There have been times in the life of Herald when it has fought shoulder to shoulder with the people of Goa to win life changing battles for our land. Those continue to be and will always be feathers on a very weather beaten crown that we wear very proudly on behalf of the people of Goa. Many of the young men and women who took to the streets in their fight for Goa’s identity, language and its land are grandfathers and grandmothers. And many have left us.
But while we go to work for the service of the people we serve, we focus on our every day contemporary battles – of holding truth to power, to unearth and bring what is suppressed, we are the ones who pull the carpet off to expose what is beneath. At the same time we salute, hold hands and clap for those who make Goa a better place. And we realise that at times fighting the small battles are actually tougher but are sometimes much more rewarding. Most of the smaller battles are about justice, of the fight against absolute and abject violation of human rights, a fight for the helpless crushed by the might of the powerful and the state siding with the powerful. When you fight for these people and make some difference, the real purpose of being a part of a journey called Herald is fulfilled.
#Justice for Vanita is one such campaign. It began as a crime story which landed on our news desk, of a death of young woman from Malkarne in Quepem, in GMC. We quickly learnt that she succumbed 13 days after she consumed pesticide. Even this didn’t come as a huge shock, since we have been so unfortunately de-sensitised to even these kind of deaths. And then, when the full gamut of circumstances which led to the death of Vanita Gaonkar emerged, everyone in the decision making team at Herald decided that we would not treat this as just another story. This was not an issue we needed validation from anyone. It didn’t matter that no political leader felt the surge of humanity to go and meet the family of a girl who took the drastic step to poison herself, because her father in law was demanding the Rs 1 lakh she received as part of the Laadli Laxmi scheme, meant for girls who are of marriageable age. She couldn’t take the harassment, and that is what she told the police, before she died. She didn’t live long enough to detail what happened, but for her sake, we must know every single morsel of truth of what that brute of a man did for a sum of one lakh.
If this is what it takes to make men who should be fathers to the wives of their sons, to turn into beasts, then how are we different from the cesspools of UP, Bihar, Haryana and other places where the objectification and debasement of women is common? That is why it was so important not just to give Justice to Vanita, but to do even more, send such a strong message down that line that Goa will not tolerate the objectification and victimisation of women even by family members. But that message was not forthcoming. Even after she gave her dying declaration and died, the most obvious act of arresting the father-in-law, and if there was more evidence, also the husband and the mother- in-law of the victim, was not carried out. The unfairness of this was too much. That was the time when #Justicefor Vanita was announced. And though not a word came from the political leadership and specially the Quepem MLA Babu Kavlekar, who didn’t think there was any need to waste time on this, the people of Goa spoke. There was an outpouring on our social media pages as well as through mails and calls.
For three days, even as the SDM recorded statements, we asked what stops the police from arresting the father in law. No girl who has just got married kills herself without a reason. Her dying declaration is the only FIR. It’s the only evidence. It’s the only proof that was needed. But the arrest of her Father in law isn’t the justice we are looking for. Everyone who abetted the crime or did worse by knowing about it and being silent should be interrogated and arrested. It is also time that Goa should begin a nationwide campaign so that those who are responsible for dowry deaths are treated like murder accused.
It took a Nirbhaya to change rape law. In Goa, we hope it takes Vanita to change the dowry death law.
Herald will fight for this. This is not our battle, but yours.
