As the State awoke to commemorate Nupi Lal of 1939, one of the most important events in its history when ordinary women rose up to fight against the monopolistic trade practices and the colonial administration of those times, the people of the State, where `women`were once revered with a distinct territorial protectiveness either as Ema, Eche, Echel, Ene, Eteima etc in a now bygone era, were greeted with the news of two shameful acts having been committed against women the previous day.
If you think that this writer is trying to evoke pathos, you are perhaps right as such incidents have been occurring so often that we stand in danger of becoming blase against such incidents. Like the way, we have become utterly indifferent to the news of bomb blasts, people dying from gun shots and so on. Human psychology works in strange ways; if we are unable to eradicate or put a stop to a stimulus which causes us great distress, its inbuilt defence mechanism instructs the human brain to circumvent the stimulus. That means teaching ourselves to become completely desensitise as there are now ways in which we can affect the stimulus to stop distressing us. Meanwhile, the long term pathological prices that the diseased society will have to pay escape our attention as it`™s not immediate. Besides, it`™s not easy to diagnose or treat a neurotic society. But, life goes on as it must and it always will.
Various dignitaries of the State have come out with press statements greeting people on the day marking that historic event in 1939. Reiterating the demand or an appeal to put a stop to the ever increasing crimes against women will be of little help here as those demands or appeals have been made again and again in this selfsame space. But little has been done to address this menace. Nor is there any suggestion of political will to fight crimes against women. Wait. When was the last time any top functionary of the government visited the family of survivors of violence or crime against women promising swift actions against the perpetrators or to mitigate their sufferings. If the government or the law enforcing agency had taken some swift actions in the past, there may have been a different tale. Political inaction can only aggravate the situation. As the matter stands today, only another Nupi Lal appears capable of curbing the ever increasing crimes against women. But if we allow that to happen, it will be a sad commentary on the collective masculinity of all men in the State. May all the men including those in power wake up to this fact and get their acts together before that happens.
Leader Writer: Svoboda Kangleicha