Sexual assaults on children, women: the battle has to be won in homes, schools, streets, communities
News headlines can sometimes assault your senses. And when a newspaper carries an almost banner headline announcing ‘12 cases of sexual assault on children, women in 24 hours shock Chennai’, it can certainly upset the start of your day. That was how I felt today after seeing the headline in The Times of India . The story could have probably been carried at the bottom of the page. After all, families who continue to buy a newspaper (a recent Reuters study has confirmed what many of us know: today’s generation and even elders prefer to get news via social media, not by reading the newspaper) will have adults as well as children scanning the pages. What impressions might such banner headlines make, I wonder! Let us now come to the issue – sexual harassment and assault. Why are more and more such crimes being reported daily? The news report I am referring to mentions a three-year-old girl being raped and murdered, and seven other minor girls and four women sexually assaulted in and ...
