It turns out the gangrape of Jyoti Singh Pandey was as much her fault as it was the rapists’. A self-declared “spiritual guru” called Asaram Bapu says so.
Addressing his followers recently, Asaram said that when the girl encountered six drunk men “she should have taken God’s name and could have held the hand of one of the men and said I consider you as my brother and should have said to the other two ‘Brother I am helpless, you are my brother, my religious brother.’
She should have taken God’s name and held their hands and feet…then the misconduct wouldn’t have happened.”
Because with genuine rape, the body has a mechanism to shut that whole thing down. Because if you call on “God” and call your rapists “brothers” then the rapists will stop. Period. That’s a fact, and there are no exceptions. Also, it’s a fact that all women know, with certainty, so any woman who is raped clearly wanted to be raped (or she would have done the things she knows with certainty will prevent the rape). So there’s no such thing as rape.
Jyoti Singh Pandey’s father made her name public yesterday.
Badri now cherishes the memories of his daughter. He remembers her dream of being a doctor.
He said: “I told her I can’t afford to pay for her to do such subjects but she was determined. She wanted to be a doctor and earn lots of money and go overseas a lot.”
When Badri first moved to Delhi in 1983 he earned just 150 Rupees a month – the equivalent of £1.70 today.
But he sold some land to pay for his daughter’s studies and saved as much as possible from his 5,700 Rupees (£65) a month he now earns.
Badri said: “It’s hard living in Delhi on my wages, very hard. But Jyoti always said she would change all of that. She wanted to change our lives once she got a job.”
Jyoti had only just finished her four-year course in physiotherapy at college outside Delhi. She was doing an internship when she was attacked.
That’s the end of that.