The national response to the brutal sexual offence committed
to Delhi survivor and other issues in recent past compels one to ask the above
question. Let us view the response in hindsight and try to make sense out of
it.
The outrage can largely be credited to media taking up the
issue which else like hundreds of sexual offences might well have gone
unnoticed. Much of the noise that was doing the rounds was more about the
penalty that the perpetrators should get. My facebook wall for once was filled
with requests for online petitions demanding death penalty for the offenders.
Similarly petitions to change the law to include death penalty for sexual
offences, including for retrospective cases (such as this Delhi case) was doing
the rounds. This brings forth the very question that I asked in the beginning.
Quantum of punishment for any crime has two facets to it.
One is that it must act as a deterrent and secondly the punishment must be
commensurate with the crime. Interestingly an additional dimension is getting appended
in our society. That dimension is of VENDETTA and it is this dimension which I
believe emotionally charged the people to demand amendments to the
constitution. Instead of focus being on how to best reform and implement the
law so that such instances do not take place in future, the whole noise was on
how to hang the perpetrators. Anybody with a contrary opinion was looked down
upon and ridiculed for going too soft on barbarians.
Also let us look at the role media is playing in this
regard. The recent trend has been that the media takes up mostly emotionally
charged issues, be it this Delhi case , the beheading of two of our soldiers
(issue loaded with nationalism) or be it the case of Owaisi/Togadia
speech(issue loaded with religious sentiments). Issues such as farmer suicides (more than a million in last 2-3 decades) are conveniently brushed
under the carpet. Since our media believes in doing all this self adulation, it
is high time that they start taking brickbats along with the bouquets.
