Because The Hash Tag is not Enough!!

I remember, I might have been eight or nine years old, when I first experienced this... old enough to know the difference between the casual stares and those with wicked intentions...
"Molestation" "Eve teasing" I did not know these terms back then, but I knew that the boys looking at me were not thinking anything good about me...
Once I visited one of my uncle's house in Varanasi, it was monsoon season, it's particularly celebrated in Varanasi, "Sawan" they call it...
There would be fair and fete with lots of rides to ride... It's a festival of fun for us kids... Or it was until that day...
Me and my cousins visited one fete near my uncle's house, they had a mini replica of Giant wheel, we were on that ride when I saw a boy looking at me sniggering and pointing at me, to his friends. My first response to it was to ignore him, and enjoy my ride... But somehow I couldn't get him out of my mind and his face kept coming in front of my sight where ever I went in the fair...
Luckily enough my Uncle's house was near by and we were a bunch of girls together, that's why those boys couldn't do anything to us, or maybe they never intended to do anything...
But I remember, I still do... That stare and that face and those pointing people at me... I felt like I'm not a person at all. I felt like I'm an object, a funny looking or I don't know what kind of an item that they could point at and talk about and make fun of...

Going out in bunch helps, but not always...

Again once I visited my Grandmother's place in Varanasi, it was "Barawafat" time, a kind of festival celebrated grandly over there, whole of the "Nai Sarak" was decorated, it was my first stay during that festival, people erected platforms with decorations over it in front of their shops, it was bright, and beautiful to look at... One of my cousins offered to take us out for visiting various platforms around the locality... We were all excited... It was my first time you know... And the last...
We went everywhere and everywhere we had fun we ate "Chat" and "Golgappas" (Indian snacks)
All of a sudden we realized some people are following us, we discussed it amongst us, one of my cousins said 'stay close and if they linger longer we'll tell our brothers' (the elder cousins who were with us) but somewhere we lost those following men. I was relieved... For time being...
Finally when it was getting late, the eldest of our cousins suggested it would be prudent to return home. While we were heading back to home, we faced a very jam packed street (the "Daal Mandi) we tried getting our way through it...
And there I felt...
A hand on my back...
Feeling me... I looked back, nobody was looking directly at me, I couldn't tell by their expressions which one of them was that person, but I spotted those people who were following us, they were staring ahead, I couldn't tell who was doing it among them, but I was sure it was them... their faces were expressionless...
As if nothing out of place is been done...
I tried to push my way through the mob and I kept screaming in my younger sister's ears... "Stay ahead of me, keep moving". When we finally reached home that day I told this story to my cousins and some of them shared the same experience, they said someone behind them was touching them and all the could do was keep moving and not turn back... By common consensus we decided we would never go to see the platforms again on "Barawafat"

I kept contemplating why they did it, I wasn't very much educated in the matter back then, and with time I realised... It's not the gratification of sexual kind that they receive (I mean up-to some extent they do) it's the game of power... I felt like "being at the mercy of them" on that street... That's what they seek... They want submission... And that's their way...

We make changes in our lives so that we don't succumb to these teasing and molesting on a daily basis... I did not tell about these incidences to anyone, first one to no one and the next one we girls (me and my cousins) discussed it amongst us but said nothing to elders...
I don't know why? Were we ashamed of it!?...
Maybe...
Over the years I discovered it's generally us the victim who feel ashamed...
Why should we be ashamed?!?  Why every girl feels it awkward to express her experiences... Why only the "hash tag" and not the story behind it...

People say she was out at a "wrong" time or may be at "wrong" place... I pray, please define "wrong"!!
"wrong" time, "wrong" place, "wrong" clothes, "wrong" attitude...
I think there is something seriously "wrong" with a society that sees everything "wrong" in the victim...
It was a "wrong" person who did it, be it the rape of a girl who's out late at night or the woman perfectly inside her house...
Stop victim blaming and shaming... Shame the culprit and we might get things toward a better direction...

Yeah #me-too!!