Tiger80 Posted May 28, 2013 Posted May 28, 2013 In a dusty tenement in a crowded neighbourhood in the Indian city of Kanpur, a young man takes out a bright yellow sari from a shopping bag and presents it to his mother. "Do you like it?" he asks her. "Yes," is her reply. It is an innocuous scene, except that the young man, Kanhaiya, has waited a long time to give his mother a gift. Nineteen years ago, his mother Vijai Kumari was convicted of murder - wrongfully, she claimed. She was granted bail on appeal but she did not have the 10,000 rupees ($180; £119) she needed to post bail. Her husband abandoned her and no-one else came forward to help her. "I thought I'd die in prison," she says. "They told me in there that no-one ever gets out." She was pregnant when she went to jail. Four months later, Kanhaiya was born. "I sent him away when he got a bit older. It was hard but I was determined. Prison is no place for a young child," she says. So she stayed in prison all these years, lost in the system and forgotten. All she had to keep her going was a passport-size photograph of her son and his visits to her every three months. 'Think of her and cry' Kanhaiya spent most of his childhood growing up at various juvenile homes. And he never forgot his mother. "I would think of her and cry," he says, speaking softly and with a lisp. "She was in prison, all alone. No-one else ever visited her. And my father turned his back on her." Vijai Kumari only had a small photograph of her son Kanhaiya As soon as he turned 18, he was trained to work in a garment factory. And he began saving up to get his mother out. Eventually, he hired a lawyer. "Someone told me about him. He was surprised to hear about my mother's case." The lawyer took on his case and earlier this month, his mother was freed from prison. Judges expressed their shock at her situation and the "callous and careless" behaviour of the authorities. They have now ordered a sweep of all the prisons in Uttar Pradesh state to see if there are others like Vijai Kumari. The reality is that hers is not an isolated case. There are an estimated 300,000 inmates in India's prisons, 70% of whom are yet to face trial. And many of them have spent a long time in custody. It is a reflection of India's shambolic and sluggish legal system where it can often take years for a case to be heard and a trial to be concluded. But, for the moment, mother and son are reunited and anxious about their future. "All I want is for my son to be settled," Vijai Kumari says, her voice breaking and her eyes moist. "He's all I have in this world." Kanhaiya and his mother plan to approach his estranged father and fight for their rights, including a share of the family property. But for now, they are taking in the present and trying to make up for all the time they have lost. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-india-22677850
Clarke Posted May 28, 2013 Posted May 28, 2013 Heartbreaking :(( Judges expressed their shock at her situation and the "callous and careless" behaviour of the authorities. They have now ordered a sweep of all the prisons in Uttar Pradesh state to see if there are others like Vijai Kumari. The reality is that hers is not an isolated case. There are an estimated 300,000 inmates in India's prisons, 70% of whom are yet to face trial. And many of them have spent a long time in custody. It is a reflection of India's shambolic and sluggish legal system where it can often take years for a case to be heard and a trial to be concluded. Why does no central/state govt care about this ?
diga Posted May 28, 2013 Posted May 28, 2013 life sentence is for 14 years.. and here she served 19 :wall:
beetle Posted May 28, 2013 Posted May 28, 2013 Poor ...and a woman.She is the lowest priority in this country .:((
FischerTal Posted May 28, 2013 Posted May 28, 2013 phir bhi hum kahenge, EAST OR WEST INDIA IS THE BEST :wall:
Clarke Posted May 28, 2013 Posted May 28, 2013 Poor ...and a woman.She is the lowest priority in this country .:(( A guy wouldn't be any better off. Kanoon is truly andha in terms of abusing an individual's rights.
beetle Posted May 28, 2013 Posted May 28, 2013 A guy wouldn't be any better off. Kanoon is truly andha in terms of abusing an individual's rights. a man would have a family behind him including his wife unlike this woman....
Raghav_12 Posted May 28, 2013 Posted May 28, 2013 a man would have a family behind him including his wife unlike this woman.... There is no need to convert this in man vs woman issue. Indian jails are full of such cases and vast majority of people languishing in jail would be man. In fact in Indian law in many cases bail conditions are much easier for women than men, meaning that for same crime women may go out while men may sluggish in jail. There was one case, shown on TV where an 18 years old was picked by police under allegations of stealing some 100 bucks and spent 11 months in jail without any kind of trial. There are many guys, predominantly muslims, who would be picked on charges of terrorisms and spend years in jail. Heart-rending story. That boy would have grown only with the aim of getting his mother released from prison.
Crookbond Posted May 28, 2013 Posted May 28, 2013 a man would have a family behind him including his wife unlike this woman.... That is quite apathetic and over generalization.
superstar Posted May 29, 2013 Posted May 29, 2013 Sad story. Hope Indian media spends time on these instead of Srini mamu. BBC on the other hand only has news that show India in bad light....
zumi Posted May 29, 2013 Posted May 29, 2013 saw this on BBC World, what was gut wrenching was the state of the legal system, with all the clerks and lawyers lined up outside setting stalls to be hired. many times many of these so called hardly know the law themselves and are only worth their salt for getting documents notarised and acting as third party bribing agents for judges, police, collectors, and other government officials.
beetle Posted May 29, 2013 Posted May 29, 2013 That is quite apathetic and over generalization. Really.....even the families of the six rapist in the delhi case are standing behind those monsters ans defending them.It is so easy for a man to disown a wife and get a new one specially when she is uneducated and poor.Even her maternal family didn't bother because they probably were done with her the day they got her married. It's just not about these kind of cases ...it's just about the hierarchy in our society...poor woman is probably just a step above poor and physically /mentally handicapped. Being poor is a curse ...being a woman and poor is a bigger curse.
zumi Posted May 29, 2013 Posted May 29, 2013 Really.....even the families of the six rapist in the delhi case are standing behind those monsters ans defending them.It is so easy for a man to disown a wife and get a new one specially when she is uneducated and poor.Even her maternal family didn't bother because they probably were done with her the day they got her married. It's just not about these kind of cases ...it's just about the hierarchy in our society...poor woman is probably just a step above poor and physically /mentally handicapped. Being poor is a curse ...being a woman and poor is a bigger curse. best solution is, but very difficult, women of india need to create their own independent political party. I feel the NGOs fighting for womens right and economic empowerment have little impact due to lack of political clout.
beetle Posted May 29, 2013 Posted May 29, 2013 What do women politicians really do for women? Besides do women want to change? What is stopping women from treating other women right....what stops women from protecting daughters,sisters daughter in laws ? A lot of domestic abuse is committed by women on women or at the behest of women...specially in our joint family system.
Tiger80 Posted May 29, 2013 Author Posted May 29, 2013 Really.....even the families of the six rapist in the delhi case are standing behind those monsters ans defending them.It is so easy for a man to disown a wife and get a new one specially when she is uneducated and poor.Even her maternal family didn't bother because they probably were done with her the day they got her married. It's just not about these kind of cases ...it's just about the hierarchy in our society...poor woman is probably just a step above poor and physically /mentally handicapped. Being poor is a curse ...being a woman and poor is a bigger curse. What about the male undertrial prisoners which are langushing in jails? Raja Bhaiaya himself mentioned in one article that he met a man in jail which had spent years in prison because there was no one to pay his bail.Raja bhaiaya paid his bail and now he is working with him. Seventy percent of our population is poor. The crime rate amongst this class is also higher than in the other classes. Whatever the reason for the crime, bail is generally given except where the accused cannot furnish the surety amount demanded by the court. How can the poor man produce surety since his relatives and friends are also generally likely to be poor? Therefore the accused undertrial ends up in a jail for years. This is at the expense of taxpayers like you and me! Can't we avoid all this? After all, no poor undertrial is going to run away from the country or his family. Why not take a personal bond from him and be done with it? It is people like Dawood Ibrahim who escape or are allowed to escape from India and are not even brought back! Even pickpockets spend years as undertrial prisoners. There is no real equation between the gravity of the offence and the years spent in jail as an undertrial! Most often, the undertrial spends more years in jail than the warranted maximum punishment for his offence! This is the sad travesty of our justice system! http://creative.sulekha.com/sad-plight-of-undertrial-prisoners_508870_blog This not a man woman issue.The core issue here is failure of judicial system.Turning it into man woman issue is like turning a case Hindu vs muslim or upper caste vs lower caste.
zumi Posted May 29, 2013 Posted May 29, 2013 What do women politicians really do for women? Besides do women want to change? What is stopping women from treating other women right....what stops women from protecting daughters,sisters daughter in laws ? A lot of domestic abuse is committed by women on women or at the behest of women...specially in our joint family system. they become puppets often forced to defend accused/convicted/sexist male politicians. Sheila Dixshit comes to mind.
Crookbond Posted May 29, 2013 Posted May 29, 2013 Really.....even the families of the six rapist in the delhi case are standing behind those monsters ans defending them.It is so easy for a man to disown a wife and get a new one specially when she is uneducated and poor.Even her maternal family didn't bother because they probably were done with her the day they got her married. It's just not about these kind of cases ...it's just about the hierarchy in our society...poor woman is probably just a step above poor and physically /mentally handicapped. Being poor is a curse ...being a woman and poor is a bigger curse. None of what you said matters a least bit to the core issue of under trials in jails. Personally, I am emphatic on women rights but not everything should be looked to be turned into a gender rights issue to further a particular agenda one thinks is important. I read this on a blog in a different context (probably applies here too) - "Don’t dismiss the work out of hand just because it fails to attack any problem that you care about" . Also, it would be best to stop generalization. Even if 1 out of 100 don't conform to your preconceived stereotype it is unfair on that 1 person.
Recommended Posts