Week 1 in the IT-sphere

And finally I took the plunge into the harrowed yet interesting IT world. And surprisingly, the first brush was quite pleasant.

The positives:
1. I get up at 6 in the morning, yes 6 AM without my father or mother nagging me and telling what an           indolent boy I was.

2. I learnt to iron my clothes, an errand I never did for about two years. * Pat on the back*

3. I learnt patience, infact loads of it. Noida actually tests your patience at each and every turn and U-
turn. Travelling in jampacked buses; pushing, pulling with fellow passengers in the Metro and coming out unscathed, is not a meager achievement.

4. The sense of achievement when you make it to office on time after 85 minutes of utter pandemonium.

5. To sit on a chair for 7+ hours in almost an erect posture. (The writer eats, studies and sleeps while laying on the bed :))

Week 1 has been, predictably, the induction week. Getting acqainted with fellow joinees and verticals of the company. Got the answer to the perennial question, " Beta, tumhari company mein kaam kya hota hai". Got to learn a few useful things about corporate etiquette and team building.

Did not have a bright start really. In the first group activity, was made the scapegoat as I couldn't memorize my team's name in the stipulated time but now I remember them all.
The remaining activities were better and got to know some of the members quite well through regular interactions and group activities. Some of the sessions were really useful. Another thing that I learnt was the respect for time. Doing things strictly on agenda and within time limits was quite a task, but eventually managed. Phew..Thanks to my remarkable group. Its a privilege to learn with you guys.

Waise to, there were hardly any negatives in Week 1, but one that conspicuously stands out is HIGH CAFFEINE INTAKE. 4 cups of coffee have become a staple diet for the past week. Hope to get rid of it asap. Hoping that the coming weeks broaden the learning further and increase my bandwidth of knowledge and that we get vacant table tennis tables during our breaks, I sign off.


Udit 

Violence and Women: What remains unseen

Where do we lack? Are Indians just a bunch of people suffering from perennial amnesia? We behave like unruly citizens struck by a blazing streak of indignation trying to turn the tables on the hapless law agencies and spark a revolution. Hundreds of women commissions and volunteers blurt out in public but why does these voices debilitate in a few weeks? Why this ire is extinguished precociously?When will this rhetoric have an answer.

We start with zeal and chutzpah but our end is anti climatic, a stalemate.

Repetitive incidents of assaults and brutality against women blot the dailies, it garners a lot of despise from the society, condemnation from the government and empathy from the past victims. Some senior leaders and ostentatious sadhus blame the victim and the western culture instead; inexplicable and utter nonsensical in the contemporary world. But, this platitude never leads to any action. This is where the source of the problem lies. The protests are important but do we critically analyze whether they actually serve any purpose other than creating a volatile environment and fragile law and order. 

The 16th December rape in Delhi garnered a lot of media interest and varied sections of society came out on streets demanding exemplary punishment for the culprits. The government just assured justice to everyone and promised better law and order. But, as we all know, sexual assaults and harassment haven't ceased at all. 

If we persiflage from rape, there are other crimes, though not as audacious and ignominious as rape but equally shameful. There are thousands of cases of gender discrimination right from birth: female foeticide, restriction on secondary education, dowry and domestic violence. So, as WHO implies, violence can be mental as well as physical and by a stranger or an intimate partner. The bruises caused by the latter are deeper.

What has the common man learned and imbibed by these menaces? People have come to terms with the fact that they can't curb the violence until the government takes stern measures against those accused of crimes against women. So, they have started to evade from those errands where their safety could be compromised. It is imperative, at this time, for women to discern that all men are not with a criminal psyche. They are also victims of this violence but in this patriarchal society, it is the women who are categorized as the oppressive sex. Men have time and again came out to support gender related issues. Raising our voice, using our democratic rights, protecting our, mothers,sisters and wives of any unforeseen incidents to an extent are some exercises that we can pursue to achieve a degree of safety. The tunnel is long and dark and the light is sputtering, but a billion people together surely have the grit to bridge the chasm and bring about a defining change is the paradigm of the society.

Should we redefine the word juvenile?

Before embarking on the treacherous path of making my opinions heard and thought upon, I’d like to ask a question. Do the grotesque creatures which perform these diabolic deeds, distinguish between juveniles and adults? Its rhetoric.  Ain’t it?

Firstly ,we need to understand the meaning of the word”juvenile”. The lexicon says it is someone which is physiologically immature.

But, they rape a 10 month old girl with the same brutality as that of a 60 year old elderly lady. So when it comes to punishing them for their scurrilous acts why do WE need to classify them as juvenile. They do deserve equal punishment. After all, they are criminals too. So, I’d be with the motion ,that is Yes, we do need to redefine the word juvenile. If not in the Oxford dictionary, then in the Constitution of India.

With due respect to the Constitution of India and the Indian penal code, juveniles who are alleged to be involved in heinous crimes like rapes, murder, extortion ,molestation and the likes and have substantial evidence stacked against them should be liable for the strictest of punishments even capital punishment. They cannot commit such crimes in the shroud of age as age reflects innocence but these criminals cross all limits and the innocence is buried deep below the crust.

Standing firmly against lowering of the age criteria for juveniles accused of heinous crimes including rape, the Justice J.S. Verma Committee report on ‘Amendments to Criminal Law’ has noted that “the Juvenile Justice Act has failed miserably to protect the children in the country. We cannot hold the child responsible for a crime before first providing to him/her the basic rights given to him by the Indian Constitution.’’ But, if that child is a delinquent and offers threat to the society, he/she needs to be condemned and by force if need be. We need to go a little deeper into the legal integrity of the juvenile laws in the Constitution. The laws states that minors should be taken to reform homes and the like and care must be taken to help them refrain from committing such offences in future. This is absurd and outlandish for a criminal who has swiped an innocent docile girl off her grace.

“Old enough for rape, young enough for jail.” What is the psyche of our lawmakers? Atleast I fail to comprehend their orthodoxy or negligence. In this contemporary world, we need to have a result oriented approach and if an existing scheme or law under the aegis of GOI is proving to be incompetent to challenge the growing crime in the nation, it needs to be amended. The apocryphal investigations and claims to make fast track courts for speedy hearing cannot put a shroud of obscurity on the janta anymore. There is a lot of anger and zeal in the janta . Please stop teasing us and appeasing the juvenile offenders.

Juvenile delinquency has been on the rise all over the Indian metros. Being a Delhhi –ite, I can say with some cognizance that many violators of traffic rules, cases of road rage and eve teasers come from the sub 18 group. Allowing them to get away with a warning or a minor punishment is only going to be pejorative for the victims and it will denigrate our society into rebellious and anarchism might not be so far. In order to prevent such grave circumstances, we, the YOUth needs to act and raise our voice so that the Supreme court and the entire conclave of law makers are able to understand the gravity of the situation and act sternly.

Cannot be allowed to get away scott free. Measures need to be taken. Amendments need to be made. Sexual age of maturity should be made 16 and not 18. While other major offenders stare at the gallows why not them. The juvenile was actually according to the victim’s kin the most brutal of the rapists and the barbarous act he committed must not allow his age to come between him and the gallows. To give momentum to my views, I’d like to add that sexual assault is an extraordinary kind of a crime. We cannot typify crimes on women. Thus rape classifies as an extraordinary crime.

To conclude my argument, I strongly feel that the Government instead of buck passing and mud slinging should be more sensitive to the needs of the people, especially women. Instead of condemning the protests as rebellious and negatively instigating and cynical, I urge are lawmakers and law implementers to do their but if they expect us to be law abiding citizens. The need of the hour calls for that or else the candles would be replaced by lathis very soon. With this I’d like to rest my case.

(This piece of work won the 1^st prize at online essay writing competition at Tremors ,the CSI dept. fest of Indira Gandhi Institute of Technology, New Delhi)

Udit Bhatia

Electronics & Communication Engineering

Final Year

MSIT(IP University, New Delhi)