3. Modi’s Election in India
Photo Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-india-20907755
Many
would not consider the election of the right-wing Bharatiya Janata Party’s
leader Narendra Modi in May 2014 in the top 4 headlines of 2014. However, India’s
booming economy makes it a key player in the changing world order. More
importantly, after the deeply misogynistic nature of Indian culture was
epitomised to the world after the New Delhi bus gang rape in late 2012, women’s
rights and anti-sexual violence movements in India would be front page news at
any feminist newspaper and should be top of any election agenda. The empowering
and inspiring feminist protests and movements coming out of India in 2013 and 2014, brought issues of women’s rights to the very forefront the national agenda. These women would not longer let their voices be stifled.
And politicians could no longer ignore them. We hoped.
A brief reflection on the Hindu Nationalists reputation of governing women in
Gujarat from 2001-2014 speaks volumes about his attitudes towards these
atrocities. During the anti-Muslim riots in 2002, it is believed the Sangh
Parivar orchestrated the systematic rape of hundred of women, girls, men and
boys. According to many Human Rights groups, Modi effectively stood by and
allowed these atrocities. Strangely enough the investigation into Modi’s
involvement in these riots has since been silenced. Yet again, when these
attacks hit the headlines they were rarely gendered. This is staggering
considering that the exclusively female branches of the Sangh Parivar undertook
many of the attacks - internalised patriarchy looks to be rife here. Additionally,
under his governance in Gujarat, which he hinged his election campaign upon, female
education rates and rape conviction rates slumped whilst the minority of women
in the community has suggested rates of female infanticide. (Wilson, 2014: The
Guardian.) Should economic growth really be prioritised at the hands of patriarchy and misogyny?
Today, these attitudes continue, Modi has spoken a handful of times
about the problem and his speeches seem to be just that: words. The laws have
been tightened and some photos have been taken but real action to secure the
safety of almost half of his country has not been seen. Recently he also banned
the British-made India’s Daughter documentary
about the 2012 bus rape and the reaction to it. Although some say this is a
result of its inaccuracy and western bias, it is also interpreted as an
outright attempt to silence the anti-rape movement in India that was reignited
in the wake of said documentary. The response to these claims is that the laws
in place for gender equality in India are there, but these are not problems
that can be solved with the wielding of a truncheon (especially given the
well-known corruption salient in the Indian police force): they are cultural. That
is not to say that judicial reform is not important but these problems are
deeply entrenched into the minds and institutions and this is a revolution that
cannot be solved by signatories on a piece of paper. When there is a leader of
a popular political party denouncing the upmost penalty for gang rape because
‘boys will be boys’ you know something needs to be done.
Nevertheless,
Modi’s election was heralded as a triumph for liberal democracy (unfortunately
I could not find gender disaggregated voting figures but the likelihood of male
dominance in voting rates goes without saying) and both Obama and Cameron
publicly invited him to Washington and London respectively. All in the name of
economic and business interests: the mainstream press in both the lead up to
and the aftermath of Modi’s election orbited around his economic plans to
further liberalise the country and reach out for foreign direct investment and
jobs for the disproportionately young (male) demographic. There were, at best, sparse
mentions of his plans for India’s (bigger) social problems of gender
inequality, corruption and wealth polarisation. Such is the nature of
neoliberalism in its ability to blindly deny or ignore the real problems of
society, as long as the people at the top have money in their pockets and women
at their disposal. But the feminist movement in India threatens to take both of
these away from their elites: as Enloe (2014) points out that tourism is
central to the Indian economy (6% of GDP, 20 million central and 70 million
supply chain jobs) and as they continue to ignore the fact that 1 woman is
raped every 20 minutes in India, their tourism revenues slump. Indeed in the 3
months after the Delhi rape hit the headlines, the number of foreign tourists
fell 25% on the same statistics from the previous year. The number of female
foreign tourists fell by 35%. (Enloe, 2014: 59.) If they will not fight this
problem for a lack of morality, then perhaps they will if the queues outside
the Taj Mahal suffer. I have told people about my desire to travel to India
only to get the repeated response ‘it’s not a place for women.’ There are 600
million real women who live in India; it should go without saying that if it is
not a place for me, it is not a place for them and no state should be deemed ‘no
place for women.’ When South Africa was publicly mistreating people of
colour, the west stood up and listened, and used capitalism to stop it. Why
will we not boycott India’s misogyny? Why is it consistently pushed under the
rug? Beatrix Campbell coined the term neoliberal, neopatriarchy which resonates here. Thankfully, these amazing Indian women and men have not and will not stop
until they see justice but this is just another example of the headlines not calling out blatant sexism. In the last of this series of posts on 2014 I will address the Ukraine Crisis in the veil of the rise of nationalism in Europe. Thank you for reading and please follow the twitter for regular updates!
Sources:
Enloe, C
(2014) Lady Travelers, Beauty Queens, Stewardesses and Chamber Maids: The
International Gendered Politics of Tourism. (See recommended
reading)
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