For the past three months, she kept a secret from her parents. It wasn’t easy. Worry consumed her. She wondered what would happen if they were to find out. She had been raped. But fearing stigma and societal pressure, she kept quiet for about three months. One day when they did find out, 24-year old Neetu’s (name changed) immediate impulse was to kill herself. Her parents had seen her naked pictures.
A man who had raped Neetu three months back had also photographed her. He kept blackmailing her and extorting money. Each day was a struggle. When she ran out of cash, she refused to pay anymore.
Neetu, 24, from North-West Delhi finally went to the police last month. But her life has not remained the same. She sees her friends less often now. Sometimes while watching TV at home, she gets lost in her thoughts. When her mother would touch her arm with love and compassion, Neetu would recoil. There are days when Neetu feels fine, outwardly, but her family has observed that there are days when she withdraws from everyone and everything.
A simple meal together with family has become an ordeal. Neetu can’t bring herself to face her father and mother. A counsellor who has worked with Neetu says that she keeps blaming herself. The family has tried to allay her fears and been “supportive” even though they too have been emotionally shattered by this horrific episode. Madhu Das, a counsellor who has worked with Neetu to help her overcome the trauma, says the feelings of guilt and worthlessness remain. “She feels worse when her parents are nice to her. She thinks she did them wrong.”
The ‘Uber rape case’ in the Capital has once again focused attention on women’s safety and prevention of rape. There is talk of how the December 2012 gang rape-murder and its aftermath seem to have not had any deterrent effect on criminal minds. There is outrage on the streets and on social media, but then what? Amid the outrage and, sometimes, misplaced anger, what happens to the person who has been violated? How do they cope with life after rape? How do they heal the scars and return to living life as they did? There are cases that come to the attention of the media and make headlines but then there are thousands of others that go unnoticed, experts say.
Neetu’s was one such case. Silence has become a part of her life. Even though it has been a while now, she still isn’t quite ready to face the world. And that has her family worried. Pooja (name changed), 18, was raped in July in the Capital. Her parents were back in Bihar when the incident happened somewhere in West Delhi. She had come to the city to prepare for competitive exams and made few friends. Occasionally she would call her parents and talk for sometime. Then she would keep herself busy with studies or chatting with friends. It was a friend who raped her, breached her trust.
When she was brought to hospital, bleeding heavily, she lied to the police and dodged questions from the doctor. She told the police she fell from a swing and a rod pierced her. A worker from the Delhi Commission for Women’s crisis relief centre (CRC) was present when her statement was being recorded and noticed something weird about Pooja’s behaviour.
Iknew she was lying. But doctors recorded the statement and left,” said the CRC worker who has followed the case closely. “I felt she had a suicidal tendency. She had messed with the intravenous fluid needle in her wrist and it was bleeding.” Only a cousin was present at the hospital. Pooja kept sobbing in her arms and pressing the needle into her skin, making it bleed more. “I knew it was someone close to her who had violated her. The way she was crying, it showed,” said the CRC worker.
For a few days she kept the secret to herself. Then one day she said she was ready to make another statement. When asked if she wanted to pursue the case, she said yes. A case was registered and the accused arrested. But it did not end there. Pooja stopped her studies, left the city and is now back in Bihar.
“Some of the biggest challenges they face is coming to terms with it,” says Dr Rajat Mitra, who works to promote the emotional health of people who suffer psychological trauma and is also the director of non-profit organisation Swanchetan. He says it starts with denial and the inability to accept it has happened to them. “Dissociation is the most common reaction where they feel fragmented inside and feel detached from their bodies as if it belongs to someone else,” he told INDIA TODAY.
This psychological trauma is something that is hard to fathom and only the person and his/her immediate family know the burden. Sometimes, it takes years to overcome the trauma. Many suffer from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). Especially in India, where women who have been raped are victimised, the reactions they receive are varied. Experts believe that the notion that “no one will marry me now” adds to this psychological pressure. “Many women who are not married feel that ‘no one will marry me now’,” says Mitra. “It is drilled in by family and society, the feeling that ‘I am now worthless’ is deeply pervading for all.”
Rape changes people. Life changes. Behaviour changes. And it manifests itself in day-to-day activities. There is a lack of trust. There is fear. “Lack of trust shows itself in intimacy, in situations where they have to become vulnerable again,” Mitra recalls from his experience of dealing with such cases. “Vis-Ã vis relationships it is very poor. They would need therapy for a long period to work through issues of trust.”
But some believe attitudes are changing. Ashwini Ailawadi of RAHI Foundation, a non-profit organisation that works with incest and sexual abuse survivors, says, “Women are talking about it now. There is no shame. After ‘Nirbhaya’, women came out and started talking. People are not afraid to say ‘sexual abuse’ anymore. It is no longer mystical.” RAHI launched a project called ‘Firebird’ that aims to connect survivors. “They share their stories and gain knowledge on the subject that will help them become advocates,” said Ailawadi. The workshop is followed by ‘Firebirds (Female Phoenix)’ conducting these activities in their communities. “The process continues to be therapeutic and a mentoring support for them.”
What makes it hard is the stigma in different cultural settings. The stigma stops them from coming out, as was the case with Aditi (name changed), 33, who couldn’t tell her parents it was a family friend. The stigma can be quite overt during the trial phase of the case and the worst culprit is usually the lack of confidentiality in the police station, in court and during identification parades of the accused.
Sohaila Abdulali, author of the novel Year of the Tiger, was 18 when she was gang-raped in Mumbai in 1980. She wrote a first-hand account of her experience. “Time and again, people have hinted that perhaps death would have been better than the loss of that precious ‘virginity’. I refuse to accept this. My life is worth too much to me,” she wrote in an essay. “I fought for my life, and won. No negative reaction can make me stop feeling that this is positive. Being raped was terrible beyond words, but I think being alive is more important.”
