Trigger Warning: Description of sexual assault and rape
When i went through the ordeal that is called 'medical examination' because i made a complaint of rape, there is just one thing that i wished. That it would never ever be done on another woman. So when a 4 year old child was gang raped in G D Birla school, Calcutta, and when she was subjected to medical examination, i just hoped against all hopes that it was not what i thought it was. But it was. A four year old child was subjected to the heinous practice of male superiority, of medical and legal ignorance all because she was raped by two Indian males. It was as perverse as it was shocking.
For those of you who are not familiar with what happens in a medical examination that follows rape, you can read my testimony here. The Ladies Finger republished my story. [They have, in the past, also published some relevant research on the two finger test that was banned.] That was all i could do at the time. I was in no position to file yet another writ petition and go after the system that raped women after they were raped.
In my early twenties, when i was subjected to this test, i shrieked in pain inside the room. Quoting myself,
Do you understand the futility of this? Most victims will agree to do it because the police and some lawyers make it sound necessary. In my case, since i refused to undergo that torture, they made me sign a paper that said so. This would later be produced in court. These are the various mechanisms that the system uses to dissuade women from reporting rape. Now think of a child.
She is not in a position to make any decisions. The police or lawyers probably told the parents that this was a routine examination and one that had to be done to strengthen the case in court. The truth is that right after the child was raped, when the father demanded a medical examination (since there is more probability of evidence soon after the crime) the doctor had violated the POCSO Act and had refused to do it.The police first refused to file an FIR saying that they needed a medical report. The parent(s) ran from hospital to station and back in the hope that their child would get justice. This here, is our system.
Is a medical report necessary to file an FIR? No.
Can a doctor refuse to perform the medical examination without an FIR? No.
Yet, this is the reality in India.
The newspaper reports clearly say that the child refused to undergo the test twice. Any guesses why? Well, me, a sexually active female in twenties could not stand the pain, what do you expect a child's vagina to do?
This brings me to the newspaper reports. First, let us all agree that they still haven't figured out what pictures or thumbnails to use while reporting rape. Don't you remember many ghastly examples from earlier? These reports have a huge role in sexualizing rape while in fact it is violence, gender violence, to be specific and has got nothing to do with sex.
These newspapers, including ABP, the biggest news network in the North East that prints the Ananda Bazar Patrika in Bangla and the Telegraph in English, thought that it was important to print that the child's hymen was intact. This, in a country where people don't even know the parts of a female genital area. There are men who have tried to 'educate' me that during periods, women bled through their clitoris.
It is in this context that newspapers are publicizing such a private detail of a human being's, a girl child's body. Don't you get it? The whole system thought it was necessary to see if the girl had had 'sex' in the past or not. By saying that the hymen was intact, they were also saying that the rape that had taken place was 'mild'. Surely for it to be a 'serious' rape, the men would have had to penetrate to break the hymen with their penis?
No, i am not taking it too far. This is how narratives are formed by the media. This is the power that the media hold that they think can be used whenever they please to make or break stories. Look at a direct result of these reports.
It gave the supporters of the great school more reason to bark foul. Repeated cases of sexual abuse at a school should not be linked to the school or its principal. What mattered was the name and fame of the school and of course, please don't politicize rape.
I don't know how many of you have read the 'Chronicle of a Death Foretold' by Gabriel Garzia Marquez. The whole story is a tale of revenge circling around the virginity of a young woman. That's where i got to know that there was a custom of hanging bed linen with tiny drops of blood on it on clotheslines, just the day after the wedding to announce that the bride had lost her virginity the previous night. In the story since the woman was not a virgin, her friends gave her useful tips on how to 'fake' the losing of virginity. Reading the reports of the rape of the child in Kolkata, one would feel that the media were looking for the stained linen.
Or else, why would they be insisting on looking at a child's genitals when she herself said that one of the accused removed her pants? One of the reports said that there was no 'active' bleeding. How does this explain the fact that the parents got to know that something was wrong when they noticed that the child was bleeding? Didn't the father of the girl shift her to a private hospital because she started bleeding again? Yet, the Telegraph chose to write about the absence of what the doctors and papers are now calling an 'active bleeding'. It becomes even more horrific when you realize that the medical team are pushing for a second medical examination because the first one was 'inconclusive.' This is after the father made it clear that he didn't want his child to go through one more such ordeal. According to the Telegraph itself,
It is time to bring an end to this torture. Not even a four year old is spared by the system when it comes to rape and sexual assault. First people cried foul when it was called 'gang rape.' No, this was after they cried foul over calling it rape. The incident was reported in the media as the child being forcefully penetrated by finger by the accused. People made it clear that that was not rape enough. No matter what the law says, for a rape to be 'rape enough', the victim has to be forcefully penetrated by a penis. For it to be gang rape, there should at least be fifty people doing that. I don't want to think of what they would have printed if the child had no visible signs of abuse. Yes, it is possible. No, rape is not written over victims' foreheads for everyone to see and understand.
WASH condemns this heinous practice of medical examination. We would like to state unequivocally that it is a barbaric practice that has no place whatsoever in a case of rape or sexual assault. The importance that is given to this kind of torture should immediately be demolished. Isn't it the second time that a child is being sexually assaulted G D Birla school? Why did the school circulate the name of the victim and her picture? Why don't you think of all that while you eagerly browse pages to know the status of a four year old's hymen and vagina.
We have had enough of virginity checks and stained sheets on display. Now go ahead and do something about the rape culture that you actively promote.
- kunjila
[kunjila is one of the founder members of WASH. She is a filmmaker.]
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| From WASH rally in Jadavpur University, Kolkata, July, 2017 Image: Harsh Doshi |
When i went through the ordeal that is called 'medical examination' because i made a complaint of rape, there is just one thing that i wished. That it would never ever be done on another woman. So when a 4 year old child was gang raped in G D Birla school, Calcutta, and when she was subjected to medical examination, i just hoped against all hopes that it was not what i thought it was. But it was. A four year old child was subjected to the heinous practice of male superiority, of medical and legal ignorance all because she was raped by two Indian males. It was as perverse as it was shocking.
For those of you who are not familiar with what happens in a medical examination that follows rape, you can read my testimony here. The Ladies Finger republished my story. [They have, in the past, also published some relevant research on the two finger test that was banned.] That was all i could do at the time. I was in no position to file yet another writ petition and go after the system that raped women after they were raped.
In my early twenties, when i was subjected to this test, i shrieked in pain inside the room. Quoting myself,
'The old woman made sit on a bed and asked to spread my legs. She approached my pubic with a dirty red rag. I still haven't understood what it was for. Then she started pulling my vagina and looking into it. It hurt. I shrieked. She asked me to shut up. She was trying to stretch my vagina and it hurt like hell. I shrieked in pain again. She said 'why are you doing aargh. aargh.' I said it was hurting. 'Tat. What hurt', she said. One more time she pulled it wide i got up and wore my pants and said that that was all i was going to stand. I left.'Allow me to remind you that the rape that i had reported had happened more than a year ago. Yet, the police insisted that i undergo the examination. The purpose of it was just to show that i wasn't a virgin. That my vagina was 'habituated to sex.' In other words, that my hymen wasn't intact.
Do you understand the futility of this? Most victims will agree to do it because the police and some lawyers make it sound necessary. In my case, since i refused to undergo that torture, they made me sign a paper that said so. This would later be produced in court. These are the various mechanisms that the system uses to dissuade women from reporting rape. Now think of a child.
She is not in a position to make any decisions. The police or lawyers probably told the parents that this was a routine examination and one that had to be done to strengthen the case in court. The truth is that right after the child was raped, when the father demanded a medical examination (since there is more probability of evidence soon after the crime) the doctor had violated the POCSO Act and had refused to do it.The police first refused to file an FIR saying that they needed a medical report. The parent(s) ran from hospital to station and back in the hope that their child would get justice. This here, is our system.
Is a medical report necessary to file an FIR? No.
Can a doctor refuse to perform the medical examination without an FIR? No.
Yet, this is the reality in India.
The newspaper reports clearly say that the child refused to undergo the test twice. Any guesses why? Well, me, a sexually active female in twenties could not stand the pain, what do you expect a child's vagina to do?
This brings me to the newspaper reports. First, let us all agree that they still haven't figured out what pictures or thumbnails to use while reporting rape. Don't you remember many ghastly examples from earlier? These reports have a huge role in sexualizing rape while in fact it is violence, gender violence, to be specific and has got nothing to do with sex.
 |
| Deccan Herald reporting a gang rape |
These newspapers, including ABP, the biggest news network in the North East that prints the Ananda Bazar Patrika in Bangla and the Telegraph in English, thought that it was important to print that the child's hymen was intact. This, in a country where people don't even know the parts of a female genital area. There are men who have tried to 'educate' me that during periods, women bled through their clitoris.
It is in this context that newspapers are publicizing such a private detail of a human being's, a girl child's body. Don't you get it? The whole system thought it was necessary to see if the girl had had 'sex' in the past or not. By saying that the hymen was intact, they were also saying that the rape that had taken place was 'mild'. Surely for it to be a 'serious' rape, the men would have had to penetrate to break the hymen with their penis?
No, i am not taking it too far. This is how narratives are formed by the media. This is the power that the media hold that they think can be used whenever they please to make or break stories. Look at a direct result of these reports.
 |
| A Facebook comment following the report that the first medical examination was 'inconclusive' |
It gave the supporters of the great school more reason to bark foul. Repeated cases of sexual abuse at a school should not be linked to the school or its principal. What mattered was the name and fame of the school and of course, please don't politicize rape.
I don't know how many of you have read the 'Chronicle of a Death Foretold' by Gabriel Garzia Marquez. The whole story is a tale of revenge circling around the virginity of a young woman. That's where i got to know that there was a custom of hanging bed linen with tiny drops of blood on it on clotheslines, just the day after the wedding to announce that the bride had lost her virginity the previous night. In the story since the woman was not a virgin, her friends gave her useful tips on how to 'fake' the losing of virginity. Reading the reports of the rape of the child in Kolkata, one would feel that the media were looking for the stained linen.
Or else, why would they be insisting on looking at a child's genitals when she herself said that one of the accused removed her pants? One of the reports said that there was no 'active' bleeding. How does this explain the fact that the parents got to know that something was wrong when they noticed that the child was bleeding? Didn't the father of the girl shift her to a private hospital because she started bleeding again? Yet, the Telegraph chose to write about the absence of what the doctors and papers are now calling an 'active bleeding'. It becomes even more horrific when you realize that the medical team are pushing for a second medical examination because the first one was 'inconclusive.' This is after the father made it clear that he didn't want his child to go through one more such ordeal. According to the Telegraph itself,
So then, in a case where the victim is able to identify the perpetrators herself, why is she being tortured this way? Really, all you can come up with is the status of her hymen?
'I want my daughter to forget this whole episode as fast as possible. But another test would bring back all the terrible memories'
It is time to bring an end to this torture. Not even a four year old is spared by the system when it comes to rape and sexual assault. First people cried foul when it was called 'gang rape.' No, this was after they cried foul over calling it rape. The incident was reported in the media as the child being forcefully penetrated by finger by the accused. People made it clear that that was not rape enough. No matter what the law says, for a rape to be 'rape enough', the victim has to be forcefully penetrated by a penis. For it to be gang rape, there should at least be fifty people doing that. I don't want to think of what they would have printed if the child had no visible signs of abuse. Yes, it is possible. No, rape is not written over victims' foreheads for everyone to see and understand.
WASH condemns this heinous practice of medical examination. We would like to state unequivocally that it is a barbaric practice that has no place whatsoever in a case of rape or sexual assault. The importance that is given to this kind of torture should immediately be demolished. Isn't it the second time that a child is being sexually assaulted G D Birla school? Why did the school circulate the name of the victim and her picture? Why don't you think of all that while you eagerly browse pages to know the status of a four year old's hymen and vagina.
We have had enough of virginity checks and stained sheets on display. Now go ahead and do something about the rape culture that you actively promote.
- kunjila
[kunjila is one of the founder members of WASH. She is a filmmaker.]
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