Prajwal Revanna Abuse Videos: Identities Disclosed, The Victims Suffer Again
Editor-in-Chief of indiacommentary.com. Current Affairs analyst and political commentator.
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By Sunil Garodia
First publised on 2024-05-07 07:12:05
About the Author
Editor-in-Chief of indiacommentary.com. Current Affairs analyst and political commentator.
View all posts by this Author
The most important
and disastrous fallout of the leaking of the videos of Prajwal Revanna's sexual offences has been the disclosure of the identities of the victims. In the case Nipun Saxena vs Union of India, the Supreme Court had ruled that the identities of victims of rape and sexual
molestation/harassment cases must not be disclosed in any manner. This ruling
was made to protect their dignity as the court recognized that instead of the
perpetrator, society chose to stigmatize the victim. But in the instant case,
the video clips have been made available to all and sundry through their
targeted distribution in pen drives (containing the offending videos) that were
handed out to random persons in public places in Hassan. Thereafter, these
videos went viral on social media. The identity of the women in the videos was
in public domain and they had to flee their homes to escape the unwanted glare
from society and, possibly, retribution from the influential Deve Gowda clan. One
woman was allegedly kidnapped and held captive in the farmhouse of an aide of
Prajwal's father, JD(S) MLA H D Revanna, to prevent her from approaching the
SIT. She was rescued by Karnataka Police and H D Revanna has already been
arrested.
Without guessing
who had distributed the pen drives containing the offending videos for
what gain (which in times of election is easy to guess), it will suffice to say
that they are equally guilty of demeaning women. The Congress is in power in
Karnataka. It must do all it can to bring Prajwal Revanna to justice for his
ghastly crimes and abuse of power. But it must also take steps to stop the
circulation of the videos. For the women whose identities are being disclosed
in these videos, the torture will continue for their entire life. Most of them
are from lower middle class families and they will be uprooted from their
homes. Their lives will not be the same ever again. If the Karnataka government
had wanted, it could have taken immediate steps to stop the circulation of the
videos on social media. In fact, it was bound by law to do so. It could have used Section 228A of the IPC and Sections 66E and 67A of the IT Act to proceed against the miscreants. But it failed
miserably. In the political slugfest that ensued after the disclosures, most
politicians chose to treat the matter as a law and order issue and forgot about
the victims. The women in the videos are the ones who are suffering again now.
