A shocking and horrific incident has come to light in Udupi district of Karnataka, where video of Hindu girls in college washrooms were recorded through mobile phones and spy cameras in a prestigious medical college. Three Muslim girls who were studying in the same college were identified as Alimatul Shaifa, Shabanaz and Aliya who placed the video cameras in the girl’s washroom. Not stopping there, it has been reported that they had forwarded the video with Muslim boys in their community WhatsApp group.
The three accused were suspended from the college on two counts: bringing mobile into the premises and the other using it to film the washroom. Many questions arise from this event. Does Bringing mobile phones to the campus and filming the unsuspected girls stand on the same grounds of severity? What about the act of circulating among the boys of muslim community? Is the suspension from the college sufficient for their horrendous crime? Or is it not necessary to consider it as a crime just because the girls are from the “majority community” or the perpetrators are from “minority community”?
1992 Ajmer Sex Scandal
This Udupi incident is a chilling reminder of the Ajmer 1992 sex scandal where hundreds of girls were systematically gang raped and sexually exploited by the local gang members belonging to Muslim community. Photos and videos of the girls were taken and used for blackmailing them and used for sexual purpose.
Upon investigation it was found that the man who was behind all this was a Muslim with links to Ajmer Sharif Dargah. He not only used these for himself but circulated among others within his community, who took complete advantage of it in sexually exploiting all the innocent girls. The psychological trauma the victim girls went through that time is beyond imagination.
“Fool me once its your fault, fool me twice its my fault”
The similarity between Udupi and the Ajmer incident is uncanny. But this time it seems to be caught in early and there has been no reports of any girl undergoing sexual harassment or blackmail as of the time of writing this article. Suggesting the work of the same person would be foolish but it is pertinent to note that there are many common factors between the incidents.
Although thinking of involvement of a single person is foolish, it is naive to view this as complete coincidence. It is also important to note that the human rights brigade and women rights group whose hearts were bleeding for the perceived injustice on the women who blocked the road of Delhi as a protest against CAA, haven’t even uttered a word regarding this incident. What might be the reason for the silence of these activists when the dignity and safety of hundreds of girls are at risk? Is it probably because of the religion of the victims or the perpetrators?
Media’s sleight of hand
Mainstream Media in its conquest to not hurt any religious sentimentality of any religion has played it safe and properly buried the news. There is little or no coverage of this news in the mainstream visual media regarding this. The national news channels seems to have given the whole responsibility to the local news channels to cover this news, when they are busy in calculating if the naming of the opposition coalition is a masterstroke or not. If the nth version of Rahul Gandhi is the one which can stitch coalition and finally take his long awaited rightful place as Prime Minister of India.
One curious observation is that even when this news is mentioned in the media, the perpetrators are always mentioned as three girls not three muslim girls. This sleight of hand technique of the media is so prevalent that it’s depressing. This was the same when the Shraddha murder case came to light. This is also the same when people from Kerala and other parts of India are radicalised and converted to join terror organisations. The killers, who stabbed an innocent tailor in broad daylight and who confessed to have done the act with a certain religious belief and propagation of it are mentioned as “two men”.
This monkey balancing of Indian media to protect the religious sentimentality and feeling of everyone including the perpetrators is doing nothing but hurt the credibility of the media itself.
These sort of serious issues must be brought to light in front of the nation to have serious and truthful discussion. The vote bank politics and its compulsions of the opposition can be understood but the blind eye of the media is neither understandable nor acceptable. Fortunately this was identified and caught in the nascent stages, imagining the ramifications if this had taken the same path as that of Ajmer Scandal can be a nightmare. The future of many bright girls who had worked hard and struggled to realise their dream to pursue medicine is not something to be taken lightly.
The suspension of the 3 Muslim girls who are the main accused in videotaping in the girls bathroom is just the first step and not the conclusive punishment. This must not be considered as a prank of some adolescent, teenagers by any stretch of imagination. There must be a total comprehensive investigation regarding this. For starters how did a bunch of girls get the idea of videotaping their own classmates and friends? What was the purpose of it? What were they going to do with it? Is it truly similar to the Ajmer case where the perpetrator had certain affiliation?
There seems to be little hope of obtaining the answers for the questions by the Karnataka State government with its affiliations and well known soft corner towards the certain sections of the society and its power centres.
This is where the power of democracy comes into picture, which is not just voting one day and remaining unconcerned on all others. With strong enough reaction this can be pursued to its logical end but the question always remains: Do we have intent or conviction?
