SHILLONG: Offence is the best defence and Sushmita Dev, the president of the All India Mahila Congress, was following the adage to a tee when she lambasted Union Minister Smriti Irani for questioning women’s security in Meghalaya.
Dev countered Irani’s allegations saying the “biggest sex scandal in the history of India” is the Kutch rape case last February in which BJP leaders were arrested.
The Congress leader added that women are sexually abused in the home state of Prime Minister Narendra Modi who she accused of maintaining silence on the incident during his visit to Kutch.
Referring to the National Crime Records Bureau data since last September, Dev said BJP-ruled states like Haryana, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan recorded the highest rate of rapes and other crime against women. She denounced Modi for not speaking on the issue.
Irani on Saturday criticised HDR Lyngdoh for the Marvelene’s Inn incident where a minor was raped by legislator Julius Dorphang.
“What business have you (Irani) got to come to Meghalaya and talk about women security? And please explain why BJP MPs and RSS say women are baby making machines,” Dev retaliated at Congress Bhawan on Sunday.
She was referring to BJP lawmaker Sakshi Maharaj’s 2015 comment where he said Hindu women should produce more babies.
“Meghalaya is a progressive state. Women here play an important role. You cannot raise the issue of one rape to say that in Meghalaya women are unsafe,” she added.
However, she was quick to add in reference to Dorphang’s crime that “rape is rape (and) we condemn it”.
Women’s quota
Dev also questioned the BJP government’s delay in introducing the Women’s Reservation Bill in the Lok Sabha despite having a majority of 282 MPs. “I want to ask Smriti Irani and Modi that you believe in women’s empowerment then why haven’t you brought the Women’s Reservation Bill… the solution to this problem lies with Modi’s government and he is not solving it,” she said.
Strengthening the Congress’s case in protecting women’s rights, Dev argued that despite Sonia Gandhi writing to the Prime Minister last September about supporting the bill if tabled, the government did not pay any heed.
“Have you ever heard that a principal opposition party writing to the Prime Minister to say that bring a bill and we will support it? But we have done it,” she said and assured that with the Congress’s comeback after the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the bill would be tabled.
Dev also pointed out that the Nirbhaya Fund for women, which was started by the Congress-led UPA, remained under-utilised and the BJP had no answer to it.
She termed the Centre’s Ujjala scheme as “regressive” saying, “Modi said he has given 2 crore women dignity by giving them Ujjala gas. Today, can you connect the dignity of women to a gas cylinder?”
She added that if the ideology of RSS and BJP is allowed to be penetrated in Meghalaya, “They will take you 20 years back to the kitchen.”
RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat had once said women were meant to do household chores, which is part of the theory of “social contract”.
