Some horrors are so extreme that they are best referred to as acronyms. Female Genital Mutilation or FGM is one such atrocity. Bizarrely, a modern democracy is allowing it to persist under the garb of personal law. If flagrant violations of human rights and ‘surgical’ violence against minors can be justified on the grounds of religion, what’s to stop widows from being shoved onto the pyres of their husbands? Or shamans from performing brutal exorcisms?
The very fact that a five-judge bench of the Supreme Court is debating the validity of the practice from a constitutional perspective is beyond grotesque. The only point of law in question here should be the extent of penalty against the adults subjecting minor girls, just six or seven years old, to physical mutilation and those conspiring to aid and abet the process. Last year, Union Women & Child Development minister Maneka Gandhi made it clear that FGM was punishable under Indian law, specifically the sections of IPC dealing with “voluntarily causing grievous hurt”, as well as the Protection of Children from Sexual Offenses (POCSO) Act, 2012.
Referring to female circumcision as such is erroneous, because the practice has nothing in common with male circumcision, it has no health benefits whatsoever and depending on the extent of the procedure, can lead to anything from a loss of sensation to excruciating pain, life-threatening infections and death in childbirth. Distinctions such as cutting or nicking are irrelevant; nor is removal of the clitoral hood equivalent to snipping off the foreskin.
Masooma Ranalvi is the most outspoken campaigner against FGM in India. When Delhi welcomed this amazingly bright, spirited and charming publisher from Mumbai in the 1990s, the fact that she came from the Dawoodi Bohra community was a matter of cursory interest. Of course, no one knew her back story or could ever have imagined that she had been subjected to ‘khatna’ — as the practice of removing the ‘haram ni boti’ or ‘sinful lump’ (yikes!) is termed. “I was never told about it; my grandmother took me for an outing that turned into a nightmare. At that age, I felt violated because a stranger undressed me and cut a part of my genitals. It was very painful,” she said in an interview.
The revelation was a shock and for most of us, a reality check. It undermined our collective sense of security and brought us face-to-face with our vulnerability as women. Class, money and education are tissue-thin barriers against patriarchal aggression; gender trumps all other identities. The point being that FGM is an issue for all women, not just those from the Bohra community.
As Ranalvi said when the PIL against FGM was referred to a five-judge bench of the SC earlier this week, there is no logic in reframing the issue as a question of personal law — it is a violation of human rights, pure and simple. The stand of the Centre in the SC, supporting the referral to a Constitution bench, is inconsistent with that of the WCD minister.
Parliament need not have waited for the apex court to reach a verdict in the case against FGM; as the WCD minister had warned the Bohra community, it can enact legislation and guillotine (pun intended) the practice. Only the most illiberal and openly misogynist of parties would oppose such a law. Thirty countries across the world have specifically banned FGM. In the US and Australia, those practicing it have faced criminal prosecution.
The ruling NDA may take the plea that there is no political consensus on the issue. Why is one needed, on an issue that isn’t political? Who among us is so perverse or cynical as to see outrageous acts of violence against minor girls, with irreversible consequences, as anything but a violation of human rights?
The Centre may point to the fact that the Opposition had stalled the Triple Talaq Bill, forcing the Union Cabinet to take the Ordinance route to criminalise this form of divorce. (Muslim groups have challenged the Ordinance in court but given that the SC banned Triple Talaq in the first place, they are unlikely to get any relief.) It is also true that Congress MP Abhishek Manu Singhvi has been defending FGM in the Supreme Court, on the premise that it is a religious practice supported by Bohra women. If Singhvi is defending FGM, he is presumably doing so as a lawyer and not as a politician. One would like to image that if a Bill banning the practice was tabled, his stand in the Rajya Sabha would be quite different from that in the court!
Even if there is no specific law against FGM, there is no reason why IPC sections 320 and 323-325 cannot be brought into play and vigorously implemented. The NDA government cannot offer any justification for allowing FGM to continue on its watch. Not if it stands for the rights of women and children. Surely, this falls under the category of ‘Beti bachao’?
Bhavdeep Kang is a senior journalist with 35 years of experience in working with major newspapers and magazines. She is now an independent writer and author.