An Open letter to the Bulandshahr victims and their kin

I am sorry. I am sorry that our national highways weren't safe enough to prevent this nightmare from happening. I am sorry that you have to go through the pain and anguish and helplessness you are experiencing right now. 

Because I understand, atleast in a minuscule intensity, what you are going through. I feel deeply pained and troubled by it on an individual level so I can only imagine, my pain has only scratched the surface compared to yours. I understand because I have read and researched on this issue for way too long to empathise even when I am not remotely connected to this happening. I understand because I specifically remember at the time of the Jyoti Pandey (Nirbhaya's) case while her life hung by a thread, I spent sleepless nights. And on the unfortunate night of her death, even before the news of her death broke out, I suddenly awoke and started refreshing Google News because my instinct told me something was horribly wrong. But perhaps that is how empaths work. 

And I cried. I cried for a soul that I never met, and never would but I knew it changed me in ways I don't seem to understand till date. And then the Shakti Mills gangrape followed and more. The list was endless. 

Rapes became a "cultural norm" even as we didn't realise it. From a headline soon these cases became short stories filling up the corners of the newspaper and I am just too afraid to think that the same will happen to you.

All my "Facebook warriors" are quiet right now. Deafening silence by those who couldn't stop debating whether Salman Khan was guilty or not and it makes me cringe. And I am sorry for that.

I am sorry that when a female politician in that state is labeled a "prostitute", all their party members and workers threaten a statewide protest but when it comes to you, there's not a single soul speaking out. But you shouldn't read much into it, for these are the very people who termed the wife and daughter of the perpetrator of this comment ''sluts'' and ''whores'' to save the honour of their female politico. So you see, it is all an eye-wash purely for scoring political brownie points. And for that I am sorry.

I am sorry that a state minister thinks that the rapes are a "political conspiracy" but what else can you expect from these so called leaders when their patriarch thinks "boys will be boys and they shouldn't be hung for such trivial matters". I am sorry.

I am sorry this appeasement of the uninformed class is at your expense. 

But it's not the leaders alone. Haven't we got ourselves to blame? 

It's the way we've been brought up all our lives that makes me want to hang our heads in shame. 

I am ashamed because every time I try to wear something "revealing" I am termed a woman with a loose character and I do not protest. 

I am ashamed that when my friends freely hurl abuses that are gender specific, I do nothing about it.

I am ashamed that when a guy teases me or comments on me though my blood boils, I am too afraid to confront him. I am afraid he'll do something awful and even if I do not fear for the consequences, even if it means death. I am afraid I'll be revered a hero  in the headlines but I'll be soon forgotten and I'll just be a shadow of what could have been. 

I am ashamed that you have to  think of committing suicide with your family to avail justice for this is the system that we've put in place for you. But it's not the judges. It's us. And I am ashamed of it. 

I am ashamed that even as I write this, my Google news page shows another gangrape of a teacher in UP and it is effed up.

I am ashamed that it makes me realise that I'm neither the first nor the last person writing this and neither are you the first or the last people going through this. I am ashamed.

But despite all of what I have said, do not lose hope. And don't think your family has been ashamed. It is us who should feel humiliated. And contrary to whatever this society tells you, let your daughter and your wife know that their "honors" do not lie in their vaginas. Their life hasn't been "destroyed". They are not victims or survivors but they are warriors who should not lose their spirit.

Because that can give us hope for the future. A future where we tell our kids to respect all humans beings. A future where we treat the victims of rape as equals. A future where a commission of crime results in the shaming of the perpetrators and not the victims. A future where you won't have to consider killing yourself to attain justice.

A fellow human being.