India is still in her sexual adolescence
By Angshukanta Chakraborty
The lurid spectacle of Pinki Pramanik being dragged by two policemen and the frenzy with which the media went berserk with speculations on her ‘hidden sexuality’ points towards a much larger malaise in our society. Not only does it firmly establish the fact that ours is a sexually juvenile culture, but also, that we urgently need a crash course in basic human dignity.
While it’s true that the Indian Penal Code is a legacy of the long departed British, it is completely to our discredit that even after 65 years of independence, we have not been able to suitably update the archaic legal system. Except for milestones such as reading down of the notorious Section 377 that criminalised homosexuality, our understanding of sexuality and law is still mired in extreme prejudices.
Why is it so important to put a familiar tag on Pinki’s sexuality? From a legal standpoint, to relieve Pinki from charges of rape, it needs to be ascertained that she is incapable of penetrating another woman, as according to rape laws in India, rape is tantamount to penile penetration without consent. However, it is absurd to imagine that Pinki, who has won medals for India in prestigious international competitions, has been duping everybody about her gender all along.
A deeper discontent is the spontaneous correlation of Pinki’s indistinct sexuality with deviancy, moral degeneration, criminal aggressiveness and a general delinquency that the 24X7 television and online media have thrust upon her.
Speculations on Pinki’s hard drinking, her sexual relationships, her ‘masculine traits’ such as physical strength, a stout and muscular body, and even conjectures about why she suddenly left athletics after the Melbourne Commonwealth Games, albeit she was just 22, have been oozing out from television screens and more adventurous corners of online journalism.
This automatic and uncritical linking of sexual deviancy with sexual predation and criminal tendencies has, in fact, been the worst fall out of the media banality. It brings to fore once again every form of bigotry that exists when it comes to sexuality and freedom of sexual-self-expression. Instead of assuaging Pinki of her personal troubles, the media sleaze-fest was busy massaging the worst forms of cultural and social discrimination that have been meted out to the people in the fringes of society, such as sex workers, gay and lesbians, transgenders and those who belong to indeterminate sex.
Strictly, this collective voyeurism at the expense of a person, who has won laurels for the country, is reprehensible. However, it is not enough to simply abide by the law and let it take its own course. For it is the law and the government that are in urgent need of reform, especially when it comes to gaining a thorough understanding of the wide spectrum of sexual identities and self-expressions.
Also telling is India’s schizophrenic nature when it comes to women and sports. While India makes icons out of more glamorous sportspersons such as Sania Mirza, Saina Nehwal, who do not overly challenge its prescriptions on sexuality, it is at a loss while grappling with the likes of Pinki Pramanik, who break several stereotypes while giving rise to others. Still, gender baiting is a national pastime and even stalwarts such as Mirza are not exempt from it, as her recent experience with the Olympics selection committee has amply demonstrated.
The initial demonisation of Pinki’s sexual nonconformity, and if I may be permitted to use the neologism, her “sluttification” by all and sundry, is a tell-tale sign of how shaky our cultural and moral foundations have become. The internet circulation of the MMS that illegally recorded Pinki undergoing the arduous, redundant and humiliating gender tests was the icing on the proverbial cake of the barrage of sexual ridicule that she had to go through.
Branded a rapist, lodged in a male jail for almost a month, her body, physically and virtually, was now not only subject to gut-wrenching scrutiny ostensibly in the garb of routine medical tests, but also it was up for grabs for the consumption of the policemen, the law-keepers and a national audience that considers such garish drama worthy entertainment over their evening meals. Another huge disappointment, although not completely unexpected, is the deafening silence from the West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee, who once again failed to correctly rise to the task of protecting women’s rights in her own state. Erstwhile, Banerjee had displayed a spectacular callousness and lack of sympathy for the victim of the Park Street rape case.
Now, Banerjee, whose voice otherwise reaches the heights of shrillness at any detection of ‘violation of women’s dignity’, especially if they come from innocuous cartoons humouring her tempestuous brand of politics, her conspicuous absence in this instance proves the Park Street experience to be the rule rather than the exception.
Whether Pinki has sexually assaulted her live-in partner is for the court to decide. But before that is being firmly proved, she’s entitled to every right that being a citizen of a democratic republic gives her access to. What kind of a sexually immature society feeds on the very shards of its broken mirror of distortions? What sort of cultural intolerance singles out self-made achievers like Pinky, makes a scapegoat of her and subjects her to this “witch-burning” in broad daylight? (IPA Service)