Three Years After a Horrific Rape, is Delhi Safer for Women?

Three Years After a Horrific Rape, is Delhi Safer for Women?


Dec. 16 marked three years since 23-year old student Jyoti Singh was brutally attacked by a group of men while doing nothing more than riding a bus at night. Now, the case is back in the spotlight, as the youngest perpetrator convicted of the heinous crime was just released from jail, sparking an outcry from advocates and those seeking justice for Jyoti.



When Jyoti was attacked, word quickly spread through the streets of Delhi, rippled throughout India and details of the story were soon broadcast around the world. Incidents of violence against women, as well as government officials’ efforts to prevent such violence, came under intense scrutiny.

In 2012, just weeks before the attack, the International Center for Research on Women (ICRW) set out to better understand how and where violence occurs in Delhi, conducting research through United Nations Women’s Safe Cities program, which works to reduce violence in Delhi’s public spaces. The results were eye-opening. When asked, only five percent of respondents told our researchers that they feel “safe” or “very safe” in New Delhi’s public spaces. More than 6 in 10 women told us they avoid going out after dark for fear of sexual violence, and 1 in 5 told us they choose not to engage in public life because they fear for their safety. When Jyoti was attacked, it seemed to confirm women’s worst fear: public spaces in Delhi were unsafe and rife with the possibility of physical and sexual assault.

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Programs like the U.N. Women-funded Safe City Delhi have done this, teaming up with community-based organizations and the Department of Women and Child Delhi (DWCD) to push for change at various levels of the government. As a result, the DWCD has taken strong ownership of the issue, working with departments in charge of roads, buses, public works and education to create concrete action plans to increase women’s safety. In the three years since the attack on Jyoti, however, the government’s overall response has been mixed. While some departments have instituted strong measures to prioritize responding to violence, other departments are still only in the planning stages. The police department has changed its emergency response system to prioritize calls related to sexual violence in public spaces on par with how they respond to other heinous crimes. Other measures they have taken include outreach to schools, the revitalization of helplines and meetings with community members to encourage bystander intervention.
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One of the most important ways to create real and lasting change is to empower women, men and other members of the community to speak out against violence that has, for far too long, been normalized as acceptable behavior. A starting point must be for women to demand their right to access public spaces safely, from bus stops to markets. An effective way to do this is to empower women to play a role in creating safer spaces by working in collectives that host dialogues and explore solutions that work in individual communities. The next, but equally important, step is to engage men and boys in these conversations. Men are not just perpetrators of violence, they are allies-in-waiting who can challenge harmful masculine attitudes and behaviors and play a critical role in preventing violence where they see it, creating safer communities for women and girls.

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http://msmagazine.com/blog/2015/12/23/three-years-after-a-horrific-rape-is-delhi-safer-for-women/