You start your day normally and carry on with your chores without a slightest of inclination that by evening you would be famous across the country as an eve-teaser, molester and a branded criminal having to apply for bail and attending courts. This is what happened with Sarvjeet Singh on the fateful day of 23rd August 2015 as he was standing at the traffic signal of Tilak Nagar, Delhi. Little would he have known that a minor confusion over traffic lights would lead to the girl Jasleen Kaur taking his picture (without his consent, as per his statement), post it on social media and tag him as a molester and eve-teaser, and the society would brand him as a criminal without any verification.
This also reminds us about the famous Rohtak sisters case which happened in November 2014, wherein 2 girls Aarti and Pooja had mercilessly beaten up 3 innocent boys with belts over seat argument and made a video of the same claiming they were molested by the boys. After a lot of brouhaha and male bashing, it emerged the girls were liars and they not only failed the lie detector test before the SIT but also eye-witnesses supported the boys. But this was not before a false case of molestation was filed against the boys, their lives and reputation ruined and they lost their appointment in army.
Coming back to Sarvjeet Singh’s case, eye witness statements emerged and also Sarvjeet himself spoke up and reality came out. It was a false case and the girl Jasleen just thought of claiming fame by making out a story of molestation while she was an Aam Aadmi Party volunteer for traffic management at Tilak Nagar traffic signal.
While we are it, it is pertinent to mention about Dimapur Lynching incident also wherein a 7000 strong crowd marched into the prison facility at Dimapur, Assam and lynched a man accused of rape mercilessly by dragging him on streets and raining blows on him. Later, it turned out that he was trapped in a false rape case.
So, what did we learn from these cases?
The message is very clear – Men are unsafe on streets
Any argument or disagreement with a woman can end up in the man being trapped in a false case of rape, molestation, eve-teasing, his life and reputation ruined and many such innocent men have either been jailed, or worse, they have been beaten up mercilessly or even killed.
That’s not the worst part. The worst part is, society justifies such killings and attacks on men by calling it “Instant Social Justice”. Such a social mindset, which emerges from a patriarchal society, makes the lives of men extremely precarious. Conservative and traditionalist people refuse to see this as a social issue despite numerous examples coming to fore.
Also, no action is taken on people who abuse men based on assumptions without verification of facts. As a result no man is safe on streets.
The role of media in such cases also cannot be ignored. More often than not media channels blow the issue out of proportion without verifying facts in a blind race for TRPs. Most often media channels resort to passing stereotypes against men which make the situation for men more dangerous with each passing day.
“We need to remove people like Arnab Goswami from journalism. In a recent TV Debate on Times Now channel, Arnab was spotted saying, “Do not throw data at me”. Had he said the same thing in some other debate, he would have been out of job by now and his journalistic career would have come to an end, but because he said it in a gender debate and his statement was against men, he is still in the job. However, in the interest of journalistic ethics, Arnab must be fired” rued Sujit Deshpande, National Coordinator for Save Indian Family Foundation, a men’s rights organization.
“Save Indian Family Foundation strongly condemns such horrific acts of violence on men and the vilification of men in general discourse. Such behavior against men is extremely sexist in nature. As a society we only teach men to respect women but we don’t teach women to respect men, this must change. Otherwise I can see a dangerous trend setting in, wherein men are refusing to help any women fearing that she will take a picture of him and ruin his life by uploading it on social media”, says Jyoti Tiwari, spokesperson for Save Indian Family Foundation.
Save Indian Family Foundation urges the society to take a pro-male approach in dealing with such cases. Let’s make the streets safer for men.
