The Crime And
Advertisement
By Sorit Gupto
07 September, 2005
Countercurrents.org
To create an awareness in the citizens
of Delhi against eve teasers, Delhi Police has come up with an advertisement
in the news papers, which goes like this, There is a scene of a bus
stop where two young persons are teasing a young lady. In that frame,
five persons are also there but they are just mute spectators of the
event, in which one of them is an elderly lady.
The copy of the
advertisement says,' There are no Men in this Picture.'
At the bottom of
the main visual the copy continues as, 'Or this would not happen'.
It again says, Surly
you can't let a women be teased in front of you?
You are a real Man.
You know how humiliating
and embarrassing it is for her.
So protect her.
And help her.
Escort her away
from the scene. Or inform the nearest PCR van.
Save her from shame
and hurt.
Help some one in
need.
Protect women from
eve teaser.
Now by going through
this advertisement, one can have a clear idea that the city is not safe
for women, and by now it is an established fact. The other thing, which
comes out through this ad, is rather the new angle of the problem and
for this, the credit goes to none other than Delhi Police dept.
After failing completely
to curb the menace of the growing incidence of eve teasing, Delhi Police
challenges the male inside you. In fact Delhi Police wants to awake
the ' Mard' inside you, the 'Mard' who is savior of the female from
the time immortal, the Mard who fights with the more that one bad persons
at a time to save the 'ijjat' and 'ismat' of a lady, the mard who is
undisputed king , from folk lore to Bollywood masala films.
But, bad luck of
the Delhi Police that there is no any word in English Dictionary for
'Mard' and that is why they have to satisfy themselves by replacing
' Mard' by Men.
In this advertisement.
Delhi police is
asking 'you' to protect 'her', asking 'you' to be a 'real man', asking
'you' to 'protect her', asking 'you' to 'escort her', 'to save her'
from save 'her' from shame and hurt.
Now who is this
'you' in this ad?
None other than
a male, and who is 'her' in this ad? A female.
So in other words
the females are so hapless and weak creatures that if they are being
teased by a male , they have to seek help from another male!!!
They do not have
ability to defend themselves, neither they have any protection of law
against eve teasers.
According to Delhi
Police ad. , there are two kind of males, The ordinary male or a male
who used to tease ladies here and there. For Delhi Police they are not
man, as far as copy of the ad. Says so. The other kind of males are
'man' and Delhi Police has pointed out the specialty of the second category
as , they help a hapless women, they do not allow any male to tease
a woman, they escort women, help them and so on
In- between the
lines of this copy one can read the writing on the wall that mentality
wise we are not very indifferent from other back ward societies who
advocates openly that women has to be escorted by the male members.
The ad. clearly
reflects the macho mentality of the state which has taken for granted
that eve teasing is a common phenomena and to save the women from this
evil we need macho men.
The state should
realize that contrary to their belief , we do not need any macho man
, but what we need much is a responsible and aware citizen and above
and all an answerable state.