
“People
think rape is a single crime. But for Dalit rape victims,
it’s just the beginning of a lifelong chain of crimes
and struggles: mental abuse, fear, intimidation, threats,
denial of basic rights, denial of education and a decent livelihood
– the list is very long. In fact, once you are raped,
you stay a victim all through your life,” Manisha Mashaal,
founder of Swabhiman Society, tells IPS in Hindi. Mashaal,
a Dalit women’s rights defender and lawyer, is helping
Shabnam and many other young women in their fight for justice.
VIOLENCE
AGAINST DALIT WOMEN -- WHAT ARE THE TRUE NUMBERS?
According
to the National Crime Record Bureau (NCRB), a federal agency,
cases of physical attacks on women have been increasing.
In
2019 alone, says NCRBs latest report, there were over 405,861
cases of assaults on women — 7 percent more than was
reported in 2018. The crimes include beating, stripping, kidnapping
and rape.
Of
these, 13,273 assaults, which included 3,486 cases of rape,
were against women from Dalit communities.
Jacqui
Hunt, the Europe and Eurasia Director of Equality Now, says
widespread under-reporting and problems registering sexual
assaults with the police mean that the true figures are likely
to be considerably higher.
“As
a consequence of gender, caste and class inequalities, Dalit
women and girls are subjected to multiple forms of subjugation,
exploitation, and oppression. Sexual violence, including rape
and gang rape, has been perpetrated against them by men from
dominant castes as a mechanism that reinforces India’s
deeply entrenched structural hierarchies. Women’s bodies
are being used as a battleground to assert caste supremacy
and to keep women ‘in their place,’” Hunt
tells IPS.
Mashaal
believes that almost 80 percent of Dalit women who are raped
do not report the crime because of political and social pressure
as the women and their families are usually threatened by
the perpetrators. Besides, Mashaal says, a majority of the
sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV) survivors are minor
Dalit girls, while NCRB data for child rape survivors does
not differentiate according to caste.
To
help break the cycle of silence on crimes against Dalit women
and girls, in 2013 Mashaal founded Swabhiman Society –
a charity that provides various services, including legal
and psychological support to Dalit survivors of SGBV.
“We
currently have 25 women who work with us off and on, but this
is a safe place for hundreds of women who have been stigmatized,
brutalized and yet have nobody else to turn to,” says
Mashaal.
Mashaal
started the society because she noticed few organizations
were aiding Dalit survivors of SBGV and that there was a lack
of knowledge and awareness among the community about their
legal rights to justice or the procedure to follow.
In
several cases, they would be dictated to settle out of the
court by the Khap Panchayat – a powerful, traditional,
community assembly run by the landowning Jat community, which
decides on village affairs. The decisions of the Khap are
often controversial and considered anti-Dalit, but few dare
oppose them fearing reprisals.
Mamta,
another woman Mashaal represents, was a minor when she was
gang raped by 'dominant' caste men in 2012. When the Khap
Panchayat ordered that she had to marry one of her rapists,
her father – a farmhand and daily wage earner —
was too scared to oppose the decision.
For
months Mamta was locked in a small room and repeatedly raped
by both her ‘husband’ and his friends and relatives.
“It
was like a cage. I lived in a small room. My husband would
lock the door from outside. He would not otherwise touch me
as I was a Dalit but would forcibly have sex whenever he wanted.
Every day, he would bring other men and they would also rape
me.
“I
was like a fly stuck in mud – I could not live and could
not fly away either,” Mamta, who is now 26, tells IPS
in Hindi.
Eventually
Mamta managed to escape and discovered the Swabhiman Society.
There she met many other women who had also experienced similar
abuse and brutality. Together they have received counseling,
awareness training about laws on rape and sexual attacks on
women. But most important of all, they have gathered the courage
to demand justice in a legal court.
According
to Hunt, Dalit women lack economic power and are often reliant
on dominant castes for their livelihoods. When survivors of
sexual assault or their families are dependent for jobs or
other sources of income from someone who is from the same
caste as an assailant, or the perpetrator is also their employer,
accessing justice for sexual violence becomes even more problematic.
“Culprits
and their associates often wield their economic power to silence
survivors and witnesses. This includes coercing survivors
or victims’ family members into settling cases out of
court, or hounding them from their home and village.
“Our
forthcoming report gives an indication of how common this
problem is. In almost 60 percent of the cases we studied,
survivors were forced into a compromise, many times caused
by threats of economic retaliation,” Hunt says.
According
to the recent data published by the Census of India, 71 percent
Dalits are landless labourers who work on land they do not
own. According to the Agriculture Census, in rural areas,
58.4 percent Dalit households do not own land at all. This
gets grimmer in Dalit-dominated states such as Haryana, Punjab
and Bihar, where 85 percent do not own land.
“This
is the reason why there is continuous gruesome sexual assaults
on Dalit women because they are thrice-vulnerable. First,
because of their caste, second, because of their gender and
third, because of their landless status,” says Mashaal.
According
to a 2018 study by Reena Kukreja, an assistant Professor at
Queens University, Canada, the Dalit community in Haryana,
“with over 80 percent of Dalits living in rural areas,
they are dependent on the three landowning castes for agricultural
wage labour as their primary source of livelihood.”
The study explores the link between land rights and gender
violence, especially in the context of Dalit women’s
marriages in Haryana.
The
women Mashaal represents don’t believe there is a silver
bullet for the endemic SGBV against women in their community.
It is why a number of them are pursuing a college degree,
especially in law.
“Every
time we go to court, we see the perpetrators hiring 10 to
15 lawyers to fight their cases. They hire big law firms.
On the other hand, a Dalit woman victim can hardly afford
a single lawyer. It is very frustrating. So, we encourage
the girls who come here to go back to school and study law.
We must build our own network of women lawyers who will fight
and win every single case of Dalit rape,” Mashaal says.
Presently,
at least 10 women from the Swabhiman Society are studying
law, says Shabnam.
Pooja
is another young Dalit woman whom Mashaal is assisting. When
Pooja was only 17 she was kidnapped by 12 men who took turns
to rape her. Pooja – the youngest of the women —
just passed her last school exams and plans to enroll in a
law school. Though her enrolment has been delayed by COVID-19
lockdowns.
“I
will apply to a private college if needed and take up a job
to pay the fees, but will not give up on becoming a lawyer,”
Pooja tells IPS as Mashaal and the other Dalit women in the
room break into a cheering chorus of support pledging to “make
sure that happens.”
Meanwhile,
the Equality Now / Swabhiman Society joint report provides
recommendations for improvement of the police, medico-legal
and judicial processes in Haryana to improve access to justice
for survivors of sexual violence, particularly Dalit women
and girls.
Note: Names
of some interviewees have been changed to protect their identity.
by Stella
Paul
The Day I Couldn't Urinate
