By Lillian Anjum Smale
Growing up, in an educated mixed marriage, I was exposed to ideas, values, concepts that many even now would believe to be too perfect for today’s world. I remember the times when my Nana would bring me onto his lap and tell me the stories of fighters and soldiers and the kings of old. How Alexander conquered the world, how great of a king Akbar was, poems of Sarojini Naidu. My mum would tell me about the invasion in Afghanistan and how she would sit by the radio day after day waiting for an update. I watched movies and heard stories of people, regular people who rose to fight for what was right to fight for our country.
I was 10 when I heard about the legend of Spartacus, 14 the first time I ever watched Rang De Basanti, the first time I saw and heard the word Azadi,16 when I first watched an interview of Arundhati Roy, where she spoke of the India she was fighting for. My childhood, my whole life, every story, every movie and moral has pushed me to want and yearn for Azadi, for freedom. It has been driven into my bones, to want freedom.
So when people ask “ tum kya chaahte hai?” (What do you want) My only answer is freedom, ‘Azadi’.
During an MLA meeting in Karnataka, while the assembly was discussing the chaos of the state a law maker said, “There is a saying that when rape is inevitable, lie down and enjoy it”. Has all the fighting and suffering of our people before us come to this? Has all the blood-shed for equal rights come to this? To allow such comments to pass, for someone who is in charge of the laws that restrict us, that allow us our freedoms and rights? What rights could come in place if such crimes are dealt with and seen as common gossip and laughing matters by the same people who are elected into power regardless of the parties they represent.
When a woman walks down the streets, regardless of whether she wears a skirt, jeans, a kurti, school uniform, work attire or a burqa, should it give a man the right to take advantage of her simply because she is a woman? Simply because he can? Simply because of these same comments made in houses, in shops, on the streets, behind the shadows or in broad daylight and now even during MLA Meetings.
Where is the Azadi, the freedom, the independence we so proudly speak of when a woman cannot walk the streets without clutching her keys, her eyes averting any gaze, her ears perked up for any sounds just to get home safely? Why is it that even in school uniform, we still receive stares and advances from men? Where is this freedom when our right to clothing is being questioned instead of the rates of pollution or literacy or discrimination?
Why is the price of living rising everyday? Why is there such high illiteracy or poverty? Why are there children begging on the streets or working in small dukans and dhabas? Why are basic menstruation facilities and products unavailable or unaffordable for so many little girls? Why are we turning a blind eye to so many of the problems that are vital to the development of our country? How can we be the fourth largest economy in the world, battling at an international level yet our own people are starving to death? And our law makers and representatives are discussing “ripped jeans”.
In the words of George Orwell “ All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others”
That’s true, because some men can make comments like this so openly, completely disregarding women and pushing us back by years in 1 sentence. Many may wonder, why so much anger over a single sentence that he has already apologized for? Simply, because it is not just a sentence. It is a comment which stems from years of systematic disregard towards women, years of listening to what the chachas and mamas say, years of men and systems pushing women down again and again and again, of taking away our rights our freedom are dignity, years of saying “ what was she wearing? Why was she out so late at night?” And it’s not just men, but also women who too have been desensitised by such a society that they too blame the women. A desensitisation so great that when Men come out about their own abuse and traumatic experiences they are mocked? Why is it that when a boy is sexually harassed or assaulted the only words of “comfort” are “ You must’ve enjoyed it”. Why must one be expected to have enjoyed un-consentual sexual interaction simply because they have the organs too? Why is rape and sexual assault treated so lightly? Why is society always making excuses “ don’t ruin his life, he has a bright future ahead”, “ it’ll bring shame on your family if you file a case?”
What Azadi is this?
What freedom is this, where the blood of our ancestors has dried into dust beneath our feet, forgotten by those who sit in power? The women and men who fought, who starved, who bled and died for this land did not imagine a future where their sacrifices would be mocked in legislative halls. They did not fight so that the very people entrusted with protecting our rights would reduce women to bodies and jokes.
Our ancestors would be turning in their graves, not in quiet disappointment but in rage; rage that the freedom they carved out with their lives has been warped into a hollow slogan. They fought for dignity, for safety, for equality, for the right to exist without fear. And yet here we stand, watching law makers debate women’s bodies instead of hunger, poverty, education, violence, or justice.The past does not sit silently behind us. It screams. It echoes with longing and shrills with sorrow at what this country has allowed itself to become. Every freedom movement, every slogan, every martyr’s cry rises to ask us: Was this the future you promised us?
This is not about one comment, one case, not one man, not one moment of “poor judgment.” It is a nation that has learned to flinch and then look away. A country desensitized to the pain of its own people, trained to excuse violence, to laugh at cruelty, to normalize humiliation.It is a system that teaches men entitlement and teaches women endurance. A society that demands silence from survivors and sympathy for perpetrators. One that asks women to adjust, to cover up, to stay home, to stay quiet while asking nothing of those who violate them. One that protects “reputations” more fiercely than human lives.
This is the Azadi where outrage lasts a news cycle and apologies erase accountability. Where women’s anger is labelled hysteria and their fear dismissed as exaggeration. Where justice is negotiable, dignity conditional, and freedom reserved for the privileged few.
How long can a nation survive when it grows numb to its own moral collapse? How much blood was spilled for a freedom that now exists only for some?
Because this is not freedom, this is betrayal and history is watching.
