A nationwide campaign called Reclaim the Night will be launched tonight against rape.
After the rape and murder of a trainee doctor in a medical college in Kolkata, protests are growing across the country. In many states including Delhi and Uttar Pradesh, doctors have taken to the streets for their safety. This incident happened at a time when the country was preparing to celebrate its independence. Now on the eve of August 15, women will protest together at midnight and demand their freedom and security.
The performance will begin after 11 pm on Wednesday. Women from every corner of the country will participate in the exhibition. The exhibition is titled Reclaim the Night. Before 12 midnight in Kolkata, women will hit the streets and demonstrate in many parts of the country. Who finally spoke of starting a protest with this name?
Demonstration campaign on social media
After the Kolkata incident, many women doctors and people protested this heinous incident through social media and other platforms. One of them is Rimzim Sinha, who completed his bachelor’s degree from Presidency University (year 2020) 4 years ago and is currently doing research. After this incident, he first took the name Reclaim the Night for a performance. The demonstration has now moved from the streets of Kolkata to many states across the country.
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This is not the first time that people have taken to the streets to protest in the name of Reclaim the Night for the safety and freedom of women. Even before this, there has been a movement all over the world on this name. The special thing is that the protest called Reclaim the Night started in a developed country. Gradually the word came into discussion and it became a loud voice of women’s protest.
British women were thus inspired
Reclaim the night that began this way. On April 30, 1977, women in Germany took to the streets to protest the growing sexual harassment in the country and called their protest ‘Take Back the Night’. Inspired by this, the women of Britain decided to create their own ‘Reclaim the Night’ march to protest. Reclaim 11 cities in 1977 in response to the “Ripper” murders in the British city of Leeds.
The “Reaper” murders include those committed by serial killer Peter Sutcliffe, nicknamed the ‘Yorkshire Ripper’ by the media. Peter sexually assaulted and then brutally murdered 13 women in Yorkshire between 1975 and 1980. The women here were outraged that the police showed laxity in these killings and did not take any strict action. Even the media did not give much prominence to these murders in their newspapers. The main reason behind this is believed to be that most of these women were sex workers and were murdered.
After the murder of the student, anger flared up
However, the murder shocked the country. When a student was killed, the media and the police paid more attention to the incident. However, the police later said that women should not go out at night. In a way a ‘curfew’ was imposed on women. This ‘curfew’ was frustrating for women, especially those who worked late at night or night shifts, or those who worked as sex workers, and were not allowed to go out at night.
This angered feminists and various student and women’s groups. His anger continued to flare due to the successive murders. Meanwhile, the Leeds Revolutionary Feminist Group organized demonstrations across Britain on the night of 12 November 1977 against rape and for women’s right to walk at night without fear, and called for large numbers of women to join them.
Advertisements in the paper for the campaign
Advertisements were also given in national level newspapers for this. Propaganda was also carried out in women’s groups. That night hundreds of women took to the streets in their cities and demonstrated with burning torches. Meanwhile, women raised the issue that they should be allowed to walk anywhere. Men should not be blamed or banned for the violence they commit. The women also chanted the slogan ‘No Curfew on Women – Curfew on Men’ during the demonstration.
Shows in America and Australia after Britain
Following the success of Reclaim the Night in Britain, a similar exhibition was held in America the same year. More than 5,000 women from 30 US states demonstrated in San Francisco’s red light district. The campaign was also launched in Australia. The first Reclaim the Night marches were held in Sydney and Perth. The first Melbourne march was held in 1979.
A similar demonstration took place in India in the year 2012 when the Nirbhaya case in December shook the entire country. Large-scale demonstrations were held in every corner of the country regarding the safety of women. After the rape incidents in the country, there are large-scale protests by women regarding their safety. The Kolkata incident has reminded us of the Nirbhaya incident, there is anger in the country over this incident and people are taking to the streets demanding women’s safety and freedom.
