This is a short clip edited from a 7-8 min video I shot of these two bravehearts standing up to the Delhi Police all by themselves on the evening on December 23, 2012 at India Gate in New Delhi.
An unprecedented mass outrage followed the brutal gangrape and assault on a 23-year-old medicine intern by six men in a moving public bus near New Delhi's Vasant Vihar area.
Indian national dailies variously called the rape victim Nirbhaya (which means fearless), Amanat (which means something trusted with you for safe-keeping, the colloquial reference is usually a person or thing entrusted to you by God and so, which needs to be protected and loved till death) and Damini (called after the female protagonist of a Bollywood film who fought single-handedly to get justice for a rape victim).
Nirbhaya was announced dead on December 29, 2012 in a Singapore hospital. Doctors at New Delhi's Safdarjung Hospital said Nirbhaya was someone with an unusual willpower and inner strength. Being a doctor, Nirbhaya precisely knew what she was going through, and perhaps knew it was a losing battle she was fighting. Still, she kept about her calm, poise, dignity and presence of mind in spite of bearing unimaginable pain, Nirbhaya recorded a police statement before her body could no longer keep up with her will.
The government's immediate response - if it can at all be qualified so - was of apathy, blame-game and a complete disconnect with the ground realities of molest, sexual assaults and rapes that Indian women face every single day.
Chief minister Sheila Dixit refused to meet a group of protestors that sought an interaction with her outside her residence. Home Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said they understood the nation's pain because "they also had daughters." To this lame talk, the most staple response of all young women protesting at India Gate, including that of Kritika (seen in the video) was: "Have their daughters ever travelled daily in a public bus? Waited for an auto at night? Look who's talking!"
Lt. Governor Tejender Khanna, under whose authority lies the Delhi Police, was vactioning in the US when India was boiling. He reportedly had to be "called back" (which gives us a ground to assume that he did not voluntarily curtail his trip) to take charge of the situation after a public and on-television blame-game by chief minister Sheila Dixit. Khanna returned to Delhi only on Sunday night, December 23, 2012. On Sunday evening, police constable Subhash Tomar collapsed after reportedly being roughed up by a mob protesting at India Gate. Tomar was announced dead on Tuesday morning, December 25.
An unprecedented mass outrage followed the brutal gangrape and assault on a 23-year-old medicine intern by six men in a moving public bus near New Delhi's Vasant Vihar area.
Indian national dailies variously called the rape victim Nirbhaya (which means fearless), Amanat (which means something trusted with you for safe-keeping, the colloquial reference is usually a person or thing entrusted to you by God and so, which needs to be protected and loved till death) and Damini (called after the female protagonist of a Bollywood film who fought single-handedly to get justice for a rape victim).
Nirbhaya was announced dead on December 29, 2012 in a Singapore hospital. Doctors at New Delhi's Safdarjung Hospital said Nirbhaya was someone with an unusual willpower and inner strength. Being a doctor, Nirbhaya precisely knew what she was going through, and perhaps knew it was a losing battle she was fighting. Still, she kept about her calm, poise, dignity and presence of mind in spite of bearing unimaginable pain, Nirbhaya recorded a police statement before her body could no longer keep up with her will.
The government's immediate response - if it can at all be qualified so - was of apathy, blame-game and a complete disconnect with the ground realities of molest, sexual assaults and rapes that Indian women face every single day.
Chief minister Sheila Dixit refused to meet a group of protestors that sought an interaction with her outside her residence. Home Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said they understood the nation's pain because "they also had daughters." To this lame talk, the most staple response of all young women protesting at India Gate, including that of Kritika (seen in the video) was: "Have their daughters ever travelled daily in a public bus? Waited for an auto at night? Look who's talking!"
Lt. Governor Tejender Khanna, under whose authority lies the Delhi Police, was vactioning in the US when India was boiling. He reportedly had to be "called back" (which gives us a ground to assume that he did not voluntarily curtail his trip) to take charge of the situation after a public and on-television blame-game by chief minister Sheila Dixit. Khanna returned to Delhi only on Sunday night, December 23, 2012. On Sunday evening, police constable Subhash Tomar collapsed after reportedly being roughed up by a mob protesting at India Gate. Tomar was announced dead on Tuesday morning, December 25.
