Yes #MeToo!

With Diwali round the corner today had to be a busy day with all the cleaning and decorating still pending. But, no matter how busy the days are one visit to FaceBook (or FakeBook as I call it!) is a must for everyone these days and it happened.

My page refreshed with a hashtag from an ex-neighbor... it read #MeToo. I clicked on that and saw many fellow girls & women posting the same hastag on their pages. So, I googled (easy way out to find answers to anything these days) and found that an actress, Alyssa Milano had encouraged women to tweet #MeToo to give people a sense of the magnitude of the problem of sexual assualt & harassment faced by women everyday.

Call me a feminist if you have to, but such causes & news ignite a fire in me and now that I have a daughter, the want and wish to make the world a better & safer place for women is all the more bigger & stronger. So, I joined the movement and wrote #MeToo On my FB page and deleted it soon after. Why? The same age-old concern of what will my friends & family on FB say or think if I wrote so? 

Couple of hours later I see a female relative post the hashtag and then there was no holding me back!! So, this time I posted on FB and Twitter, never to delete.

“Yes #MeToo !!

I was born & brought up in Delhi... the capital of India.. I would be surprised if there were/are any girls/ women in Delhi who haven't faced sexual harassment & I'm not even considering routine verbal abuse or Eve teasing . If someone didn't, she was either confined to four walls of home OR had the luxury to avoid public transport OR was PURELY FORTUNATE!

And, if such was the situation in the capital, we can well imagine situation in rest of the country.

Yes, I belong to a country where goddesses are worshipped & girls killed in womb, sexually harassed, raped, killed for dowry.

T

Yes, me too!”

Looking back, as I stress my mind I can clearly recollect some of the times I first faced the gender bias or assault as I now learn it was. 

I must have been 5 or 6 years old, on my way to school by a DTC bus from my home for the annual function. I was going to receive several certificates and prizes (for standing first in all sections of first grade & participation in extra-curricular activities). Mummy Papa were going to join later so I was all by myself in that bus carrying not very many passengers. Needless to say I was excited as I sat on that window seat on right side of the bus. Someone (a young lad as I remember) came and sat beside me a couole of bus stops later (or may be he was already in the bus I don’t remember), I didn’t bother until about one stop prior to where I was to get down and I see he was caressing his favorite part of the body (I now know it’s m**t*rb*t**n) and I was just clueless as to why he would do that apart from

being shocked and scared if he’ll let me go through to get off at my bus stop. With hesitation I got up and pointed my hand towards bus’s door, he remained sitted but moved his legs out of the seat to give me space as he continued with his hand job. Today, I think that, that day my biggest prize was getting off safe from that bus.

Next I remember, I was probably 8 or 9, my mother asked me to take one of her cousins (from village) to another relatives home. So, I got on this DTC bus (again!) with her and asked her to sit in the front while I got the tickets from the back. The bus was a little crowded with several people standing, when I was coming back from the conductor to the aunt someone groped my chest & before I could react the hand was touching me between the legs. I was a kid I couldn’t even make out what had just happened and even today I won’t understand what pleasure could a pedophile get by molesting a kid who doesn’t even have breasts.

Thereafter, I used to be very cautious when traveling by DTC buses but that didn’t stop the touching, groping, rubbing, pressing... sometimes I dared to fight back for myself and for others, at others I just let go fearing worse that could happen if a fight was started. 

I would believe that these frustrated men (of all age groups) get into buses (public transport) only to harass school, college & office going girls & women, when countered they have pet answers ready, “ 1) I never touched you. 2)You are not as pretty as you think of yourself. 3) The bus is so crowded a little touching would happen. 4) If you have so much problem why don’t you travel by auto. “ 

Getting less crowded or ladies special buses to and from school or colleges and later office used to be such a relief that one would forget all miseries of the day imagining no fight on the way back home today!

Sad part is, the culprits were and are on the lose, while the victims keep looking for ways to save self from these monsters. Sometimes by covering chest with school bags or purses, sometimes asking a male friend to drop home after a certain time and at others just remain home bound once the sun has set. 

God didn’t create earth to be an unequal and unjust place for women... MEN MADE IT SO!!