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Devyani Khobragade is a diplomat and works for the Indian Foreign Service.)
When my two daughters were born, I realized that if there was a God, she had given me the additional responsibility and privilege of raising the more precious and rarer sex. I had been tasked with bringing forth into the world two beautiful confident women who are comfortable and happy in their own bodies and minds, and I was grateful for my calling.
Raising my girls in this way is very important to me. Hence, when I saw the young ladies from Rohtak on television yesterday, I came back home and showed the video to my eight-year-old daughter. I told her that's how she is going to treat any man who teased or touched her. We discussed which Taekwondo moves she had recently learnt that she could use. I was proud to hear her say that she will use her black belt when she gets one to beat up any man who ever misbehaves with a girl (or a boy - I told her how young boys too get abused).
And this is not the first time we had this conversation. Right from when they were four, I told my daughters about when my sister yelled loudly at a man who stalked her on way to school, how she beat a guy with her umbrella when he touched her as we travelled in a crowded local train in Bombay as students.
The Rohtak women, and many others like my sister, showed immense courage despite the subtle and subliminal messaging that girls internalize as they grow up - of somehow feeling ashamed and guilty when men abuse and violate them. I'm sure many girls were told, like I was by my mother, to hide my breasts under tight bras and duppatas, lower my eyes and walk stiff so that I don't attract unwanted male attention.
All this did not help as I endured many boys and men fondling and touching me as a child - the rickshaw wallah who carted me, the boy who went to school in the rickshaw with me who pinched my chest black and blue even though I did not have breasts then, the stranger sitting behind me in a cinema theatre, the "friendly" uncle in a bus ride, and so many more whose memories I've suppressed. I felt guilty, shameful and somehow responsible for these unacceptable violations. It did not help to foster pride and love for myself and this beautiful thing that was mine and that was me. I did not feel comfortable in it or about it.
Therefore, I completely and unapologetically believe that acting and speaking up as the Rohtak girls did should be part of the narrative of raising girls - I'm not advocating vigilantism and beating up men or raising women to think of men as their adversaries. Nor is that a solution to the problem, although the symbolism of the Rohtak girls' actions sends a strong and timely message.
The media will highlight these heroines once in a while, but abuse happens every day. The solution is therefore telling our girls and boys every day how beautiful, precious and inviolable their bodies are. It is not an easy task to make girls feel comfortable and whole in their bodies in any country. We need to tell our girls early on how absolutely gorgeous their bodies are. That their private parts are even more special parts of their bodies and not "shame shame", as I heard many a nanny say while I was growing up. Our girls must be told their bodies are for them to be proud and happy about, and cannot be touched or commented upon by anyone without their consent.
The solution is to raise our girls and boys more fairly and equitably. So they do not stand by the next time anyone is subjected to touching or staring by men. So they stop going to films which show stalking as acceptable behaviour or women as brainless sex objects. Or buying products whose advertisements send these messages. They speak up in offices and work places when men crack demeaning jokes about women. So they step up every time to help that girl or woman who is being 'eve-teased'. So they applaud the one who raised his or her voice at her treatment, like I do for my Rohtak heroines.
So can't women ask for something as simple as our sons to offer the newspaper to both you and your husband, and not just to your husband? Or insisting that son and daughter both tie 'rakhi' to each other, promising to love and protect one another. I make my daughters tie rakhi to each other with the same promise. I feel proud that my sister calls her twin five-year-old sons "beti" and teaches them not be embarrassed about it. She explains to them why she finds phraseology like '
hathon mein chudiyan pehen rakhi hai' offensive; to not be offended if someone calls him a girl!
Recently, I did some plain speaking with a parent at a birthday party where I took my daughter. I saw the dads playing cricket with the boys, mothers upstairs taking care of food and logistics, and the girls left to their own devices - to blow bubbles and play with badminton rackets! Later, the prizes were also given out first to the boys - subliminal messaging that boys were given more attention and priority than girls. The parent obviously did not like my comment but I felt I had to say it for my two girls and many others!
These I feel are small but very important ways to raise our children to make a difference in their attitudes - to change the power equations between sexes for the better.
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