Violence Against Small Girls

The most sorrowful aspect of the problem is that families of the victims are often too poor to support the court cases which take even five years to complete, writes Rifat FatimaShe is too small to understand why she is lying in a hospital bed. The seven-year-old girl is hardly bothered about doctors, nurses or the next-bed patients. If she has any emotion she keeps it to herself. Or else she spends time drawing flowers, butterflies or fish. However, one person who is profoundly worried about her is the girl''s middle-aged mother. "She understands nothing about her plight," says the mother of the girl, who has been brought to the hospital after she was raped by two wayward boys at her Mandail village in Keraniganj. The small girl from a poor family was fishing in a pond when she was attacked by the boys from politically-influential families. Her small age did not matter at all. Violence against women has been common and widespread in Bangladesh. Girls as young as three are also becoming victims of rape and sexual assaults, according to police records and media reports. A recent report of Bangladesh Shishu Adhikar Forum suggests that violence against small girls is rising in Bangladesh. Last year, 361 small and teenage girls were raped, says the report. And 41 of them were murdered after rape. It is evident that cruelty against small children, especially girls is increasing. Experts have explanations, why. "The decline in moral character of the society is one of the reasons why our small girls are becoming victims of such barbarism," says Prof AKM S''aduddin, who teaches at the Dhaka University''s Social Science Department. There are other factors too, he explains. The factors are: the sense of immunity from trial and punishment; lengthy and knotty process of justice. "The offenders dare to commit crimes such as rape since they know that they would not have to pay for it," says S''aduddin. Rubayet Ferdous, a teacher at Mass Communication and Journalism Department of the same university, has attributed the crime to some other factors. "Rapists are driven not only by sexual desire," says Ferdous, "The sexual crime is being used as a weapon to insult the rivals or take revenge." "Rape is a tool to settle scores in disputes over land or something else among rival families." In Bangladesh, most rape victims are from poor families. The offenders are largely from the families who control the society, especially in villages. This phenomenon explains why, despite having some stringent laws, Bangladesh is still lagging in the task of taking the offenders to court. Most often than not the offenders hold money and muscle, which in turn help buy support from politicians, police and the administration. Reports about rapists threatening the victims or their families are in plenty. That''s why many rape cases do not make it to police records. There are also instances of withdrawal of cases by the victims in the face of threat from the rapists. This is what has recently happened in the rape of a small girl at Burichang Upazila in Comilla district. The offender''s family promised to give 10,000 taka to the victim''s family in out-of-court settlement of the case. Instead of paying the compensation money, the offender started threatening the girl''s family with death or dire consequences. The offender, allegedly a member of the ruling party''s student front, also stopped the girl''s poor family from filing a police case. Families of the victims are often too poor to afford the court cases which take years to complete and quite a good amount of money. This brings into picture a number of rights groups which take up the legal fight in favour of the victims. Ain-O-Salish Kendra is one of such groups. Says Advocate Neena Goswami of Ain-O-Salish Kendra: "We have a law that provides for death penalty as maximum punishment for rape or violence against women. But it takes at least three years for a trial to complete. There are trials that run for more than five years." There are many reasons why the trial takes so long. The courts are overwhelmed with huge pending cases. In rape cases, the investigating police officer plays a vital role as a witness. Transfer of such investigation officers causes delays in the trial. Public prosecutors are too busy with cases. It has been observed that they can''t always give enough attention to such cases. There are police officials who are reluctant to take up rape cases because they want to avoid the trouble of investigation and standing as a witness. "So, we need a massive social awareness and cooperation between police and members of the public to effectively curb rape crimes," says Mohammad Shahjahan, a former Inspector General of Police, now Vice-chancellor of Asia Pacific University