India is gripped by an epidemic. Our most vulnerable population, men in positions of power & authority, are being forced to take responsibility for acts of sexual aggression. Never before has the status quo been challenged so brazenly. Going forward, there could be a possibility that entitled men may need to think twice before catcalling, inappropriately touching and/or sexually assaulting women. These are trying times for our men. But all is not lost. An army of warriors across print, TV and social media has jumped into action to protect our defenceless men accused of sexual assault. Hopefully we can create an India, where men never need to take an iota of responsibility for their actions. We want to play our part in creating this misogynistic utopia. So here are some of the best ways to ensure that women always get the blame for being sexually assaulted:

1) Blame women, for being women

Women have bodies that they cover with clothes, they have mouths through which they talk and they hold jobs (some magnanimous men allow this!). This essentially means you can blame a woman’s clothes, words or behaviour.
Anything a woman wears, or says, or does, can be used to justify sexual assault. Why was she wearing that? Why did she say/email that? Why did she go there? Boom! No further explanation needed for a man sexually harassing and/or assaulting a woman. This reasoning can be also be complemented with the good old, “men will be men”, “boys will be boys” because it’s common knowledge that men and boys just can’t help themselves.

2) Blame women for “not reporting on time”

One of the unwritten rules of sexual assault is the statute of limitations on reporting incidents. An assault only occurs if reported to the police immediately. Whenever accused, a man can just say that the woman should have gone to the police immediately. Thankfully, 99% of sexual assault are unreported in India, largely because no one believes victims (often, including authorities) and we have too much societal pride to inconvenience our men. Additionally, the power dynamics often mean that women would be forced between having a career OR choosing to spend the rest of their lives trying to prove that they were wronged. And God forbid, if a women comes out openly, a man can always use the law (which mercifully is skewed in favour of those who have power and influence) to shut women down immediately. Indian heroes MJ Akbar & Alok Nath are currently providing a beautiful demonstration of this phenomenon. The man always wins.

3) Blame women for their “publicity” needs

A little known fact about Indian women is that they have an insatiable desire for “publicity”. This is why dozens of women are able to use their feminine witchcraft to organically come up with independent accounts of sexual assault experiences that name the same individual. In this case, society automatically believes the man (who of course is the real victim) and will dismiss the women for just wanting some publicity.

4) Blame those evil western women

#MeToo started out somewhere in the West. As the revered Mohan Bhagat, Sarsanghchalak of the RSS once educated the country that rapes and gangrapes are restricted to urban India with its western culture and that such ‘things’ do not happen in rural India, where traditional values hold sway. #MeTooIndia can be minimized as a Western concept that is irrelevant in India. A nice twist to add to this logic is to say that if we care about urban “elite” Indian women, then we are ignoring the poor i.e. the “real issues” of the country. Urban women are of course expected to keep getting groped and assaulted till someone solves the “real issues”.

5) Blame women supporting victims

If all else fails, just find an unrelated woman to blame. For example, you could blame the daughter of someone accused of sexual misconduct. In the case of Journalist Vinod Dua, it was decided that his daughter, who is a public figure, was to be held accountable (in fact, even more accountable than perpetrators of these alleged crimes). Even better, just blame Barkha Dutt. As per Twitter, the ultimate responsibility for ensuring justice is served, lies with her. The key here is to deflect blame from the man being accused.

Thankfully, the country continues to care about due-process for the accused men, rather than the rampant sexual abuse of women. And we continue to have societal structures and laws that will continue to keep women subservient to the whims of powerful men. We have a rich culture of entitled men doing whatever they want with women. #Metoo / #TimesUp etc. will come and go but our bhartiya sanskriti is safe.

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