The peaceful protests publicised under the viral hashtag #IWillGoOut started on Facebook, has within a fortnight, become a national campaign. The #IWillGoOut team reach grew to a little over 2,300 members with about 80 active participants who are organising the marches across the nation
HYDERABAD: Even as women and members of marginalised communities continue to be vulnerable in public place, section of people express more worry about the victims clothing, express shock over their audacity to be adventurous or to imagine that they could party on New Year’s eve without any incident. In their charged discourse, they often forget to question the culprits, instead indulge in victim-shaming.
Questioning the notions of protectionism, to assert their need for access to public spaces and to reclaim streets, women activists are organising marches and several demonstrations on Saturday in Hyderabad and 21 cities and towns of the country including Bengaluru, Mumbai, Pune, Delhi, Chennai, Nagpur, Thrissur, Goa, etc, at 5pm. An online campaign from Kashmir will also be held simultaneously.
The peaceful protests publicised under the viral hashtag #IWillGoOut started on Facebook, has within a fortnight become a national campaign. The #IWillGoOut team reach grew to a little over 2,300 members with about 80 active participants who are organising the marches across the nation.
Varsha Bhargavi, an activist and coordinator for the Hyderabad chapter, says this was bound to happen. “Outrage had been building up since the Nirbhaya rape case. The mass molestation was the tipping point, that turned the angst into a movement,” she says. The common thread that brought the team together was their experiences as victims of street sexual harassment. “We discussed, brainstormed and formulated a plan to channelise our anger in the right direction and plan the protest marches in a few cities initially. Then the calls started coming from our sisters across India who shared the same angst and joined hands for #IWillGoOut.”
The aim of the protest is to channelise the outrage into action with focus on three core areas – safety and security for women in public spaces; ease of approach to report crimes committed against women and compulsory gender sensitisation.
Besides sloganeering, the team will also submit regional petitions to the state Police department, Ministry of Home Affairs and Women and Child Welfare Ministry at the respective states with signatures of the protestors. The petitions will be available online once submitted to the government.
But will going out on streets help women feel safe? “We need to recognise that restricting women and girls from going out is clear violation of their rights. We condemn this on all counts. Today women hesitate to venture out alone because the streets are not safe. But the underlying problem is the law enforcement should ensure that streets are safe for all genders. In rural India, girl students are forced to drop out from schools and colleges due to street sexual harassment. There is only one way to eradicate and uproot the fear - Go out and reclaim public spaces for women,” asserts Varsha.