The Hindu : 'Muslim women suffered a lot in Gujarat'

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Dec 20, 2002

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'Muslim women suffered a lot in Gujarat'

NEW DELHI DEC. 19. An international women's committee today condemned the "large-scale" violence against women belonging to the minority community during the recent communal violence in Gujarat and said the carnage had "exposed the myth of Indian democracy".

The all-women committee, comprising experts from the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Germany and Sri Lanka, which toured the violence-affected areas of the State, asked the Government of India to allow an international team to inquire into the "large-scale killing and dereliction of state responsibility".

"We have seen lack of national political will to quell violence in Gujarat.

Then, for nine months, we see no redress mechanisms to ensure justice to victims and law enforcement too failed.

The myth of Indian democracy has been exposed'', the committee, under the banner the "International Initiative for Justice in Gujarat", said after releasing a report here.

"Women belonging to the minority community suffered a lot during the communal violence. We met a large number of them who were subjected to sexual violence and the survivors also had little access to counselling and rehabilitation," Anissa Helie, a social worker from France, said.

Nira Yuvali Davis, a professor in the University of Greenwich, U.K., said a few women, who "mustered courage" to file complaints, found the law enforcement system totally unresponsive.

Ms. Davis, who had run a centre for traumatised women in conflict-torn Bosnia, said the situation was "worse" in Gujarat.

"Sexual violence was being used as a strategy for terrorising women belonging to the minority community in the State," said Gabriela Mischkowski, a German historian. — PTI

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