Tribal women demand justice as families reel from police atrocities
Local organisations are counselling husbands in a tribal area of Andhra Pradesh not to aggravate the trauma of their wives after eleven indigenous women of Visakhapatnam district were allegedly gang-raped at gunpoint in Vakapalli village by special anti-naxalite police personnel called the Greyhounds, on August 20.
The women’s families were not letting them back into homes because tribal tradition requires the guilty to be punished and the women to undergo cleansing rituals. Their spouses had forbidden them from even visiting their children. Some of the husbands said the women are now “wives of the policemen”.
ActionAid partner, the Organisation for Rural Reconstruction (ORRC) has been helping the women return home.
“I told them that customs should be respected but not all customs. Some traditions actually deny women their rights. This convention of not allowing the women to come back to their homes would be a double blow. Because of this unjust custom, children are also suffering,” says DS Prasad Rao of ORRC.
Violation
On August 25, nine of the eleven women met the State Human Rights Commission headed by B. Subhashan Reddy and Chief Minister Y S Rajasekhara Reddy.
The women are Kondhs, an endangered people classified as a ‘Primitive Tribe’ in the Constitution. For food, the Kondhs of Vishakapatnam rely on forest produce and rain-fed cultivation. Monsoon is a tough time for them as food is scarce while work in the fields is intensive. Also, they have to brave diseases like malaria and diarrhea during rains.
According to the women’s testimonies, 21 policemen walked into their village around 6 a.m. on August 20 while the men-folk were away in the fields. They rounded up the women after accusing the community of having links with Maoists.
The police had rushed into villagers’ huts, throwing possessions on the floor and abusing residents. Women were accosted at various places – in their houses, fields, toilets, stacks of dry grass, and streams – and raped. Some of the elderly and children bore witness to the shocking incident.
A woman showed the wounds on her feet which she said were caused when the policemen had stamped on them with shoes. Broken bangles were found lying on the trampled crops in the fields where some women were molested.
An 18-year-old woman, whose newborn baby had recently died, said she was assaulted by a policeman as she was lighting the hearth at her house. A constable stood guard outside her house while his colleague raped her inside.
The policemen allegedly warned of more rapes and even murder if any one disclosed the episode.
“We demand a probe”
Reports say the district police chief had at first dismissed the news as a ruse by Maoists to discourage the police from carrying out search operations in Maoist areas.
''We demand a judicial enquiry. The hearings should be held in the village and not somewhere else,'' says a Kondh woman. “This incident has come to light because of the sheer number of women molested, but there is so much police violence against women that goes unreported.”
Activists say there was a deliberate delay in getting the rape victims medically examined.
The police have booked a case of rape and another under the Prevention of Atrocities against Scheduled Castes and Tribes’ Act.
The Chief Minister says that no one would be spared if found guilty.
Speaking out
ORRC and members of Dhimsa, a network of indigenous youth supported by ActionAid, met the women at the village council. The women were very afraid and not ready to reveal what happened. Their clothes were torn.
After counseling the women and encouraged them to reveal exactly what had happened, ORRC and Dhimisa members, together with local politician Lake Raja Rao, accompanied the 11 women to lodge a complaint with the sub-collector, a district official with judicial powers.
They also accompanied the women to the hospital where they had medically examinations.
On August 21, a local rally was organised where 1200 people – students, civil society representatives, indigenous people’s groups, teachers, and human rights activists as well as ORRC and Dhimsa members – took part. The protestors also formed a human chain.
A bandh (general strike) was observed on August 22 to express solidarity with the rape survivors.
