Farooq Abdullah Fears Women

For those used to live colourful life with flamboyance are a worried lot today. The spate of incidents involving rape or attempted rape, sexual misconduct and harassment of women by people including rich and famous persons have focused the nation’s attention demanding punishment of the guilty.

Farooq Abdullah is known for his flamboyant lifestyle. Even at this age, he takes dance floors and enjoys late night parties that have glamour and beauty along with choicest wines and whiskies. It is nobody’s business to peep into another’s private life. What the Union Minister and tall leader of the National Conference does in his private moments is his business. But a public figure carries accountability to the people and to the nation on his shoulders. It was here that Farooq erred on Friday, December 6, 2013 when he inadvertently remarked on the prevailing mood of the country vis a vis women’s chastity.

Farooq was casual when he told a group of reporters outside Parliament House, “Ab to ladkiyons se baat karne mein dar lagata hai”.( Now I fear talking to girls). He went on to say that the situation in the country has come to a point when one fears even appointing a woman as secretary. Better send all men to jail”.

All hell broke loose. News channels went viral and women activists were up in arms against Farooq’s remark. True, simple interpretation of his statement goes against the dignity of women. Talking to women will not lead anyone to jail or even keeping a woman secretary is all right. There is remote possibility of a woman misusing or better say abusing her gender to make false and fabricated complaint against her boss or against anyone who comes into contact with her. But that possibility cannot be ruled out altogether. Farooq Abdullah has this in mind when he aired his views to the media.

But interpretation and more than this it is perception that matters. If a person does not make advances against a woman, if he does not try to make physical contact or pass lewd comments, he has nothing to fear in the company of girls. Problem arises when men start taking undue advantage of the situation while being in the company of women.

Rules have changed and so have the laws. Despite this, there are regular incidents of men assaulting women sexually; the only thing is that all the incidents are not reported. Women fear the society and fear the men who are rich and powerful enough to ruin the life of the victim. Look at the case of the victim journalist who was assaulted by her editor Tarun Tejpal in a Goa hotel. The woman journalist took some time in mustering the courage to report the matter to her Managing Editor, Shoma Chaudhary, also a woman. But for the leak of the e-mails, the Tejpal case would not have come to the public domain and the culprit would not have been in police custody now.

I desist to comment on the other much hyped and publicized incident of a law intern who wrote in her blog that she suffered unwelcome behavior from a judge of the Supreme Court Justice A k Ganguly who since has retired from the Supreme Court. The girl wrote her blog almost a year after the incident took place in a five star hotel of Delhi.  The UPA Government was terribly unhappy with Justice Ganguly because he strictly monitored and wrote judgment in the 2G scam. Is there any angle of motivation in the complaint notwithstanding the three member panel has found prima facie veracity in the complaint of the law intern.

~R. K. Sinha