Is death of all Indian women lesser than Sushant Singh Rajput’s

Another girl and another girl and another girl. Age, caste, creed, education, dress, locality nothing matters. She is just an object. It was college student few days back now it’s a school student. Abuse of an object is reported like the abuse of everything else, everything that should matter. And our reaction is in true sense “Just a reaction”. Momentary. A sudden burst of anger will result in surge of online protests, tweet-e-thons, trending #’s and then suddenly a #challenge will come and we will all forget. Social media will be filled with black and white selfies or with people dancing or random #s (#BINOD). We don’t forget but the instant gratification generation choose to ignore that just liking or commenting on a post does not bring the cultural change. We feel we have done our bit.

We must remember this momentary burst of anger and need for instant gratification is when approximately 100 women are raped every day and 1000+ crimes against women happen on daily basis as per government data (2018). Our Media had donated less than 10 hour collectively on all news channels on issue related to women in 2020. Leave SSR, even death of a sarpanch got more coverage. And then we wonder why things are not improving. Why women in our country face discrimination and violence. Why am I comparing different deaths, because every life is equal isn’t it?

If we need a permanent solution, we need more than a #metoo. Something that will last and will force the not only government but every individual to take action. We need a new movement based on the core principles of nonviolence. On ground protests are necessary but, in the digital and lockdown we need a “Digital Revolution”. Flood the NEWS feed. Flood the PRIME TIME.

Every news channel and social media is seeking justice for SSR. The entire nation is rallying behind them but not for their own daughters, sisters and mothers. And if you are wondering why? Ask yourself and ask your family. You will know.

Having doubts? Seems like an emotional plea? Have you forgotten the Nirbhaya? It was done before. The laws were changed. Now, it’s the battle of accountability.

Can one NEWS channel, just ONE focus all their energy on this. Can they just talk about women exploitation? They have teams dedicated for every page and domain. Ask them to dig in stories of women exploitation in field of Economics, Politics, Religion, Academics, Journalism, everything. You think TRPs will go low. If yes, then you know that you stand by side with the abuser. And if you are worried about the impact, remember “SPOTLIGHT” highlighted the abuse in Church and rocked the world. You will have enough to rock a nation.

But that’s not enough. We “the people” need to talk about it. Fill in our feeds with posts about what a women is going through. Talk about it with our friends, parents, grandparents and above all, ourselves. We need to identify our own biases.

By the way just to be clear. It’s not a battle of the small group, it’s of the complete nation. Yet, as always a small group need to take the charge. But as we charge up for this we must remember that India is a country that won the battle against Sati, widow remarriage, girl education, female feticide. We as a nation has done this before, when we had so called less progressive people.

Can we do it? Or shall we all agree that death of all Indian women is lesser than Sushant Singh Rajput’s.