A local minister has refused to apologize to female revelers who have allegedly been molested by mobs while ringing in the new year 2017 in the Indian state of Karnataka. He has actually blamed Western culture for the barbarous manner in which men treated them, almost suggesting that they deserved it.
An Indian witness, quoted in the Times of India (TOI), said, “I saw a woman shouting for help and another who took off her heels to protect herself. You can fight back if one or two people are trying to molest you, but when it is a mob how do you fight back?”
NDTV reports:
Bengaluru is in shock after a photojournalist from the newspaper Bangalore Mirror alleged that he had seen several distraught women approaching police women and complaining that hooligans had molested them and made lewd remarks during the New Year’s celebrations on December 31.
Photos published by the newspaper show women seeking help from the police. The newspaper report said the young women were seen running towards the cops for help, some holding their shoes in their hands as they tried to get away faster from their attackers. Some, the report said, were weeping.
Authorities of the capital city of Bengaluru, where the alleged “mass molestation” took place, reportedly claimed no official complaints by the women have been registered.
However, “Though no one approached the cops, many eyewitnesses came forward to share their experience with the media,” notes the TOI.
“On New Year’s Day, when Mirror got in touch with the cops to ask about the verbal complaints of molestation, they said not a single formal complaint had been lodged on January 1. So, all was well? On paper, yes,” adds Bangalore Mirror.
“But the women who got mobbed that night were too busy fleeing the molesters to call the police helpline; too traumatized, perhaps, to head to the police station and file a formal complaint. It was also unlikely that they would remember the face,” it adds.
Karnataka Home Minister G Parameshwara appeared to blame Western culture for the actions of the deviants who molested the women, suggesting that women dressing in Western attire induced young men to harass them.
New Delhi TV (NDTV) quotes the minister as saying:
In events like New Year or Christmas Day, there are women who are harassed or treated badly. We take precautionary measures. But unfortunately, on days like New Year, a large number of youngsters gather on Brigade Road, Commercial Street and MG Road. And youngsters are almost like westerners. They try to copy the west, not only in their mindset but even in their dressing. So some disturbance, some girls are harassed, these kind of things do happen.
According to the New Delhi TV (NDTV), the day after the incident, the Home Minister “said there were enough policemen and women in Bengaluru to ensure safety, offering no apology for the incident.”
The sexual and verbal harassment of the women took place in Bengaluru, the capital of the Indian state of Karnataka, where 1,500 policemen had been deployed, according to the minister.
Even with the hundreds of police officers, “cops struggled to control thousands of revelers who had poured out on the streets at midnight,” reports NDTV.
Despite being faced with an irate city crowd angered by the alleged “molestation” of the women, Minister Parameshwara, refused to apologize and instead insisted Bengaluru is safe.
He professed that his first priority was to stress “the security of women and children.”
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