– Dr. Venkatesh Muthukrishnan
Consultant, Psychiatrist, U.K.
நல்லதோர் வீணை செய்தே – அதை
நலங்கெடப் புழுதியில் எறிவதுண்டோ?
Would you make a lovely harp
with great artistic taste,
and throw it in the lowly mud
its beauty laid to waste?
The recent gut wrenching rape and murder of a Postgraduate Doctor at RG Kar Medical College poses several questions, not just to the wider society but to all of us, who follow Periyar and Dravidian policies.
For starters, this should not be seen as an offence just against medics or indeed as an offence towards women. Neither is this an isolated incident.
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It is an offence against all humanity in general and Dravidian principles of equality, social justice and inclusive growth.
We fight against inequality of all kinds. Periyar has spoken eloquently and elaborately, on several occasions, as to how women often occupy the bottom position of caste hierarchy. It is part of a very devious plan conceived by those at the top of the pyramid to keep the rest subjugated. The rest of the men are kept subjugated as they are all offered the “carrot” of being able to subjugate women. This will make them forget that they themselves are subject to discrimination by the upper caste persons.
This horrific incident is not a random one off incident, for it is the culmination of several low level harassment of women at work.
Sexual harassment is not only an expression of the carnal desires of men. It goes beyond that and is often a statement of power and control by men over women. The Council of Europe states “Gender-based violence, and in particular violence against women, is one of the most pronounced expressions of the unequal power relations between women and men”.
Its sole purpose being to suck the morale and soul out of the women workforce. This is therefore designed to be the killer blow for the woman who is faced with this, after having worked harder than her male counterparts to get to this position.
This is a very devious plan on the part of those who propagate and support this to scare the women folk away from education and work. This the perpetrators hope will keep the women subjugated as they have done for the past 2000 years. It is designed to maintain the illusion and misconception that women are not as good as men.
And women empowerment is not just empowerment of women- it represents the empowerment of the entire society. There are several evidences, right across the world, where women’s education and empowerment in the workforce is a direct and immediate cause for the growth and development of that particular country and society.
When a disillusioned female classmate of mine sighed “It is our destiny….for God has created a world in which men and women are not equal”, I replied with “What if God himself was created by a man?”.
Doctors continue to be considered as a prized career objective, right across the world. Becoming a Doctor is an ultimate dream for many girls and represents the culmination of several years of rigorous work at school and stupendous academic achievements. Women becoming Doctors therefore is a critical signal to the society that women are as capable, if not more, than men.
Women doctors are of paramount importance in care delivery in sectors like maternal and child care besides other medical specialties. Women make up 30 per cent of the medical workforce in India and make up an even higher number of the nursing workforce in India.
Sexual violence like these against female healthcare staff therefore have a double whammy effect of dissuading women from entering a sought after and respectable career but also undermining the entire healthcare sector as well.
Periyar and the Dravidian Movement have been at the forefront of empowering women and this was achieved through empowerment of women’s education. This has not been achieved overnight. First there was the hard toil from Periyar in educating the illiterate masses of the need to educate our womenfolk.
This was followed by a series of astute steps by Arignar Anna and Muthamil Arignar Dr Kalaignar M.Karunanidhi in systematically facilitating women to pursue schooling and higher education while simultaneously bringing down the several layers of obstacles that had been built up over women.
All the above blood, sweat and tears on both the social and political fronts in enabling women to make a mark in the most acclaimed professions like medicine, only to see them shed blood and tears in the most horrific circumstances imaginable.
It is therefore our ultimate responsibility to not only continue to empower women but also to ensure robust protection for them, for them to continue to prosper and be successful. For therein lies the success and growth of the entire society.
Otherwise, all our efforts in making a Lovely Harp would be laid waste and the Harp laid waste in the mud by people less worthy than that of mud.
We, of Dravidian Ideology should therefore resolve to take steps to protect the women at work.
For this we need to follow what Periyar said” Any liberation movement created by men, cannot give real liberation to women”. The Dravidian Model Government of Tamil Nadu should therefore consider strengthening the women’s commission by entrusting this to women.
