Acid attack on women
Rameeza Rasheed
THE MEDIA has reported recently an acid attack on a young woman and the readers would have passed it off as yet another story on crimes against women. Is society aware of the fact that, of all the gender specific crimes against women, acid attack is the most horrific one halting suddenly everything that revolves around a woman's life?
This crime, which is very common in Bangladesh and Afghanistan, has spread to India also. It is a crime of vengeance and the reasons are related to refusal to marry or accept proposals of love or sex and property disputes. Often the offenders are persons known to the victims. The purpose of the attack is to permanently mutilate unsuspecting women by throwing sulphuric or hydrochloric or nitric acid on the face with the intention of disfiguring the face or to destroy the physical appearance of the victim. It is an extreme punishment for women because they will experience excessive pain due to the melting of the skin tissues. The deep penetration of the acid into the skin results in exposure of bones. It causes blindness and loss of hearing too.
It is near impossible for a woman to get back her original looks after an acid attack. Reconstructive plastic surgery and post operative care are very costly and they need several such surgeries, with each lasting four to five hours. After this attack women become unfit to move in the outside world because of the disfigurement of the face. Hence job and education come to a halt.
Emotional trauma
The victim's parents are also punished because they cannot settle such daughters in marriage and in India unmarried girls become a permanent liability. The impact of the crime is catastrophic for women. It is because normal life is impossible and the future remains bleak. The emotional trauma and the physical and mental agony are unbearable and the victims often contemplate suicide.
The offenders succeed in putting an end to the normal life of women. It is an extreme form of revenge on women. The families hesitate to go ahead with legal battles to punish the offenders who come out on bail easily due to imperfections in the prosecution statements. Once they come out, they threaten the victim's family with further damage. The conviction rate for this crime is very low.
Acid attack cannot be treated as an act of rage because the offenders plan meticulously the type of acid to be used, the quantity, the time and the venue of the attack. Insensitivity of the police, the importance given by the judiciary to minor contradictions and lapses in the prosecution's statements cause the offender's easy escape from conviction.
Crimes against women will decline only if the mindset of men towards women changes. Drastic changes are required in school education to make it value based. Until then the goal of empowerment of women will remain a distant dream.
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