Even molesters should get the death penalty

The interview begins with counter-questions. "Do you have a girlfriend?" "No," I answer.
"Boyfriend?"
I laugh out loud. I say "No" more forcefully than required.
"Did you ever have a girlfriend?"
"Yes."
"Did you ever go to a public place or a theatre and felt other men intimidating you and trying to hit on your girlfriend?"
Here, I shuffle my feet and struggle as I recall such an incident. Then I whisper "Yes".
"It's okay. If a group of men suddenly decide to attack you and your girlfriend, there's nothing much you can do. But here, at Fightback, we are preparing tools for you to go and hit back at all these men who make other people's lives miserable."

After the grilling, I have an even clearer idea of what it would be like to sit in the 'torture room' where Raghu Ram holds his infamous Roadies auditions. Raghu, a top-shot producer with MTV, is part of a group called Fightback, the brainchild of media executive and theatreperson Zubin Driver, who was driven to launch the group after witnessing the police and public apathy in the shameful molestation incident at Juhu on New Year's eve. Today, Fightback has 1,200 members on Facebook alone as well as very many volunteers committed to fighting crimes against women.

Driver, who lives in Juhu, recounts the various groups which sporadically came into existence to protest against the eve teasers but sank without a trace a couple of months later. He then decided to do something after the ugly incident had finally "shattered all illusions of a safe city".

Fightback is designed with an eye on the urbane audience that it wishes to sensitise. Tie-ups with corporates and music concerts like I-Rock, a smartly designed website with footprints on social networking websites, collaborating with known figures like VJ Rannvijay and Raghu also figured on his list of reaching out and creating a buzz for the group. The core group, however, comprises about nine people who work closely with Driver and come up with innovative ways to promulgate their cause among different strata of society.

Driver is more than happy to let Raghu take centrestage. Raghu explains why: "Being youth icons, we know how to talk to the youth in their language. We don't preach, and so they connect with us." He personally decided to pitch in at Fightback because of his time in Delhi, a city where sexual harassment is as common as flight delays at the Indira Gandhi airport. Eve-teasers here are seldom punished, and many times it's not just girls—even men who are out with female friends are subject to "feelings of helplessness and impotency" when eve-teasers strike in groups, which they normally do. He laments that even Mumbai isn't what it was five years ago, and rues the rapid decline of Goa where rape and murder seems to be the order of the day.

"We want to make it uncool for people to take part in such acts and also provide information about what can be done if you suffer from any form of gender violence," Raghu says.

Their website (www.fight-back.net) thus has links to the laws that govern crime as well as links to police control rooms and numbers to call in case of an emergency. Recently, the group tied up with Rotaract club and distributed 'Fightback Wallet Cards' outside Churchgate station which contained the control room numbers of police stations all over the state. "If 500 out of 1,000 people use the card, we'll call the drive a success," Raghu says. Driver confirms that the group spent enough time researching the numbers and verifying that they actually worked.

The reaction from government officials and police has been "solid", the group claims. But authorities come in after an incident has happened while Fightback's aim is to pre-empt incidents of gender violence. It's working goal is to "engineer a culture shift and turn the goal into a people's movement". Raghu admits it's a difficult task saying, "We are violent people. Forget Gandhi-ism, violence is in our DNA. So we are lobbying for the death penalty for even molesters. They should get screwed and other eve-teasers should be scared into reforming themselves."

Driver, being part of the Indian media, which has made a habit of objectifying women, feels the media needs to shape up with regard to gender portrayal. "Media is a reflection of society. Entertainment media does have to play a stronger role in gender sensitisation—whether it is breaking stereotypes or creating new enlightened models of behaviour," he says.

To people who want to be a part of this group, Sonali Hans offers some tips. "This is not just a club where it's all about the membership. It is a chain reaction built by people with common intent who want to turn Fightback into a movement."