Caught 140 Harassers In Mumbai Local, This Man Is Looking at Women Differently
With patriarchy growing every inch on men, while women still fighting to get it off their skin-- it becomes a win win situation for the male dominated, oriented and dictated society. The feminist like they call is a bad word, the women who are harassed each day should stop leaving home, wearing clothes they like or eat what they please to.
In this race of finding themselves equal rights, women are still fighting the basic rights. Out of all odds came this man who looked at women differently.
This man grew up in a slum, right in the interiors of Mumbai, quit education to meet the expenses of the family. His mother worked in a 12 hour catering job to keep up to her family, that is – her ill husband and son. While the family was a support, the neighbours objected to her working at odd hours.
Dipesh Tank, the man who has changed the way he looked at women had immense respect for his mother along with other women in the world.
He worked his way up and landed a job with a reputed ad agency in Mumbai eventually.
One day, on his way back home from work, he saw a group of men harassing women in the local trains. Recounting the incident to Humans Of Bombay, he said:
"I saw a group of men harassing women who were trying to get into the ladies compartment. I couldn't fight them alone, so I went to the cops who initially tried to dismiss me. After some coaxing, one of the officers came with me — but by then these men had left. I was really affected by this — I thought of my own mother who would return home late after work and being harassed in this manner…wouldn’t I have done something? I could’t let it go."
After intensive discussion with his friends and others, he concluded that he cant fight it all alone and that such is the face of India, where every woman is harassed at some point of the day. So Dipesh invested in buying a pair of sunglasses with a built-in HD camera.
He started recording everything that goes on in the locals. Primarily, men harassing women in all possible ways they can.
"My documentation made me feel sick - I got a taste of being in these women’s shoes," he said. In 2013, Dipesh Tank and his friends started a campaign called, War against Railway Rowdies (WARR).
WARR gathered all the evidence and presented it to an inspector. And soon, a team of 40 police officers began working with Dipesh.
The live feed from the recordings caught the offenders on camera and by the time they reached the next station, the police officers were waiting to nab them.
Within 6 months, they got 140 offenders jailed. However the fight hasn't finished, for both Dipesh and the women who go through these horrible experiences on a daily basis. But with the change that he is bringing at such a micro-level, we are proud of him.
-PTC News
