MARGAO: “Let’s stop discriminating against ‘victims of sexual violence’ based on gender, age, caste, creed, religion, region, colour, occupation, situation, behaviour’, was the terse message sent out to all and sundry from the city here on Sunday as a group of citizens under the banner of YWCA demanded justice for Asifa, the Kathua rape and murder victim.
The group moved around the Margao Municipal Council garden as it expressed great anguish over the unjustifiable delay in the investigations into the heinous rape and murder of the eight year old Bakerwal girl in Rassana village. “The YWCA is equally concerned over the excessive politicisation and communalisation of an incident which is clearly one of sexual exploitation, sexual brutality and murder. We are also concerned by the brazen manner in which ultra-nationalistic discourse is being used to counter the campaigns for justice and shield the culprits,” remarked Aldei Fernandes.
They pointed out that the sequence of events shows that there has been a deliberate attempt by a section from within the government to thwart the process of investigations in the case, right from the time of her disappearance.
“We feel there is a deliberate attempt to hush up the case by building up a communal narrative around the heinous crime and its investigations. Shockingly, the vested interests trying to sabotage the investigations through the communalisation of the crime and its politicization do not only include a fringe right wing group, but also two sitting senior Ministers in the PDP-BJP ruling alliance. Such a situation has further encouraged other political groups to counter the narrative not from the victim’s perspective, but for petty political goals and for fueling the communal discourse,” the YWCA said, while calling upon all political groups to stop the harassment of Asifa’s family.
“As women, we are extremely shocked and appalled by the manner in incidents of gender oppression and appropriated by patriarchal mindsets within and outside the corridors of power to subvert justice and even rob the victims of their victimhood.”
