What do the celebrities by #justiceforasifa mean?

Rape is one of the most abhorrent act that a man can do. It’s a reminder to us that some of us have still not evolved to be humans. The rape and murder of a kid in Kathua (J&K) was a grim reminder of that. The police inquiry said the rape was done in a religious place and carried out people of different faith. That entailed series of protests and some Bollywood actors protested like this.

“I am Hindustan

I am Ashamed

#Justice for Asifa

8 Year old Gangraped Murdered

in “Devi” -Stan

Temple #Kathua”

Are they justified?

We should know what all transpired. But before we begin all of us agree on three things

1.      The Rape of that little girl or any girl for that matter is a dastardly and satanic act

2.     The Rapists must be Punished

3.     And no innocent should get punished

Our objective should be to have an educated opinion rather than being part of a herd. Let’s start.

THE VICTIM:

The victim is an 8-year-old girl from Bakarwal tribal who are basically nomads. The girl was adopted by her parents.

THE CASE:

On Jan 10, 2018, the girl went missing when she had gone to graze her horses. Her dead body was discovered a week later. A 15-year-old boy was initially arrested as a suspect.

And within weeks, the Govt in J&K formed a new SIT with members mostly from Kashmir region and they charged four people and said that the girl was held captive in a place of worship place for days. The lawyers in Jammu protested and alleged that the charge-sheet was “motivated” and out of the 5 people SIT, two are tainted officers.

In April 2018, lawyers started creating a ruckus, demanding CBI inquiry. Some of them actually crossed the limit in the fit of rage and tried to stop the charge-sheet being produced in the court. People carried out marches in their support of a Federal inquiry.

DOES THE CASE ACTUALLY MERIT A CBI INVESTIGATION?

a) SIT team composition:

The SIT team comprises of 5 members; two which are allegedly tainted officers. One of the officers, Irfan Wani had been arrested for murder and rape of a girl in illegal custody. Mr. Wani has fare political inclination given that he squarely blamed BJP for the FIRs back then in a recent interview. So one may argue that there are strong chances of the officer’s political inclinations against a Party to affect the investigation.

b) Crime scene alleged in the new charge-sheet:

To be fair I came across an answer on Quora which describe the crime scene “Devistan”. And I was actually surprised to see that it was merely a room with big windows without curtains. So I did a quick Youtube search if that content is fake or not. But it wasn’t wrong:

Some facts about the alleged crime scene:

1.      The place is a single room.

2.     It has three doors, the key to each door lies with three villages.

3.     The temple was daily visited by devotees of the three villages.

4.     One of the doors is half grilled so that you can see the entire room from there. Below is the snapshot.

5. It has four big grilled windows adjacent to doors from which the entire room is visible.

Now the charge-sheet says, that the girl was held captive in the room above for four days between 10 January and 14 January 2018 without any devotee from the three villages noticing the girl.

It appears to be a bit less probabilistic that somebody could be hidden in a room whose interiors is visible from 5 cutouts (4 windows and one door) at different angles, without anybody noticing it. And given the room is frequented by men and women from three villages on daily basis twice a day, the police are bound to face a lot of searching questions on the court.

c) The accused:

According to SIT 8 accused from different ages ranging from the 60s to some in their teens. Main accused is a retired Govt officer, while there are several students and policemen who are alleged to be involved in the conspiracy

The main accused Sanjhi ram is a retired official from revenue department and had been raising voice against the stay of Bakarwals and Rohingyas in the locality. He is alleged to have called his son (Vishal) from Meerut especially to commit the crime. I don’t know but I wonder if a father can actually call his son from studies just to commit a sexual crime given the father was a retired Govt official and not a hardcore criminal.

d) Accused request for polygraph test:

Most of the times, it is seen that accused try to avoid Narco test. But in this case, all the accused are demanding the Narco test to be done on them.

e) Victim Family vehemently against CBI Probe:

While most of the times across India people demand CBI probe but in this case, the family has not only denied the CBI probe but they have threatened to launch an agitation if CBI probe is ordered.

One group is alleging that the investigation was done by Mehbooba to reinvigorate her vote bank in Kashmir which allegedly holds anti-Hindu sentiment (referring to the ethnic cleansing of Hindus from Kashmir valley in the 1990s). And those people are targeted to sabotage the movement against demographic change in Jammu which was gaining momentum in past few months. Could Sanjhi Ram have been targeted for him being part of the movement?

I think given the sensitivity of the case and lot of angles to be covered, one may argue that it merits a CBI investigation. We can relate to a recent incident in the Murder case of a boy Pradyuman in Gurgaon Ryan School Murder case, the state police bungled the investigation and implicated an innocent driver. It was only after the CBI investigated that the real culprit who happens to be from the influential family was caught.

SHOULD HINDUS BE BLAMED?

The murder even if committed is a hate crime in a certain corner of the country. To blame almost a billion Hindus for an isolated incident is a foolish generalization much. There will be millions who won’t even know about the case. And most of my friends who come from all religious background were aghast at the crime.

Then why should Hindustan be ashamed when most of them condemn the act? I was aghast when Huma Qureshi chose to hold placard to specifically target a religion and the religious place. Maybe she fell for the agenda of a group in Bollywood which arguably comes from a certain ideology. But what that it did was instigated others to delve out cases where Muslims did rape, some of them in Mosques. I saw people sharing a recent news of revelation of molestation of ladies in Hajj and how people tried to howl down those who chose to open up because it was defaming the religion. What if Hindus start carrying such a placard writing the way Huma chose to write?

How would Huma feel if she is blamed for the acts of grooming gangs which sexually exploited thousand of British kids for more than a decade? I never saw a Pakistani guy ever holding a placard despite an overwhelming number of the gangs' members were of Pakistani heritage. How is this 8-year-old girl different than thousands of little British girls?

Let me tell you, a few years back a Muslim Godman, Gulzar Ahmed Bhat raped more than 500 little girls in Jammu and Kashmir region. But we didn’t see a single guy protesting. How is this girl different from more than 500 girls not to deserve a countrywide protest?

And recently I was messaged if I condemned the incident where a 76-year man Abdul Wahab made a repeatedly raped a 12-year child and impregnated her. Of course, I do.

What if Hindus had started responding the way Huma Qureshi responded?

We have to ask our self, are we angry at the brutal rape?

or that the rape is by a Hindu or a Muslim girl?

Would our outrage for rape depend upon if it is an inter-religion rape?

I saw an answer here on Quora where a drawing of Hindu religious symbols was used as a prop to depict the victim. What has a trident (trishool) to do with the case? How can those who support response to blasphemy in Danish cartoon support such blasphemy under the garb of justice for the girl?

My point is some people are brazenly using the death of the child to endorse their religious, political and cultural bias. I came to know Ravish Kumar did a series of Primetime debates on the issue but the same man was silent when his real brother (Brajesh Pandey) and Bihar Congress VP raped a minor Dalit girl for an extended period some time back. Normally a Brahmin politician raping a Dalit girl becomes a headline for him. Should journalists only react when it suits their political interest?

In all that naming and shaming politics somewhere the justice for the little girl is lost.

LET’S BE OBJECTIVE AND NOT A LYNCH-MOB:

We must ensure that rather than being emotional we are objective in our analysis and refuse to be part of a lynch mob and gyrate over opinion on basis of what media is trying to show us. Our endeavor should be to force the govt to do a searching investigation to punish the culprits in the fast-track court and not bring the religious angle to dilute the gravity of the crime.