New Delhi: What do you do when you really want to do something about eveteasing? Well, confront them with "something you always wanted to wear, but could not".
Not quite. It may not be the best of ideas to take on the eveteasers in that ‘form’ in a city like Delhi or Mumbai. But that is exactly what the women (and men) of Blank Noise Project are out to do in Delhi on Friday.
They will be holding a 'visual protest' from Dilli Haat to Sarojini Nagar on Friday night. The 'visual protest', scheduled to start at 2100 hrs (IST) and end around midnight, is an unconventional way of highlighting and tackling the problem.
And they have a dress code for the programme. "The dress code for Friday's walk is something you always wanted to wear, but could not," says Jasmeen Patheja, director of the Delhi branch of the Blank Noise Project. "People can wear anything which they would otherwise not feel comfortable wearing due to reasons of ‘imagined’ safety," she says.
"If eveteasing on Delhi roads has you bothered, here’s your chance to do something about it. It's about reclaiming public spaces," Jasmeen says. "We wouldn't call it a march, but a visual protest. Blank Noise Project is an initiative against street sexual harassment which includes leching, touching, staring, groping, pinching, stalking, looking..."
The group, which started out in Bangalore, has branches in Mumbai, Chennai and Hyderabad. It operates mainly through its website www.blanknoiseproject.blogspot.com.
Not wanting to give away too much, the director says the walk will 'include some talk, food, drink and action'. Action might require people to 'sprint, hide and run'.
Taxis will be arranged for the participants to get home, she says, adding that men are also welcome.
The project's website says pointedly: "Eveteasing, as the name suggests, is considered a joke, a prank. Eveteasing is street sexual harassment. The project seeks to recognise eve teasing as a sexual crime and establish the issue as something that may be normal but is unacceptable."
Comments
0 comment