India Vs Bharath – Perception about women’s dressing

Whenever there is a comment about dressing of a particular sex, I see a huge reaction from the English media and on the social media. While there is no debate on grooming a male child in a more civilized manner, until that is done, one needs to exercise caution about these dressing debates.

Having been a product of the Bharath (rural India) having done my schooling at the village school and when I moved in to a large city to do my graduation in late seventies, was overawed by the way a women dressed. Here I need to say was when it was traditional south Indian dressing at my village to jeans n Salwars in the city. My upbringing might have stopped me from ogling at a girl n her dressing, but was indeed tempted to keep looking. Why I say all this is to bring forth a point that there is a huge difference in perception of a product of India and Bharath.

Typically a person coming from the Bharath is craving to look at well dressed women, this situation worsens if the person is under educated in terms of morals n behavior. Added to this is the typical deprecated society that we live in. When a person from India (Urban part) encounters these oglers, naturally they get disgusted and might react accordingly. Here the product of Bharath who is generally brought up in an atmosphere where males are dominant and considers women as 'maal' n 'cheeze', cannot take the insult lightly. Result can be as bad a situation as encountered by the 23 year old Gang Rape victim at Delhi.

While we might denounce any person, be it a MLA, Minister or a IPS officer, who speaks about the way women dresses, it is important to understand why they say, what they say. In a small town India ‘skirt’ can be a very provocative dress, particularly in the context of movies that show a skirt clad heroines looking voluptuous and making an impression on the young and old alike.

It is important that an effort is made to bring in the values both at home n in education. It is important even Khaps make an effort to insist that a woman should be respected by all as a society. It is also important that our entertainment channels too, stop showing serials which show one woman conniving against the other, which only makes the society believe there is no one to defend a woman.

Coming to the men, we need to find ways to help him in terms of his grooming n upbringing. Make him understand that every woman walking on the street is not a prostitute, every man walking along with a woman is not her boy friend or lover. A woman walking on the street should not be seen as a prey but someone who needs to be protected. 

When we see a officer from defense services holds a door open for a lady, treats her with kid gloves, it is something what he has been taught as part of his grooming. Similar respect needs to be taught as part of our schooling to every boy more so in ‘bharath’, this will certainly help bring the change in the future.

In the meanwhile let us fight to ensure there is a deterrent in terms of how a rapist is punished and how the cops treat a victim with more compassion. At this point it might be worthwhile having CCTV camera observation of all Police Stations on 24/7 basis, to keep a check on what is happening at the stations in terms of complaint registration and treatment of the accused.