The brutal rape of a five-year-old in India, the latest in a string of attacks on women and girls, has prompted the country's Prime Minister to call on citizens “to root out the evil of rape.”
After she was abducted in a lower-middle-class area of Delhi, the girl was attacked in a locked room over at least 48 hours, police told media. India Prime Minister Manmohan Singh also voiced concerns over police treatment of women who demonstrated against the incident.
The perception of women in Indian society is at a crossroads, says ANU anthropologist Dr Assa Doron. He believes male labourers from regional locations are especially reluctant to let go of deep-seated views of women being submissive and chaste. And it is technology like the mobile phone which is bringing things to a head.
After the widely publicised rape of a girl near New Delhi in early 2012, a village elder told a journalist mobile phones were to blame.
“The girls…are so scantily clad that it's shameful…mobile phones have given a lot of freedom to these girls and that's why they are behaving in a wild manner,” the man is quoted in a new book on mobile phone use in India, The Great Indian Phone Book, which is co-authored by Doron and Robin Jeffrey.
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Doron, an Australian Research Council Future Fellow based in the ANU College of Asia and the Pacific, says it is a commonly expressed frustration.
“In cities such as Mumbai, Delhi, Calcutta and Goa, newly empowered women sport Western -style business suits and jeans, rather than traditional saris; they also ride moped scooters, and carry mobile phones with them everywhere,” he says.
Advertising campaigns have been quick to tap into the trend, by using images of alluring women to promote mobile phones.
“For male labourers from regional locations seeking work in India's big cities, it's been difficult to watch on,” Doron adds.
Many are from the northern Indian states of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, or Karnataka, in India's south-west, where traditional roles of females are still upheld.
“There is a certain understanding, when you grow up, of how women should be, of how they should behave, or what they should earn,” Doron says.
“These latest trends and developments jar with men's perception of how women should actually operate in public.
“It creates frustration, animosity, uncertainty, fear.” Before the mobile phone, landlines were the preserve of the privileged few, Doron and Jeffrey note in their book.
By contrast, since its full-blooded arrival in India just over a decade ago, cheap mobile phones have enabled Indians of every status to speak with each other as never before, enabling girl-boy relationships outside of arranged marriages, particularly among semi-literate people.
Lack of respect In the face of startling change, Women's rights groups claim there is a fundamental lack of respect towards women in India.
In New Delhi alone, 700 cases of rape were reported last year. India has robust gender laws, but they are not enforced, partly because a feudal mindset is prevalent not only among male labourers from regional states, but also among bureaucrats, magistrates and the police.
After December's fatal gang rape of a 23-year-old student in Delhi, India last month passed a new law detailing harsher punishments for rapists, including the death penalty.
But disturbing cases continue to be reported – including the most recent assault on a five-year-old girl in Delhi, and that of a ten-year-old girl, who was earlier this month allegedly raped by a 24-year-old local man in Uttar Pradesh.
The repercussions for India are widespread. A recent survey of 1,200 Indian tour operators found the number of women tourists to India in the first three months of 2013 plunged by a whopping 35 per cent.
The survey by the Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India also found holidaymakers are now opting to visit other Asian countries such as Malaysia and Thailand, because they are perceived to be safer.
“The misogynist acts have severely blighted India's reputation as a non-violent and tolerant society,” says Doron.
“The country is struggling to deal with the challenges brought about by global capitalism and consumer society.”
The Great Indian Phonebook is available from Harvard University Press .
Assa Doron is currently investigating the impact of technology on India's lower castes through a three-year Australian Research Council grant. T
This article is from the Australian National University's College of Asia and the Pacific.
