Why no RG Kar-like mass outcry on Kasba law college rape case?

Kolkata, July 13 (IANS) Almost three weeks have passed since the incident of rape of a law college student took place within her college premises at Kasba in South Kolkata, however, no public outcry has been witnessed like the one seen over the rape and murder of a woman doctor at state-run R.G. Kar Medical College and Hospital.

The public outcry and protests on the streets started on the very morning of August 9 last year, when the body of the victim doctor was recovered from the seminar hall within the R.G. Kar premises. The protests continued for over six months and erupted not only across the state but also in other states. The Non-Resident Indians at several places across the world held demonstrations.

However, in the case of the Kasba Law College rape case, even the state and city are yet to witness any such major outburst of public outcry involving celebrities, successful people from different professions, and members of the civil society, as it happened in the case of the R.G. Kar tragedy.

The first reason for this is the reluctance of the parents of the law college victim to be vocal against the sexual assault on their daughter, and thus reach out to the larger society, prompting them to hit the streets on this issue.

Since the rape surfaced, the victim’s parents have kept themselves and their daughter incommunicado with the media. They have even informed the Calcutta High Court through their counsel that they were quite satisfied with the ongoing investigation in the matter being carried out by Kolkata Police, and hence they were not seeking a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probe.

On the contrary, in the case of the R.G. Kar tragedy, the victim’s parents were extremely vocal from the very first day. They started regular media interaction on the very first day of the crime detection, issuing an appeal to the larger society to stand by them in their struggle to ensure justice for their daughter.

The parents of the R.G. Kar victims, unlike the parents of the Kasba Law College victim, had demanded that a central agency probe the mishap with their daughter from the beginning.

Social scientists feel that the larger civil society generally reacts more promptly and spontaneously only if the “call for justice” comes either from the victim or her close associates, like family members. So there was a difference in the after-effects of the crimes in the cases of R.G. Kar and Kasba Law College.

Secondly, in the case of the R.G. Kar tragedy, the movement was first started by different associations of professionals from the medical fraternity, including medical students, junior and senior doctors, and nursing staff. Their initiatives to begin the movement on the issue and the continuous hunger strike by a group of junior doctors encouraged celebrities, successful people from other professions, and civil society groups to actively join the movement, which ultimately shook the entire state first and subsequently the entire country and finally different parts of the globe.

However, in the case of the Kasba Law College rape, there had been no initiative from any association within the legal fraternity, be it law students or practising advocates, to start a bigger movement on this issue. Now, following this reluctance on the part of the legal fraternity, even the bigger civil society seemed not to have felt the urge to ensure an outburst of mass outcry.

The question that arises is why the enthusiasm of the medical fraternity to initiate the movement in the case of the R.G. Kar tragedy could not encourage those from the legal fraternity to initiate a similar movement on the Kasba Law College rape case.

The reason is political. Most of the associations from the medical fraternity are mainly controlled by anti-Trinamool Congress political forces, or to be more precise, the Leftist forces. On the contrary, the ruling party in West Bengal virtually enjoys absolute control over almost all the associations linked to the legal fraternity in the state.

--IANS

src/dpb