Year after the Delhi gang-rape, more must be done to stop abuse of women

This week marks one year since the gang rape of a 23-year-old physiotherapy student in New Delhi. One evening she boarded a bus home from the cinema that never reached its destination. On board she was brutally gang-raped and beaten, before being thrown out naked on to the street and left for dead. She died from her injuries two weeks later.The incident triggered a wave of global horror and India saw thousands of protesters take to the streets to demand action from the government, only to be greeted with a terrifying series of regressive responses ranging from the president's son referring to the "pretty ladies coming out to protest" as "dented and painted", to early curfews being imposed on female students, and nine metro stations being closed – making it harder for women to travel safely. The onus was placed on women to take action to prevent being raped and assaulted: to dress more modestly; to stay home instead of going out to work; to travel in women-only carriages on trains and the metro.Mediocre amendments were made to the law, but over the last year there have been significant societal and cultural changes, not least women becoming more empowered to speak out and come forward. As the reporting of rape in India has soared, the spotlight has slowly – and rightly – shifted from the victims to the perpetrators. Myths that sexual violence is perpetuated by only monsters and lower-class rural workers moving into the big cities are being dispelled: the majority of rapists are known to their victims and reported cases frequently cite relatives, family friends and colleagues and – as marital rape is still not recognised under Indian law – husbands, too.Two high-profile cases in particular have highlighted the endemic nature of the problem: one involving the alleged assault by Tarun Tejpal of Tehelka magazine on a junior colleague, and the other involving the alleged assault by a retired supreme court judge on a law intern. It is unlikely that this time last year we would have heard of either of these cases, for fear of the predictable repercussions.What's clear now is that the volume of voices speaking out and demanding change has grown louder and more insistent in the face of a ruling elite that takes 10 steps back for every one step forward. Last week the supreme court overturned the landmark high court judgment that decriminalised gay sex in 2009. Dismay and anger at the ruling provoked a storm of fury in the media, leading to online petitions, and demonstrations urging a rollback of the court's decision.That we are now fighting over the semantics in articles – whether we use "victim" or "survivor" – launching immediate petitions, taking to Twitter, posting links to protests on Facebook, and demanding action shows the change, small though it may feel.But above all, there is a much larger lesson to be learnt.While we in the west read about the next Indian rape, shake our heads, tweet angrily and mourn the state of violence against India's women, rest assured this is not just India's problem. There's blood on our hands too.In the UK two women are killed every week as a result of domestic abuse, which constitutes around one-third of all female murder victims. There are 500,000 victims of sexual assault every year, 90% of whom are women, and only 15% of whom said they had reported offences to the police.So while we observe, judge and point fingers, there is a greater battle to be won against the abuse of women, and it is up to all of us to speak up and demand change.(theguardian.com)ANN.Az