Three women raped in a month! And no, we are not talking about the badlands of Uttar Pradesh or Bihar. We're in Kerala, hailed as God's own country by some, a state that boasts of a very high literacy rate and a sex ratio higher than the rest of India.
But far from the glowing headlines and reports, there is a routine that plays out every day in the state – one most women here are only too familiar with.
Outside of those tea shops where men discuss global politics, quoting freely from Karl Marx's 'The Communist Manifesto', women can be seen hurrying away, eyes on the ground, hoping to reach their homes before nightfall – safe, and in one piece.
It is a race they have to repeat day after day: venturing out of the house, to do their duties as wife and mother, for them it is an unending exercise to safeguard themselves from prying hands and leering eyes. And a part of their mind is always focused on getting back home safe, navigating the humiliation lurking at every corner and deserted stretch.
But three women – 15-year-old schoolgirl in Attingal, Jisha in Perumbavoor, and a 19-year-old nursing student in Varkala – lost out in this daily race. Their bodies, their souls violated, subjected to cruelty and humiliation by predators whose hands weren't held down either by the government or the police that work on taxpayers' money.
Also check: #JusticeForJisha: the brutal rape that shocked Kerala
But as horrendous details of the extent of brutality were revealed in each of these case, people also latched on to the fact that two of the three women are dalits.
Women or dalits under attack?
Yes, they are dalits. But they also are from economically weaker sections of the society, who live in ramshackle homes that offered little protection for their dignity. Kerala, over the years, has slowly managed to distance itself from the anti-dalit tag of the pre-Independence era, when the lower castes were subjected to some of the worst cruelty by upper-caste landlords.
But the horror never really ended. It has carried forth in more brutal, revolting forms. Only, the subjects of this cruelty is not any community or caste any more but women – any woman from whom fate has taken away the usual protections offered by her family. And there are thousands of such victims in the state whose tales have been silenced or forgotten.
Also read: #JusticeForJisha: shunned by neighbours, she found hope in pen camera
We now cry about Kerala's Nirbhaya. Expect lot of media and political frenzy – because it is election time. As hashtags such as #KeralaDalitsUnderAttack gather more retweets on Twitter, politicians are weighing the issue in terms of votes.
Mr politician, does a rapist ask for the community of his victim before attacking her? Jisha's story is the story of any woman who is left to fend for herself and does not have the protection offered by money and family.
If history is any indicator, expect little to change on the ground. Poor girls will continue to get exploited, brutally tortured, their lives – and dreams -- snuffed out. Their families threatened, their silence bought – by politicians and the politically connected.
Where are the lawmakers and law-keepers?
Jisha and her family had filed police complaints against the constant threat they were allegedly receiving from the neighbours. But no cop ever walked into their one-room house – until the news of Jisha's rape and murder made the whole nation sit up and watch in horror. The place is teeming with cops now, and politicians from chief minister Oommen Chandy to newly nominated Rajya Sabha MP Suresh Gopi are all running to the taluk hospital to console the poor mother who has been rewarded with a lifetime of nightmares because of inaction by the state.
Read: Jisha went without meals, walked to college, yet never complained
It took the police five days to collect the call details from mobile phones, when even in routine criminal cases, this task would have been top on their list. Nor did the police submit a report about the attack on dalits to the collector, as per the law.
The survivor from Attingal was all of 15 years old, the time when the biggest worry in a teenager's mind would be to tackle the board exams. It's a mark of her bravery that despite all the sexual and mental torture she suffered, she wrote her SSLC exam.
Read: After escaping rape horror of 2 months, brave Kerala girl wrote SSLC exam
It's even more than shocking that hours after the CM's assurance that culprits in Jisha rape-murder would be put behind the bars, a group of youngsters dared to gang-rape a teenager in Varkala, barely 30 kilometers from the state capital.
The rape headline
Rape, murder, rape… The headlines are screaming at us with such fearful regularity because successive governments in Kerala have created a climate that condones, even rewards, those who sexually assault women.
This permissive climate has been created over about two decades by politicians and aided by a police machinery that has forgotten its primary job of protecting citizens and values their political mentors' interests above all else.
The land of perverts
Anyone walking with their eyes and ears open in Kerala and not awed by the natural beauty around, would easily witness the daily abuse and humiliation women suffer on the streets and roads in God's own country.
I have friends who moved out of the state in disgust at the treatment that women get here. They say they feel more protected walking around in the crowded streets of the metros, than in walking on the roads in Kerala's urban villages. Most women would tell you of being flashed from street corners or have a friend or relative who has been subjected to the perverse treatment.
Fact is, despite its much touted development indicators and noisy liberalism, Kerala remains a terrible place for women, especially vulnerable women. A victim never gets sympathy; rather politicians, cops and even the media get into a frenzy to decimate her character, insinuating that she herself is responsible for what she “got.”
Now, this is not much different from the "dented and painted women" comments that came from president Pranab Mukherjee's son or the many other statements by north Indian politicians that denigrated women.
Keralites have read and discussed those comments ad nauseum, and prided ourselves as a society that is much more "progressive". Well, what we have done is conveniently brush away similar clouds over several politicians from both the UDF and LDF, and happily ignored how those cases were buried with active help from the police and media.
Keralite intellectuals may vociferously differ but this too-willing-to-believe attitude of ours is nothing but another facet of the same crude patriarchical mindset of the north Indian politicians.
Will we show the courage to take a stand, and demand of political parties a no-tolerance policy on such crimes, including on the big fish? Our future is in our hands. And it is election time.
Want your voice to be heard? Tweet your responses to Onmanorama with the hashtag #JusticeForJisha