On Feb. 23, 2016, an Indian woman, within hours of giving birth by C-section, was raped in a hospital near New Delhi. Some in India took consolation in the fact that at least she was not, like Nirbhaya—the 23-year-old female physiotherapy intern—beaten up after being raped.
A few days later, on March 8, 2016, on Women’s Day, a 15-year-old girl was raped and set on fire.
For those who don’t remember, in December 2012, Nirbhayawas beaten with iron rods, gang-raped, and tortured in a private bus while she was travelling with her boyfriend. As a result of an international outrage over her assault and subsequent death, new laws and new fast-track courts were promised. More women are now willing to report rape cases. But even two years after Nirbhaya, her father claims that the promises of reform were unmet, and that justice in India has failed his daughter and women like her.
Indeed, Amnesty International reports that authorities have not effectively implemented new laws on crimes against women. The majority of rape cases still go unreported. In Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s India, the problem, instead of abating, has become worse:
2011 24,206 (reported rapes per year in India)
2012 24,923
2013 33,707
2014 37,000
One explanation for the ongoing rape problem is the skewed sex ratio. Like China, India has a massive imbalance in its sex ratio. According to the Indian census, the sex ratio in the 6 and below age group has risen from 102.4 males per 100 females in 1961 (the Liberal Nehru days) to 108.9 in 2011 (the Fiery Hindutva Ideology days). In Gujarat, Indian PM Modi’s home state, the sex ratio is 112 to 100.
Economists and sociologists call this the Bare Branches phenomenon, a result of female feticide over a very long period of time. It is an issue that India shares with its massive neighbor, China, where boy babies are also culturally preferred over girls. Independent studies out of MIT and Columbia University have postulated that these Bare Branches—males with a snowball’s chance in hell of finding a female companion—threaten domestic stability and international security.
And yet, the surplus of males in China doesn’t appear to be leading to a rape crisis there. In fact, research has found that while China has seen an uptick in general violence due to the Bare Branches, they actually tend to behave gently around women. No such correlation was found in India.
Reviewed by
Asaph Mic
on
13:41:00
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