Washington 1

Jordan Washington
Mr. Phillips
English 3
Indian Women Rights
Imagine writing Im going to the grocery store on your forehead to let the
security guard know where youre going; having someone all down your back asking
where are you going and you are going?. Curfew strikes down, limiting the amount
of time with certain access of the outside world. Restrictions cage the way the
situation is and make it harder to enjoy what is represented as freedom. That is
probably how these Indian women attending this college in New Delhi feel. How
does the restriction of curfew for college-age women Indian women affect their
personal independence and growth?
Security is one thing that everyone wants whether its emotional or physical.
Parents no matter what age their kid is are worried if their kid is and feels safe
wherever they are present. New Delhi is considered Indias rape capital. With
security around 24/7 at this all-girl college, some may say that the girls should be
safe, but with some cases it is not like that. Everything can be a Yin-Yang. Earlier
this year, a former teacher at Marlborough School, which is another all-girl school,
was charged with 4 felony sex crimes. Nothing security wise has changed. The only
thing that changed is the removal and the unemployment of the teacher. We cant
really determine if someone who looks spotless on paper is really. Thats a major
problem; people can manipulate this image of themselves to get to their goal
whether its for a good cause or not.
Another sexual assault case involved a 4 year old girl in New Delhi. She was
sexually assaulted on the school bus and she was also removed from the school.

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According to the little girls parents, the reason why the school doesnt want the girl
to come back to the school is because she would be a bad influence to her
classmates. How is that even possible for a girl her age be a bad influence? She
didnt want to be sexually assaulted right in front of her fellow riders. All she was
expecting was to go to school, learn something new, and get back home safely. New
Delhi police wants to protect women from sexual assaults, but they cant even
protect little girls from it either. The bus driver was supposed to be the kids
protection, not causing harm towards them. Little kids are innocent and dont know
the dangers of harm and the cutthroat dangers waiting in the world to consume the
good in life.
Being in college, you think breathers and independence would be something
easy to do; space from family, learning is the key to what major a person wants to
study to shoot for the jobs they want when theyre out of college. Have a job to
support the goal of succeeding with passing college. The real world begins to take
its toll in life; taking care of yourself. Independence shouldn't be imprisoned with
misery locking the door and control throwing out key. A few months ago, a woman
named Nilanjana Paul and a few other students created a campaign called Pinjra Tod
(Break the Hostel Locks), which allows college women to express their thoughts on
college curfew. On the campaign's Facebook page, one female student posted that
the women at her college have a 9pm curfew, but the men that ttend the school
have no curfew which shows how diverse gender equality is in India. Paul also
stated that she is peppered with intrusive question's, which are painfully annoying
questions. With rules like this, how are you suppose to feel independent when you
have someone shooting unnessary questions at you everytime you're leaving the
campus?

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With over 1,800 rapes in the past year, the government has a point with
wanting to protect women from rape, but that can't even be safe with curfew.
People these days will do crazy things all because they have a urge that they can't
control. The police can't protect people from every single criminal that are rapist;
that's unrealistic. How are the one's wanting to protect women from rape insult
them too by stating that clothing is the reason why they get raped? With this
restriction of time with the outside world, it makes these women ll caged inside and
all they want to do is break that lock. Another excuse used by the college for the
curfew is that the parents want it. No hard feelings to parents, but if they are not
paying for their kid's college or the kid isn't living with them, they shouldn't have a
say what happens wth their kids. Most of them are grown, which brings back the
whole independence and taking care of themselves concept. The thing the
government has to see is first of all, women are to looked to as a disgrace compared
to men, so who isn't going to take advantage of ranking and abuse it. Another thing
is that women are considered property. Since when can someone buy a woman from
the shelves of a store? They are the same as men and the only difference is sexual
organs and that's it. What makes a man better than his counterpart? How can
women period feel safe if the government/society puts them down like dogs? How
can women be strong if society judges and hackles them? How can they feel like the
police has their back when an animal decides to attack them? Will they be the
blame or the police for not trying their best to cage the animals up?
Small vocies can make a bigger and beautiful sound than a loud voice. two
women decided to create a video rapping about the corruption of sexual assault and
gender diversity. The video went viral and now they are part of VProud, which is a
video base conversation platform for women. With the truth cutting thorugh the

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hearts of thousands, it has gotten people to give their opinion about the situation.
Using music helped them with expressing their opinions and teat's only one of the
was of expressing feelings towards different problems all over the world. Many ways
that college students expressed their opinion about curfew was spray painting I Am
Out Tonight on a wall on campus. Another way was doing a march, which lead to the
buring of dorm rule books and the destruction of the gate register that keeps a
record of the activty of entering and exiting of the campus. So, how does the
restrcition of curfew for college-age Indian women affect their personal
independence and growth?

Works Cited
Couch, Robbie "Indian Women Take Down Their Country's Rape Culture In 3 Minute
Rap" Huffington Post, 27 October, 2015
"Gender Equality and Empowerment" United Nations In India
"Gender Equality Issues In India" FSD International
Lakashmi, Rama "Indian Women Push Back Against Campus Curfews" Washington
Post, 27 March, 2015
Mitchell, Aric New Delhi School Bans 4 Year Old Sex Abuse Victim, Doesnt Want
Her To Shame The Other Children Inquisitr, 22 April, 2015
Parker, Lara "17 Things Only Independent Women Will Understand" Buzzfeed, 13
January, 2015
Pinjra Tod, Facebook