The increasing number of rape incidents across the country has gotten a matter of worry for all conscientious people.
In spite of a decent number of domestic and international laws set up, different activities of common society and endeavours of the administration brutality against women can’t be halted, even in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Women are not safe anywhere nor even at homes. The rape incident of an indigenous young lady in Khagrachhari in the most recent week happened when the victim was at home alongside her parents.
A woman was snatched away from before her husband and was gang-raped at the student hostel of MC College in Sylhet stunning the aggregate soul of the country.
At least 975 women were raped over the most recent nine months in the country, as per a report by Ain o Salish Kendra (ASK). Of them, around 41 were murdered after the rape and nine others committed suicide after rape.
The ASK additionally referenced that a sum of 224 cases was filed in connection with the incidents in the middle of January and August 2020. Plus, 192 incidents of rape attempts happened during the period, it included.
At least 1,413 women were raped in 2019 across the country, while as many as 732 women were raped in 2018, the ASK report revealed. Violence against women continues at an alarming rate in the year 2020.
Gender experts and human rights activists cited four major reasons – social, economic, political and legal – for the surge in rape incidents.
Professor Sadeka Halim, first Dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences at Dhaka University, said women are neither secured at home nor outside of their homes.
“The irony is that socially our family members and guardians believe that when a girl is given in marriage at an earlier age she is safe. This is an off-base thought. Since such activities cannot work as a defensive wall,” she said.
The gang-rape of a disabled Chakma woman in Khagrachhari occurred on September 24 when the woman was at home highlighting the fact that they are not even safe at home and after their marriage.
Sultana Kamal, a prominent human rights activist, said the male-centric perspective on women socially is no less liable for the incidence of violence against women.
Referring to this thought, Professor Sadeka Halim said such an idea of the male is obliterating human nobility and the golden dream of building an egalitarian society. She likewise noticed that most men in the country actually believe that they have the right to beat a woman.
Referring a research report of the International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research ‘Bangladesh ( icddr,b) she said 69 per cent of men in rural areas and 63 per cent in metropolitan territories accept that a husband has the right to beat his wife if she does something wrong. Fifty percent of men metropolitan regions and 85 per cent in rural areas believe that women should endure violence to protect their families.
Photo credit: Collected
