VOX POPULI
                                                                 by
                                                            S Kamat   
                                                                  as
                                                           Aam Admi           
                                       Issue: 220                     Date: 25.09.2017 

 skamatblog.blogspot.com or aamadmivoices.blogspot.com

Contents:

1. Oil Prices In India Going Up & Up While Internationally They are Down, Down

2. Trying To Reduce Rape & Attacks On Minor Children

3. Tightening Safety & Security Of Children in Our Schools

   Oil Prices In India Going Up & Up While Internationally They are Down, Down

The manner in which the government sold the scheme on daily change of petroleum product rates to the public was transparency. However, at this time when prices within the country of petroleum fuels is going up & up while internationally prices of oil are going down, the Finance Minister has said that the government needs to make up for lost revenue in the past and if the public want any price reduction they should contact their States since sales tax on petroleum fuels across the country ranges from 25-40%. So where is the plank of transparency? Has it been thrown out of the window in a matter of months that the daily change of rates was set up? The government in this way will lose its credibility for two reasons, one for going back on its words and second, the show of irascibility by Jaitley inspite of being a senior minster. He is increasingly showing his upset face because for him none of his initiatives seem to be working for the economy. 

             Trying To Reduce Rape & Attacks On Minor Children

After the murder incident in the Gurugram school of young Pradyuman, a number of incidents have been reported by the media across India of crimes against children mostly girls like a minor  being molested in a Bengaluru school and another middle school girl thrown off from the 3rd floor in Eastern UP. It is almost as if like termites, these cases are emerging from the effect of the rotten sexual perversion mite that is infesting our society. Such incidents have been reported across India even after the public outcry and awareness raised  post the abhorring Nirbhaya rape case in Delhi during 2013. These cases can be variations of personal enmity, childhood rivalries, carelessness of the victims etc. etc. But the underlying theme in the majority of the cases is sexual depravity of the Indian male. Added to that is the indulgent attitude shown when incidents occur from the perpetrator's families if they happen to be wealthy or politically well connected to get their people off the hook from the clutches of the police and the justice system. This attitudinal change has to  be brought about and a sense  of respect for the women in society drilled into the minds of boys and men through school and college. Another reason for such incidents against women occurring lately with increasing regularity is the depiction of our women in our cinema. Where Indian television is taking the moderate route in projecting women, cinema has been going overboard in showing women in various stages of dress to undress to pander to the supposed box office and also to ape the Western culture influence on our society.  In fact the celebrated item number in our films should be voluntarily given up by our filmmakers for at least 2-3 years to stop the salivating aspect of our films. In making our society safe for women, the women themselves also need to pitch in and contribute their mite. This means that they need to understand that for the sake of all Indian women, they will have to dress moderately when they appear in public and limit anatomical exposure to the extent of decorum and decency that is generally accepted in the surroundings in which they normally live and work. This advice particularly applies to women who are in urban surroundings and who consider themselves elite or trendsetters and in the name of women's empowerment under which pretext for them anything goes. This can be applicable when they are in their homes and family surroundings but when they come out in public they need to dress appropriately in the larger interest of other women in our society particularly those in our villages and semi-urban areas who may not be as privileged as them. We can then see if the number of rapes in the country and the attacks on small children reduce.

                          Tightening Safety & Security Of Children in Our Schools

There was a time when children once entrusted to the school for the day were considered safe and secure as much as in their homes. This included from the point they were dropped off at the school gate and/or when picked up by the school bus and until the child was delivered back in the hands of the family. Pradyuman's shocking murder at the Ryan school in Gurugram has shaken the foundation of these beliefs and smashed them to smithereens. Whatever be the circumstances how anyone can take the life of an innocent 7-year old defies any sensible person's imagination. The accusations of sexual abuse are also very disconcerting. It is very important that the child's killers should be caught and punished so that our society is reassured that such things will not take place again. For this the school system should institute suitable measures for the safety and security of the children by having a dialog with police, security consultants and the parent-teacher bodies. The Ryan school given the information put out by the media seems to be an established school but having the bathrooms without grills on the windows etc. and continuing operations with the facilities in unfinished state are a clear sign of irresponsibility. The school management should be hauled up for this and suitable punitive measures imposed on them. The CBSE board under which the school functions should also be reprimanded since it is not only when instances like this of the child's murder happens that they wake up to the lapses of the school management but that in their periodic inspections they should have brought these issues to the notice of the school management in which case maybe this particular incident would not have occurred. In any case society needs to get to the bottom of is child's murder in school premises and the way things are going of playing political and legal football the case should not go the way of unsolved cases even though the bus conductor, the suspected perpetrator has been arrested. 

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