How will we make gentlemen of our men?
Iwas going to attend my first ever school annual re-union. I was looking forward to going to Delhi to meet old classmates after 33 years. I had lost all contact with them when I left school and though I had broken the ice figuratively with them many months ago, over a WhatsApp chat group; this was going to be the real thing, the face to face meeting.
Nostalgia swept over me as the day approached.
Soon enough I was in Delhi, seated in a large circle in the school premises surrounded by former classmates.
It seemed we had never lost touch; it was all so warm and enjoyable. We talked, we ate and we joked. As the night wore down upon us, we shouted and laughed with abandon. Ah, I thought, swayed by emotions, look at us, strangers to many of our classmates while studying together and here we were, decades later, catching up with an unprecedented affection and camaraderie. One could almost reach out and touch the bonhomie around.
Then it was time to leave, we seemed to be in the midst of unending rounds of mutual back slapping and goodbye-tillwe-meet-again hugs. Finally, I waved goodbye and walked towards the waiting SUV, I stepped onto the foot plate and as my other foot left the ground I heard a muted, “Let me help you in”, followed by the feel of a hand ‘assisting’ me from behind, except, it was all in the wrong place. This was no friendly shove of assistance; it was a deliberate misdemeanour, a quick but firm feeling up of my bottom!
I was shocked, my mind frozen yet racing with a hundred thoughts as to what I should make of this experience. The moment ended as soon as it had begun, I was seated inside the vehicle and the door shut on me by the very classmate who had groped me moments ago.
Through the haze, I saw two of my male classmates doubling up in laughter over the bonnet, apparently amused spectators to the offensive act.
The bubble burst, my Shangri-La vanished and I lost my utopia the same instant. I jerked back into the real world, jolted by this sendoff which seared not my body but my sense of faith, propriety and goodness. I became another number, a part of the statistics.
The daily harassment women face on the street, in educational institutions, amid friends and relatives, at their workplace or in their homes; the perpetrators are worlds apart. Catcalls, molestation, blackmail, violence or rape; can we state a specific profile for the offender?
When I read daily about crimes against women, I think about the differentiator. Does one exist? Whether it is an uneducated bottom of the rung male or a rich and polished upper class one, objectification rules. When and how will we make gentlemen of our men, I wonder.
I JERKED BACK INTO THE REAL WORLD, JOLTED BY THIS SENDOFF WHICH SEARED NOT MY BODY BUT MY SENSE OF PROPRIETY