'Eve Teasing' in India: Fighting for Change As Sexual Violence Grows

Every day, I attract unwanted attention from Indian men -- even if I am drenched in sweat and sporting a parachute's worth of cloth (for modesty of course). Cars slow down to pass me, roadside workers stop, and groups of guys get the giggles when I traipse by. Sometimes they whisper. Sometimes they ask for a photo. Sometimes they touch me. Once a man in the market, after staring for some time, threw a grape at my roommate's chest and winked.

At first I thought it was because of my fair skin. But sexual harassment is rampant throughout India for all young women, regardless of race or nationality.


India's Deep, Growing Problem

Violence against women is the fastest-growing crime in India, according to the National Crime Records Bureau. In 2007 (the most recent year of available data), sexual harassment cases increased by 10 percent, and nearly 200,000 cases of violence against women were reported -- an increase of 12 percent in only one year.

"Every day you look at the newspaper you find so much," said Dr. Rekha Pande, coordinator of the Centre for Women's Studies at the University of Hyderabad. "Being born a daughter is [almost] not being born human. Women do not have that kind of status. And it is increasing -- the violence is increasing."

In Hindu tradition, a wife is believed to be part of her husband. Women used to throw themselves onto their dead husbands' funeral pyres rather than accept being "left behind," which was seen as very honorable. These views persist despite the women's movement of the 50s and 60s after India's independence from Britain. "We have a very traditional society, it's a very feudal kind of a society," Pande said. "And suddenly we have this whole understanding of women's roles and we have a culture that is more than 3,500 years old, which is a very patriarchal culture."

Yet independent-minded women often battle the perception that they are amoral and promiscuous, a view that is fed by the portrayals of sexuality by Western entertainment and celebrities that have become very popular in India. When combined with an entrenched patriarchal mindset and harassment laws that are not taken seriously, the influence of globalization contributes to an increasingly dangerous environment for Indian women.


Eve Teasing Across India

"Eve teasing" is the slang term for sexual harassment. It refers to the biblical first lady and includes anything from lecherous glances to unwanted touching. "It's any time a woman is teased in a sexual way," explained Ranjani Prasad, a first-year communications student at the University of Hyderabad.

Prasad is the student representative for the Gender Sensitization and Committee Against Sexual Harassment -- GS CASH for short. It helps women deal with Eve teasing, and raises awareness about sexual harassment on campus.

Committees like GS CASH were implemented across India after the Vishaka Cases in 1997, in which a female government worker was raped by five men. The supreme court of India mandated that every school and workplace form a complaint committee -- led by a woman -- to address sexual harassment.

"Often it's the woman who bears the burden of it all," Prasad said. "The idea is that if you are a good, modest Indian woman you won't be sexually harassed. So any woman who comes out with a sexual harassment case I see as very brave."

Though women found their voice and fought for their rights in the mid-twentieth century, claiming that the best way to modernize the country was to modernize its women, equality is still a work in progress.

"At least now it is being recognized," said Pande. "When we were students you could not even call it sexual harassment or Eve teasing. It was just, you were born a girl and you have to live with it."

Last year, Pande helped conduct a study on sexual harassment in the workplace for the National Institute of Public Cooperation and Child Development. Her job was to check up on the government-mandated committees in all sorts of institutions -- public and private businesses, government offices, and colleges and universities.

What she found was distressing. In the state of Andhra Pradesh, she said, so few rural organizations had committees that they had to be excluded from the study. In the cities, sexual harassment was barely being addressed. She said that many places had no committees, or that they were formed at the last minute before Pande's team arrived.

"Many places have a place that says 'sexual harassment committee room' or something, but it's used as a dump yard or it's used as a place to have tea," she said. "They were not keeping any records, they were not maintaining any files. The overall attitude was very lax."


A Work In Progress

At the University of Hyderabad, GS CASH holds informational sessions at the start of every term and deals with complaints as they come.

"Sexual harassment is a reality," Pande said. "But at least in our university we are trying to build a very strong ground saying that we will not tolerate any of this nonsense."

Pande was a member of GS CASH for its first three years. She and her colleagues investigated all sorts of incidents, including those between students, faculty and students, and internet users. In many cases, Pande said, the university only passed minimal discipline on Eve teasers.

"We found the committee does not have teeth," Pande said. "It cannot take up a decision. At the most it can formulate certain rules and pass it on to the vice chancellor."

In one case, a female student was harassed by her research guide. Pande's committee sent a report to the vice chancellor, who failed to "implement authority," she said. He appointed a judge who took up the hearing, but it was a year and a half before the investigation ended. The faculty member was eventually barred from administrative positions, though he was still allowed to teach.


Ruchika: A Landmark Case?

One of the most controversial court cases in India right now is the Ruchika case. In 1990, at the age of 14, Ruchika was molested by a prominent police officer. A month later, she was expelled from her school for unexplained reasons. Three years later she committed suicide. In December 2009, her assaulter received his sentence -- six months in jail and a fine of Rs. 1000, or about $20.

Amid public outrage, the central government decided to reexamine the case and the severity of the sentence (a new hearing is set for April 5). The case's high profile could have an impact on the wider Eve teasing norm, if only by establishing stricter punishments. Some activists hope the case will call attention to a proposed bill called the Sexual Harassment Bill that would help bring about more sweeping changes, including making it easier for women to report harassment and receive treatment.

Yet it is clear that the law needs to be supported by regular enforcement and acceptance. "The overall attitude in Indian society, not only to sexual harassment, is to suppress things," Pande said. "And in India, the laws are there -- we have fantastic laws -- but the mindset has to change."