A Series of Assaults

A few weeks ago, we meet Eva, a charming 18-year-old Dutch woman who suffers a sexual assault attempt in Varkala, Kerala just four days prior. She's out at a tourist cafe with some other travelers, loses track of the time, and decides to walk back to her hotel alone. It's about 1:30 am and she walks back along Varkala's famous beach cliffs to reach the remote hotel. Coming off her experience working at a school in Andhra Pradesh for two months, she feels acclimated to Indian culture. She's wearing conservative Indian clothes and symbols of marriage (bindi and toe rings) to show respect and ward off any unwelcome advances. These measures are already going much farther than most other female travelers.

As Eva walks to the hotel, an Indian man assaults her, grabbing her from behind. He attempts to overwhelm her and pull her off the road. She fights hard to break free and manages to run back to the cafe to get help, but the attacker has left deep bite marks on her cheek and arm and she's sustained bad scrapes and bruises on her body from the fight. At the cafe, she receives help from other travelers, and seeks treatment for the bite marks at a clinic and finds a therapist to help deal with the psychological effects. She will certainly be dealing with the emotional trauma for a long time.

But the local police aren't as helpful. Eva goes directly to the authorities and submits a police report, detailing the specifics of the attack. Not only do the police refuse to give her a copy, but the only action they take is to arrest two hotel owners associated with the hostels where Eva stayed. She has to rescind the police report in order to release the hotel owners, who are innocent. She now has no official record of the attack. I've heard plenty of stories of local police corruption, but never imagined they'd go so far with a foreign tourist.

After meeting Eva, I speak with some Indian men who insist that such attacks are a rare exception, while others admit that sexual assaults are more common and suggest that travelers should be very cautious, especially if a solo female (regardless of race or nationality).

Though I never felt overtly threatened by the relentless ogling of Indian men, I wondered if I was being naive. Perhaps I'd been lucky or appearing in public almost constantly with Nick had served to protect me much more than I thought. Most hotels have a curfew at a certain hour, usually no later than 11 pm, and ask their guests be inside by that time. Princess Inn, where Nick & I and Eva book rooms in Fort Cochin, takes a hyper-firm stance on the curfew and tells us that they will refuse us entry if we return past the closing hour. This is for our own protection and if we're out too late, it's at our own risk and the hotel cannot be responsible for us at that point. Fort Cochin isn't a dangerous town; it's small, laid-back, friendly and full of travelers. But given the Varkala police reaction to Eva's assault, it's hard to blame the hotel owners for putting firm curfews in place.

Once my ears are open, I begin to hear more stories of assaults. Subash, the manager at Princess Inn, tells us that a couple of years ago there's a knock on the shuttered door in the middle of the night. He gets up and looks out to find an Indian man carrying an unconscious Western woman on his shoulder. The man begs Subash to let the woman in and give her a room at the inn, but given the situation Subash has to refuse. The entire circumstance doesn't look good and Princess Inn can't take on the responsibility for the woman's fate. The man may or may not be guilty of foul activity, but if the woman was assaulted, raped, or robbed, someone local would certainly be blamed. If Princess Inn takes her in, it would be them. Meanwhile, if the man goes to the police he will be blamed whether or not he's guilty. Subash's reaction isn't Western -- we want to help everyone -- but in the context of India it's the only reasonable response.

When we arrive back in Bombay, we meet up with a few friends. I speak with Anupam, a Bombay resident, who describes a recent incident in Noida, Uttar Pradesh, a Delhi suburb. Two local cricket teams finish a match, and the winning team decides to "celebrate" by assaulting a random woman. A mob of ten spots a young Indian woman in a car with a friend -- just leaving a popular mall -- and attack and gain control of their car. Being in public doesn't stop the cricket players, who beat up the male friend and drive the car to a remote area where several of them rape the young woman. (News story: http://www.telegraphindia.com/1090107/jsp/frontpage/story_10353636.jsp, or Google search for "Noida cricket rape")

Hours before we leave the country, another report on the local news: an attack on women in Mangalore, Karnataka, though not explicitly a sexual attack. A fundamentalist group of Hindu men break into a pub in the afternoon and go after several woman in the establishment, claiming themselves as a moral brigade upholding traditional values. (News story: http://news.in.msn.com/national/article.aspx?cp-documentid=1792540, or Google search for "Mangalore pub women assault")

What is going on here?! Has India always been so dangerous for female travelers and Westernized Indian women? How can these young guys imagine this activity to be acceptable, in their wildest imaginations? My American brain can maaaaybe justify it by blaming alcohol or drug abuse or chalking it up to miscreants; basic lowlife. But the perpetrators don't seem to be criminals pushed outside the bounds of society, they're normal guys. This is not like taking a midnight stroll in East New York (incidentally, another friend tells me it's not as bad as I've heard) or Harlem in the 80s.

In conversations with Anupam and a work colleague of Gunjan (my Bombay friend), I learn that the trouble started recently. Only in the past ten to fifteen years have women started to feel unsafe in India. Buses and trains didn't used to have segregated cabins, but are now necessary. In Tamil Nadu, women have abandoned their traditional one-shouldered sari outfits for more coverage. Reports of threats, assaults, and rapes have increased.

What happened a decade ago? TV, of course!

Television became widely available even in the poorest and most rural regions. Locals gained access to various films, which surely includes the usual family fare of Bollywood, Tollywood, Kollywood or Mollywood movies (Indian masala films in various languages). But the local men also gained exposure to Western films and soft porn.

Out of touch from the modern world and the culture of the West, the local boys see these films with no context for which they were made. They can only see what appears on the screen via the lens of their own culture and experience. There is no one to explain to them that in the West, affection is common and women do not cover up, but the price we pay for our liberties are strict social boundaries that differ from those in rural India.

Back home in a small Indian town, everyone knows the following fact: only prostitutes dress in revealing clothing, look directly at and talk to men, and display affection in public.

Therefore, all Western (or Westernized) women are prostitutes! And men can do anything they want with a hooker.

Watching all the kissing and cuddling on TV, seeing the white girls in skimpy clothing, and watching how every guy on the screen seems to have frequent sex, the local men put two and two together. Hey! I'm the only man in the world not getting laid!

An additional pressure is complete sexual repression in the local community. The men are probably going to have an arranged marriage to a modest woman, someone within their class, and sex before marriage is still a massive taboo. It happens frequently, but it's never discussed and the woman is often seen as "used" -- not marriage material. The young men are mad for release. Forcible sex with a loose Western girl may seem like a pretty good option for getting the old job done. In a country where everyone is striving for a golden chance to rise up out of the confines of their class, many realize that the opportunities are slim and unlikely. This behavior might feel like the only chance to get a taste of the West.

I ask around, what can be done? How will changes be made? Most give me a blank look, a shrug, or an infuriating Indian head bobble.

In the short term, Western/ized women need to be more cautious than ever in India, and efforts need to be made to educate rural men about the culture of the West. It's not going away anytime soon. In the long term it seems only India's continued process of modernization will ultimately provide a feed of information into the depths of the country, radiating outward from the cities. Hopefully a greater understanding will permeate the psyche of these young men. But it's a lot to hope for and the situation is likely to get worse before it gets better.

Western women need to take care of themselves when traveling in India. I wouldn't do it alone. If bringing a man along isn't a possibility, go with two or more female friends and don't wander around without the group no matter how "safe" it feels. If really stuck alone, don't go out after dark. Stick to the hotel or a traveler restaurant/bar on the same block. Never book an out-of-the-way hotel. This is the reality of the situation.

On the other hand, Western women also continue to reinforce the stereotypes and assumptions of Indian men. Many treat India like the West, going to the beach in a bikini, walking around small towns in tank tops, shorts, and mini skirts, ready to party, drink and have a good time. The temptation to be defiant may be there but it's not worth it, and it's contributing to the problem. There's nothing to prove, except how vulnerable we are.