It was a matter of time before all the public attention on Hathras and Balrampur ‘gangrape’ of two Dalit women would begin to hurt those who are in the business of Headline management, or should we call it hashtag management. Add a little whataboutery to inconvenient news and you get instant twitter revenge sponsored by the IT cell.
While the UP Police, citing a ‘forensic report, is now claiming there was ‘no rape’ in Hathras incident, a video of the woman says otherwise.
Hw did this girl die was she murdered cremated #HathrasHorrorShocksIndia #hatrashorror #hatraskibeti #deshkibeti was she murdered very difficult to believe that she suddenly died after this it’s all so fishy they don’t allow her family into the Delhi hospital dnt allow postmortem pic.twitter.com/MKLVeI4leZ
— Nagma (@nagma_morarji) September 30, 2020
Countering the outrage over Hathras, there is a Twitter trend #अजमेर_गैंगरेप_पे_चुप्पी_क्यों (‘why the silence over Ajmer gangrape’) with more than 200,000 tweets. It reminds me of a meme. It was of an image of BJP spokesperson Sambit Patra with the following text at the bottom: Jab mata Sita ka apharan hua tha tab tum kahan they? Loosely translated, it means: Where were you when goddess Sita was abducted?
Memes are a very powerful socio-political tool. Today, they also serve as the main weapon in the game of ‘whataboutery’.
When your sympathy for the victim depends on the social and religious identity of the violator or the state in which the crime happens, then YOU are part of the problem.
Those obsessing about the identity of the accused in Hathras are silent on Balrampur and Bulandshahr…
— Amit Malviya (@amitmalviya) October 1, 2020
Cambridge Dictionary defines it as: “the practice of answering a criticism or difficult question by attacking someone with a similar criticism or question directed at them, typically starting with the words “What about?”
Whataboutery is a very powerful weapon in the hands of those defending the government. In the past six years, whataboutery has been used ad nauseam to shield the follies of the Narendra Modi government and even rape has not been an exception.
A mischievous agenda
The usual suspect behind the ‘Ajmer’ trend is the BJP IT cell because Ajmer is in Rajasthan, which is ruled by the Congress. It’s a response to the outrage over Hathras case because the latter is in UP, where the BJP government led by CM Yogi Adityanath is under fire for its treatment of the woman’s family.
All crimes committed by men on women must be talked about but the IT cell here doesn’t seem to be raising its voice against rape. Its outrage is not against rape. They would not bother with it if the society at large didn’t speak up against rape in a BJP-ruled state. Don’t raise Hathras and we won’t make memes about Ajmer, is the message. This is not the first time the IT cell has brought a rape case to defend the BJP or to score political points.
Remember the 2018 Kathua case in which an eight-year-old girl was raped and murdered? Perhaps for the first time in India, members of a political party, two BJP ministers, attended a rally held in support of the rape accused, who were Hindus.
After that, a minor girl was raped in Mandsaur, Madhya Pradesh the same year. The accused was a Muslim. BJP IT cell head Amit Malviya tweeted this in response:
Deeply disappointing to see all those who branded the entire Hindu community as rapists after Khatua maintain stoic silence after the Mandsaur rape because rapists are Muslims. Let me see if any of them can step out with a placard and malign all Muslims for act of Asif and Irfan.
— Amit Malviya (@amitmalviya) July 1, 2018
It didn’t matter to Malviya that the Muslim community in Mandsaur, unlike the BJP leaders in Kathua, had marched against the accused and said it won’t allow the body of the accused to be buried in their burial grounds. Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan assured that the matter will be fast-tracked.
BJP’s women leaders and supporters
Even the media and women supporters of the BJP have been complicit in this. Dainik Jagaran’s Jammu edition did a story denying the rape in Kathua. Even after the conviction of six people in this case, the Jagran report is still up.
Swati Goel Sharma is associated with the Right-wing portal Swarajya. She runs a Twitter campaign in the name of so-called ‘love jihad’. People like Sharma see ‘jihad’ in love but they can’t see caste supremacy when four Thakur men rape a Dalit woman.
She also stands with UP CM Adityanath on the issue of crime against women.
Is UP seeing a surge in crimes against women? We don't know. No such data. Increase in FIRs, if there, does not really explain it.
When I ask villagers, they say cases have risen, but so have arrests and convictions. They say most accused used to go scot-free under previous govt. https://t.co/yGJhTgFPEr— Swati Goel Sharma (@swati_gs) September 30, 2020
In the response to one of the tweets by the Congress on the Hathras case, Sharma gave links of seven rape cases in Congress-ruled states. Again, the anger or outrage is not over rape. Sharma wouldn’t mention these seven cases if there was no tweet from the Congress to respond to.
Some reports of rape from Rajasthan in a day:
And so on…. https://t.co/LMC57pF7EW
— Swati Goel Sharma (@swati_gs) September 30, 2020
Do you feel like asking how and when did we reach here? I don’t remember rape being a “tab tum kahan they” whataboutery. It makes one wonder, is that what a person should do? Every time a man rapes a woman somewhere, are people required to first Google for other rape incidents that might have happened or reported in India that day before outraging over the crime?
Then there are the likes of Madhu Kishwar. One of her tweets reads: “Whenever victim from SC or Muslim community, media &politicians create furore over Dalit or Muslim identity to put entire Hindu society in the dock.
But when crime committed by SC or Muslim on non SC Hindus, then naming community of aggressor is seen as anti Dalit or Islamophobic”
Whenever victim from SC or Muslim community, media &politicians create furore over Dalit or Muslim identity to put entire Hindu society in the dock.
But when crime committed by SC or Muslim on non SC Hindus, then naming community of aggressor is seen as anti Dalit or Islamophobic— MadhuPurnima Kishwar (@madhukishwar) September 30, 2020
Does she mean that Dalits are not Hindus? There is a whole different debate on being a Dalit and a Muslim girl in India but let’s save that for some other day.
Madhu Kishwar has also put out a tweet supporting the UP Police theory that there was no rape.
National in-charge of the BJP Mahila Morcha, Priti Gandhi supports Madhu Kishwar and, in turn, the UP Police’s theory.
It doesn’t matter what the Hathras woman’s family says.
Her sister-in-law responds to the UP police video that relatives were present during cremation.
She says – “किसी दूसरे को लाकर वहाँ खड़ा कर दिया गया था और video बनाया गया था!”
Shame! No dignity in death for the 19 yr old Dalit girl. #JusticeForManisha #HathrasHorror pic.twitter.com/B0miPrPXTf
— Marya Shakil (@maryashakil) September 30, 2020
A departure from past
All this brings us back to the Patra meme. Do we need to prepare ourselves to teleport to the Ramayana era and be there while Sita was kidnapped as and when we talk about the current issues of crimes against women, because someone might ask us: tab tum kahan they?
A similar pattern followed after the Mandsaur rape and the women brigade involved Shubhrastha, Malini Awasthi, Shefali Vaidya and Sonam Mahajan. Google their names with Mandsaur rape and you will know. Now, the question is: did anyone ask the proverbial ‘tab tum kahan they’ of those protesting the Delhi 2012 gangrape?
Sushma Swaraj had delivered a speech in Parliament and the nation stood united, Smiriti Irani asked for the rapists to be hanged and there was no whataboutery, people gheraoed Parliament and no IT cell backed by the ruling party at the time tried to spin counter narratives or attack those protesting. The culprits were hanged on 20 March 2020 and, barring those against capital punishment, India spoke in one voice. Why get divided now and allow this whataboutery?
Views are personal.
Subscribe to our channels on YouTube & Telegram
Why news media is in crisis & How you can fix it
India needs free, fair, non-hyphenated and questioning journalism even more as it faces multiple crises.
But the news media is in a crisis of its own. There have been brutal layoffs and pay-cuts. The best of journalism is shrinking, yielding to crude prime-time spectacle.
ThePrint has the finest young reporters, columnists and editors working for it. Sustaining journalism of this quality needs smart and thinking people like you to pay for it. Whether you live in India or overseas, you can do it here.