Wednesday, April 03, 2013

Gender Cautios to Gender Biased

Finally the bill turned into law related to crime against women after approval by President of India today. But, something still keeps on going in my mind regarding all this, why so much cautiousness for identification of gender to punish the crime. I know a simple argument can be that because mostly its women/girls who suffer. But, over making laws for every divisive factor is how much a right approach? I can easily see two examples from the past, first it one is Hindu and the Muslim law, second one is for reservation so, general and backwards, but did they really help to bridge the gap. I don't see that, despite of the fact that they are similarly empowering laws as the new one is said to be for girls. In fact, what bothers me is that we are going to be even more gender cautious society which will only lead to even more biases, for good or for bad with all this! We need balanced laws with quick implementation rather than Gender specific strict laws with little-to-no implementation to not to thicken the line between even more but to fade it.

Small town brand

In the transitory society of India, there is a cross channel branding between the small town India and the India that mega cities. While many small towners are dreaming to be one day have that metropolitan brand, those already there in metropolitan live a love-hate relationship with their small town. They don't get involved to stay away from the life and challenges over there, but don't even like to miss the "small town brand", mostly because how hard they try they fail to mix with the real big-town brand owners and "small town brand" turns out to be savior for that group. Some even go to an extent to sell their small town brand, to prove their genuineness. I remember BJP leader Sushma Swaraj's speech in parliament saying, Adhati Kisan ka ATM hota hai to pretend her knowledge of a small town. It was one of the biggest bullshit I ever heard. Anyway she was not an exception to be so. Earlier with big media in place it was a stunt done by celebrities that they go to some small town or the outskirts of the same town showing charity to  pronounce how close they are to the rest while hiding their own hollowness.  Now, with the new social media age, the less celebrated but still disconnected this new class of people try to do the same. Once in a while they visit their small town not to be part of it but just to create photo opportunities which rolls into Twitter and Facebook to satisfy their self-ego. Nothing to complain but I find both the small towns and so-called small towners in big cities in a very looser's situation between all these. We will see how India grows in the next decades.