It's Not Just Azam Khan: Outrageous Remarks on Rape by Political Leaders

Samajwadi Party leader Azam Khan's remark, that the Bulandshahr highway gangrape could be a political conspiracy to defame the Uttar Pradesh government, has been panned by his rivals and activists.

This is the umpteenth time though that a leader from the SP, or for that matter any political party, has made such an outrageous remark on rape.

Azam Khan's boss and Samajwadi Party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav had crossed all limits during the campaign for the 2014 general elections when he said, "Boys make mistakes. They should not be hanged for this. We will revoke the anti-rape laws."

When it comes to insensitive remarks, Yadav's son and Uttar Pradesh chief minister Akhilesh Yadav too wasn't far behind his party colleagues.

When a reporter from a television channel once quizzed him about increasing rapes in the state he hit back at her asking, "You are safe, why are you bothered?"

SP leader Abu Azmi told a newspaper, “If rape happens with or without consent, it should be punished as prescribed in Islam. Any woman if, whether married or unmarried, goes along with a man, with or without her consent, should be hanged. Both should be hanged. It shouldn’t be allowed even if a woman goes by consent.”

Leaders from the BJP, Congress and other political parties too were guilty of making bizarre statements on rape.

Kailash Vijayvargiya, who is currently the serving national secretary of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), said in 2013 that rapes happen when women cross the limits of morality.

Babulal Gaur, Cabinet Minister for Madhya Pradesh from BJP said, "Rape is a social crime which depends on the man and the woman. It is sometimes right and sometimes wrong."

Ram Sewak Paikra, minister in the ruling BJP government in Chhattisgarh said, "rapes do not happen deliberately. These kind of incidents happen accidentally."

Among other parties, NCP leader and former Home Minister of Maharashtra, RR Patil, was quoted as saying in 2014: "Even if we provide one policeman per house we can't stop crimes against women...The rise in atrocities against women is due to obscene images used in advertisements."

After the rape of a 22-year-old BPO employee shook Bengaluru in October 2015, former Karnataka Home Minister KJ George from the ruling Congress party suggested that two men raping a woman could not be termed gangrape.

"Gangrape means four-five people," George had said.

Dharamveer Goyat, a senior Congress minister from Haryana said in 2014, "Ï have no hesitation in saying that about 90% of the girls consensually go with men and then they end up meeting criminal minds and become targets of rape."

Former chief minister of Haryana Om Prakash Chautala once backed a khap panchayat diktat which said the age-limit for marriage should be lowered to prevent rapes among women.

And it was not just the men, this was what some of our women leaders said.

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee in October 2012 reasoned that rape cases were on a rise in the country because men and women interact with each other more freely now.

Mamata even blamed the media and said "Everyday rape incidents are being highlighted as if the entire state has become the land of rapists. Rape is sought to be glorified by these people. This will not be tolerated by people."

Her party MP Dr Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar in December 2012 described Kolkata's Park Street rape case as a misunderstanding between the woman and her "client".