Sydney, NSW

18th October, 2015

Like many others, I am outraged and disgusted with the spate of rapes in India.

Last Friday, a two year old toddler was raped in West Delhi. She was kidnapped when there was an outage of electricity and found in a critical state in a Park 3 hours after. She was bleeding profusely.

A kid of 5 years age was subjected to similar crime in East Delhi same day.

A week earlier, another kid of 4 years age was raped in Delhi.

Something is very seriously wrong with the perpetrators. I am unable to fathom how kids can by sexual objects. It is unthinkable. It is hard to find words to describe my outrage.

Delhi Police have arrested some alleged perpetrators but more are yet to be found and arrested.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/toddler-and-five-year-old-girl-gang-raped-in-india-a6697816.html

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2015/10/police-indian-girls-aged-en-raped-delhi-151017092246616.html

These rapes, like before, are in media in India and all over the world.

SBS news in Australia is covering this matter today. SBS World News will cover it at 6.30 PM tonight. This is what I said while being interviewed by SBS.

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http://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/2015/10/18/india-child-rape-cases-trigger-renewed-calls-improved-safety

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There was a significant outrage in India and all over the world after the brutal December 2012 rape of a young woman inside a Bus in New Delhi. It led to a review and tightening of laws to control these crimes.

Despite this, Crime statistics from India show that sexual crimes numbers against women have increased.

Whether the numbers have actually increased or whether other factors are at play is not certain.

Factors which could be responsible for increased numbers include;

1. increased reporting of such crimes, without actual increase, due to increased awareness
2. Law changes to mandate registering of every such complaint after Dec 2012 rape of a medical student (Nirbhaya case) in Delhi
3. actual increase in such cases

Irrespective of the reasons for the spike in these numbers, nobody can deny that these cases are totally unacceptable.

There is no doubt that they need to be controlled.

Nobody can seriously propose or expect that these crimes can be controlled just by Police alone.

These crimes are a very complex problem and will need a multi-pronged approach to control them.

Such multi-pronged approach will need the involvement of Law enforcement agencies, policy makers, Judicial system, Sociologists, Media & educators at all levels. Police alone will, and can’t, solve this menace.

For longer term results, something will need to be done within the education system starting from Primary schools right upto Universities.

The attitude will need to change. Misogyny can not be tolerated.

People can not, and should not, be silent spectators when eve-teasing and other crimes against women are taking place. This common ocurance will need to change.

Control of Crimes against women is not a Police responsibility alone. It is very much a matter for the society too, and the society must discharge its responsibility.

After all, we have mothers, wives, sisters, daughters, aunts, cousins and nieces. If we will not want any of them to be subjected to such crimes, then we must rise up and shoulder responsibility to get this menace controlled.

We, Indian Australian community, can’t do much on this issue, sitting 10,000 Kms away, but what we can do easily, and in fact must do, is to put pressure on Indian Governments of all levels to do everything to control this menace.

Let us get on the Social Media-Twitter and Facebook- and tell Indian politicians about we think and what we want. Almost all of the Indian political leaders are active users of Social media.

Dr Yadu Singh

http://www.Twitter.com/dryadusingh

http://www.facebook.com/dryadusingh