Hackers

Dear all,

The hackers have been at our facebook groups for a while (perhaps you noticed *smile*). For now the group seems to be disabled because dear Facebook has disabled my account instead of dealing with our security issues. Bizarre but such is inscrutable corporate logic.

Hang in there. We will be back.

Nisha

UPDATE:
Someone at Facebook has written and hopefully this will be fixed. Meanwhile we have been told that the trolls claiming to be Nisha Susan have even posted a link to a new Consortium of Pub-going, Loose and Forward Women. Needless to say, don't join that one people. When the group is up and running again, there will be an announcement here. Watch this space.

Also, needless to say if people are posting pictures of shit and corpses and are having a bit of a crazed frenzy about their imaginary need to protect the state of Hindutva, that's not us either. Remember that I am a secret agent of the Vatican. As a secret agent of the Vatican supported by mysterious foreign NGOs and Christian missionaries let me add that with friends and protectors like these trolls, Hindus don't need enemies.

Today is the day

Today is the day. We suspect there will be other days but today is the day. Chennai, Hyderabad, Kolkata and Mumbai groups will be out there supporting the women of Karnataka. The Fearless Karnataka group is making their big push in Bangalore today.

Join Nirbhaya Karnataka this Sunday to register your strong protest against the recent attacks on women in the context of of moral/cultural policing and religious intolerance, attacks that are escalating as women resist and fight back.

Sunday, March 8, 2009

1. Public Awareness Campaign: At 6 p.m, people will gather at five locations across Bangalore. They will interact with the audience and spread awareness about the various goals of the Nirbhaya Karnataka campaign. This will involve distribution of information flyers and testimonials, conducting bystander polls, and other such forms of interaction with the people on the streets. This can go on till 8:00 p.m.

2. Take Back the Night, Take Back Our Streets: At 9:00 in the night, people gather at Banappa park (Near Hudson Circle.) There will be performances, video projections (if possible), poster exhibits, songs, and other similar activities. This will go on till 11:30 p.m.

For more details contact 9880755875 (Ekta), 9886081269 (Nithin), 9845591798 (Vivek)


In other news a new art collective has been formed in Bangalore which has designed the most incredibly beautiful posters for the event.

This weekend be Fearless Karnataka

FEARLESS KARNATAKA / NIRBHAYA KARNATAKA

Join Nirbhaya Karnataka this Saturday and Sunday (International Women's Day) to register your strong protest against the recent series of attacks inflicted on women in the name of 'morality', cultural policing or religious intolerance, attacks that are escalating as women resist and fight back.

Saturday, March 7, 2009

400 people are expected to gather outside the office of the Director General of Police at Nrupathunga Road at 3:30 p.m along with the victims of the recent spate of attacks in Bangalore to submit a memorandum demanding punitive action against the violent acts of moral and cultural policing happening across Karnataka. The group will stand in silence on either side of the road, outside the office, holding placards, and either the Director General addresses the group or a small representative group goes in to his office and presents the memorandum.




Sunday, March 8, 2009

1. Public Awareness Campaign: At 6 p.m, people will gather at five locations across Bangalore. They will interact with the audience and spread awareness about the various goals of the Nirbhaya Karnataka campaign. This will involve distribution of information flyers and testimonials, conducting bystander polls, and other such forms of interaction with the people on the streets. This can go on till 8:00 p.m.

2. Take Back the Night, Take Back Our Streets: At 9:00 in the night, people gather at Majestic (under the foot-over bridge on Kempgowda Road.) There will be performances, video projections (if possible), poster exhibits, songs, and other similar activities. This will go on till 11:30 p.m.

For more details contact 9880755875 (Ekta), 9886081269 (Nithin), 9845591798 (Vivek)

Protest the attacks: How and Where

On the 7th and 8th of March, there are two big public events being planned in Bangalore in response to the attacks.

People who are in Bangalore, for the love of every last chaddi, participate and organise events around the 7th and 8th. We need the events to be big and scary. I think that as many people as can manage should go to Bangalore on these two days. This is really no time to reserve our troops and what is happening right now is war. Buy cheap tickets, come to Bangalore.


Watch this space. We will be posting things you can do to get involved to protest the attacks on women in Karnataka.

1. Join the walk to the Police Commissioner's Office on March 7, 2009. More details soon.

2. Join the massive Take Back The Night campaign on March 8, 2009.

3. Join the campaign addressed to bystanders.

4. If you can't go to Bangalore organise a Pink Chaddi event in your town.

5. If you live abroad, you could join the email campaign here.

6. If you are from the media look for the press release and details about the attacks.

7. Join the poster campaign: Cut/Burn/Print/Paste

Details of the attacks

Attack # 1

Time, Date of Attack: 13:10 to 13:40 | 17.02.2009

My name is Geetanjali. At 13:00 I get into my car start driving home. Almost immediately I notice a motorbike with 2 men chasing horning, hooting, and over-taking my car in a dangerous manner.

I turn onto 100ft road. The bikers follow me, then while over-taking the driver shouts at me and spits onto the window of my car. I make an angry gesture at this unprovoked action. The bikers then block my car from the front and ride very slowly. Cars behind us are now honking loudly.

I arrive at the 100ft Rd and 12th Main junction. I intend to take a right and have my right indicator on. The bikers also take the right turn and then stop their vehicle in such a way as to obstruct my passage.

The driver of the bike proceeds to get off his bike and starts attacking my car. For the next 5-6 minutes he then proceeds to beat on the car and shout obscenities in Kannada. I do not retaliate in anyway. No-one tries to help!

The pillion biker looks shocked at his friends actions and begins to roll the bike to the left side of the road. I seize the chance, and try to drive away. While doing so, the front bumper of my car grazes the bumper of the bike. This infuriates the attacker further.

He gets onto his bike and chases me. I realize that I don’t know where the police station is in this locality, and decide to seek refuge in my friends house. With the attacker following me closely, I drive straight into the basement parking area of an apartment in Indiranagar.

The attacker parks his bike outside and pursues me into the building. I get out of my car in an attempt to flee, but he corners me against my car and proceeds to shout obscenities while constantly stepping closer and closer to me. This goes on for about 5-10 minutes. I do not retaliate verbally except to shout for help from the security guard.

By now he is less than a foot away from me. I cannot move back as my car is behind me. I slap him on his right cheek. He lunges at me and tries to punch my face, I manage to evade him, however he succeeds in punching my jaw.

At this action of his, I start to shout at him loudly in Kannada about his shamelessness at raising his hand on a woman. He is startled and steps back. The security guard now steps in and tries to push him out of the building. I use this opportunity to run towards the staircase.

I have just managed to climb 4 steps up when I realize that the attacker has run outside to the road and has started to come running back in with a large stone in his hand. He is continuously shouting and swearing.

I run upstairs and find the resident of the 1st floor apartment rushing out of her house. I caution her about going downstairs. The attacker is still shouting. I hear a crashing sound as he throws the stone at my car.

From the 1st floor apartment window, I can see that the attacker is waiting outside the gate of the building. I ask the owner of the apartment to call the police, but she refuses to do so. I then ask her to call the guard via the intercom and ask him to take down the license plate number of the attackers motorbike. By the time the guard picks up the phone, the attacker rides away.

Post-mortem

On questioning the guard, he said that the attacker took down the license plate number of my car and threatened to find and harm/kill me later. None of the neighbors who were watching helped or took down the license plate number of the attackers vehicle!

I have never felt like leaving my country for good. Yesterday I felt that. For that day I was homeless and orphaned and helpless in a way like never before. The residual feeling today is one of deep sadness at the frailty of humanity. The end of innocence for having stared at the nobility of the human spirit caving into the heart of darkness.

I am tired.

Attack # 2

Time, date of Attack: 11:15-11:30

My name is Jasmine. I am a Bangalorean. At least I think I am. I fell in love with this city two years ago and shifted base from Mumbai. I was on my way to work at Koramangala at around 11.15-11.30 in the morning when my auto broke down at Ulsoor. As I was hailing another one a white Quallis slowed down next to me and the occupants said something to me in Kannada. I rolled my eyes. That was their provocation.

I do not know if that angered them but the more I dwell on that unforgettable episode in my life, they seemed like predators, on the hunt. Before I knew it four middle-aged men emerged out of the vehicle and began verbally assaulting me.

First they started hurling obscenities at me in Kannada and then it became physical. They started touching and pulling at my clothes. One of them tugged so brutally at the shrug I was wearing that he scratched my neck. Their goal — to show the collected crowd the top that I was wearing underneath my shrug.

When the shrug didn’t come off with their tugging, the violence of the tugging increased. In self defence I hit out at an offending hand that was trying to disrobe me. The response, he slapped me hard across my ear. Then they began trying to lift my top up while making references to ‘pink chaddi’ – the only words I could understand of their tirade.

I told them I would call the police and one of them arrogantly proffered me his phone to make the call. The few people who dared to gather and watch were dumbfounded and no one said a thing. Some passing cars even slowed down, but not one stopped to help.

The whole time, the four of them kept up the tireless rant of obscenities, calling me names and trying to humiliate me in front of the gathered crowd. They couldn’t bear that a woman was looking them in the eye, and each time I raised my head to look at the tormentors, they kept pushing my head down, threatening me not to look at them in the face. While they were hitting my head, an army vehicle drove past. They stopped and intervened. Finally the army men helped me into a rickshaw to continue on what I thought was going to be a regular day at work.

It looked like these guys just wanted to make a spectacle and humiliate someone that day. And I was in the wrong place at the wrong time. I don’t want to imagine what would have happened to me if the army men hadn’t put an end to the humiliation. I do not want to talk to the cops as even with hardcore evidence, the police didn’t do anything about the Mangalore episode and those hooligans are out. I do not want to talk to the press and be anyone’s political scapegoat. The whole situation was a nightmare and every time I talk about it, I relive it.

Attack # 3

Time, date of Time: 9:00 p.m, 24th Feb

My name is Lakshmi. I was attacked on 24^th Feb at around 9:00 pm. I was walking down Vasanthnagar after I’d wrapped up work looking for an auto. At the underbridge I noticed four men walking down the road towards me. I crossed over to the other side, just in case. I continued to walk down towards Kodava Samaj. Suddenly I realised that the four men had crossed the road as well. Once they were close enough they started pushing me and passing comments. I tried to ignore them, stepped around them and continued walking. They turned around and walked back towards me and started pushing me around. I finally lost my temper and turned and told them to leave me alone,

One of them came really close and started abusing me in Kannada and Hindi. At that point I pushed him away from me. The next thing I know I’m in the middle of a roadside brawl. The guy who spoke to me punched me and the other three started hitting me as well. I fought back and all of us were in a scuffle All through the attack I was abused in Hindi and Kannada for wearing jeans and fighting back. After what seemed like an eternity I heard an auto go by and I shouted out to him. Luckily for me he stopped. For a split second the four men were taken aback and let go off me I pushed them and ran across the road, climbed into the auto and begged him to take me home. The four men followed me to the auto and tried to drag me out. At that point the auto guy started the auto and rode away. The whole attack must have happened in a span of about 5 or 6 minutes.

Attack #4

28 February 2009, 10.30 pm.

Sanjana:
I was attacked at the junction of Vasanthnagar 8th main and Palace Road junction. 10.30 in the night. Two men on a bike, slowed down, socked me on my jaw and fled away. they lost control of the bike as I lunged at the t shirt of the man sitting behind - still not enough time to get a look at the number plate. Have already filed the complaint with the High Grounds Police Station - there was a battalion of my friends who were with me till 1 am.

Attack #5

SF
I was attacked on Tuesday, 17/2/2009 at 4:45 PM in Sanjaynagar, Bangalore. I was walking home from work and stopped by the roadside to give biscuits to one dog and one puppy that I have been looking after for some time as I love animals and have a very special place for street dogs in my heart. On the afternoon of 17/2/2009 I was kneeling to open a package of biscuits when I heard a car coming down this small street at very high speed. The car was going so fast that it scared the dog and he let out one or two barks. The driver of the vehicle swerved as he came near where the dog and I were and tried to hit the dog with his vehicle. The dog became very terrified and ran down the street with the vehicle in pursuit, seemingly attempting to hit the dog as the first attempt had failed. I was horrified and afraid for the dog so I jumped up and ran into the street and yelled after the driver to slow down and stop what he was doing. Upon hearing me, the driver slammed on his brakes throwing dirt and debris all over. He then put his car in reverse and deliberately struck me with his vehicle, driving me into a motorcycle that was parked at the side of the street and knocking both me and it down to the ground. I was not seriously injured so I jumped up and ran to the driver’s window and yelled at the criminal again through his open car window. I noticed that there was a passenger in the passenger seat but did not notice if anyone was in the back seat of the vehicle as the driver again hit the gas and sped down the street and turned left to make his escape. The license plate number and make and model of the offender’s vehicle is KA 01 MA 8218, a Maroon Hundai Accent.

The police have been completely unwilling to take this attack seriously, shuffling me around to three different police stations and constantly discouraging me from filing a report. Their inaction is reprehensible and they should be called to account. I deserve better and the women of Bangalore deserve better as well.

This attack has left me feeling disgusted with the police and angry at the attacker. However I am not going to let this stop me from doing what I normally do, I still stop at the site of the attack each and every day to visit my dogs but it had tarnished my image of India. As a foreigner living in Bangalore for the past two years I have had mainly good experiences but I am afraid that this particular one may tarnish the memory of all of those past. I hope that the government and the police take the appropriate action but it won’t happen without the strong, steady and deafening voice of the people.


There've been other attacks we know of. We await details.

Press Release

Fearless Karnataka / Nirbhaya Karnataka

c/o Alternative Law Forum, 122/4, Infantry Road, Bangalore 560001

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PRESS RELEASE: Bangalore, 28 February 2009, Saturday

In the last 10 days, across Bangalore, there have been 5 reported attacks on young women. The nature of the attacks has been similar – women have been targeted in public spaces such as Palace Road, Ulsoor, Indiranagar 100 feet road, Church Street by men who were completely unfamiliar to them. These attacks have also taken place in the presence of several bystanders between 1 pm in the afternoon and 12 midnight.

Fearless Karnataka or Nirbhaya Karnataka (a group of concerned citizens have come together to reclaim public spaces and promote safety for all) believes that these attacks on women are not isolated events. Neither can they be dismissed as trivial incidents of “eve-teasing”. Women across class barriers – from powrakarmikas to garment factory workers to students and young professionals in the corporate sector – have today become vulnerable targets on the streets of Karnataka.

In the wake of a series of attacks in Mangalore (the latest one was reported on February 24, 2009), women have been targeted in the name of morality, culture and “public decency” by Hindu right wing organizations. In Bangalore, the reasons for the attacks have been on similar lines – during the attacks, the girls were insulted for wearing jeans, sleeveless shirts and speaking English. We believe that the attacks in Bangalore then are a continuation of those that took place in Mangalore and coastal Karnataka regions – even though the identity of the attackers (and the organizations they belong to) could have differed.

We are concerned about the growing lawlessness in the State – a situation where people can attack women and walk free. Though there were arrests in Mangalore following the incident, the fact remains that all of them have been released on bail. In Bangalore, not a single arrest has been possible. Beyond arrests, we are concerned about the lack of preventive action from the police. In all instances of attacks in Bangalore, the much touted Hoysalas and Cheetahs were no where in sight. We believe that the State Government and the Home Minister in particular have to take responsibility for the lawlessness in the State and for police inaction. It is shocking that all political parties continue to remain mute spectators to these incidents of violence.

In an attempt to fight against the climate of fear, the collective would like to announce the following activities:

1. A protest march to the office of Dr. Ajai Kumar Singh, DG & IGP, on March 7, 2009.
2. A ‘Take Back the Night’ campaign on March 8, 2009
3. A poster campaign asking bystanders who witness attacks on women to act

There are several other efforts, including signature campaigns, art exhibitions, etc which will be announced shortly.

email campaign

Hi,

Many of us have been wanting to organise email campaigns around the attacks. Here are the addresses. Please do copy all three parties to be effective.

Dr. VS Acharya
Home Minister - Karnataka State
Room no. 315 & 315 A
Vidhan Soudha
Bangalore 560001
Tel: 080 22252536
vsacharya@gmail.com

P. Chidambaram
Ministry of Home Affairs, North Block
Central Secretariat
New Delhi - 110 001
Phone: 23092011, 23092161

websitemhaweb@nic.in


Dr. Ajai Kumar Singh
DG & IGP
Karnataka State Police Headquarters
Nrupathunga Road
Bangalore
Tel: 080 22211803, 22942999

A draft suggested by a PC campaigner is here. Feel free to write your own, people.

Dear Sir,

In the last week women in the cities of Bangalore and Mangalore have faced physical attacks by gangs of strangers. These women , without the slightest provocation - unless exercising your rights as a free citizen of India by travelling, driving a car, or walking on the street as all of us have the right to do - can be counted as a provocation - were threatened, intimidated, cursed, and beaten. Some of them will be traumatized for life ; others will be afraid to walk the streets of their own cities again. These attacks are nothing less than a dastardly attempt to circumscribe the freedom of movement of women.

We are a group of concerned citizens, male and female, old and young, Hindu, Muslim, Sikh and Christian, from all walks of life, who have gathered to express our outrage and to register our strong protest that such goons are allowed to disrupt the lives of ordinary citizens with impunity. We ask that you restore to us our right to walk our own cities free of fear and the threat of assault. We ask that you bring these miscreants to justice and return to us the confidence in our lawmakers which should be our birthright. For this is not just a "women's issue," when one woman is attacked, we are all diminished; we all have our rights as citizens eroded along with her.

We, the people, ask you for justice and for protection. We hope and trust that you will not fail us.

Sincerely,

CC your mail to mahilabharati@yahoo.com so that we have a record of the numbers going.

OR JOIN THE PETITION HERE.