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Mere days after a 10-year-old girl was raped and murdered in Coimbatore district, a video went viral on social media. The woman in the video was the girl’s neighbour. She alleged the mother had been too intoxicated to notice that her child was missing until the next morning.
This narrative was soon pushed by many on the internet. Public debates quickly centred on the mother’s morality rather than on the brutality of the men, Karthi and Mohan, who committed the crime. When TNM visited Bharatipuram village, residents too seemed united in directing their anger at the mother.
When asked why their attention had shifted to her, residents repeated the allegations of alcohol consumption and that the family’s demands for compensation had irked them.
Neha*, the woman who posted the viral video, claimed she was “furious” that the mother had demanded financial aid. She told TNM, “The child would still be alive had the mother been more responsible. Instead, she asked for compensation.”
Compensation is an established administrative practice. Describing demands for aid by victims’ families as a moral failure is incorrect, experts pointed out.
Vidya Reddy, co-founder of Tulir – Centre for the Prevention and Healing of Child Sexual Abuse, said, “The family of a POCSO victim should not have even had to ask for compensation in the first place. The family who lost the child should get the compensation by default.”
On May 24, the mother alleged that her daughter had been cremated without her permission and that she had not even been permitted to see the body. She also flatly denied allegations that she was intoxicated and unaware that her child had been abducted by a neighbour.
Moral scrutiny amid fury
The child went missing on May 21. Her body was discovered on May 22. Police arrested the accused, K Karthi, and his accomplice, R Mohan, on May 23. Neither is from Coimbatore. Karthi is from Nagapattinam district and Mohan is from Thanjavur district.
Both accused, according to the police, have confessed to committing the crime at a site located 3 kilometres from the child’s home. They have been booked under various sections of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act and for kidnapping and rape.
When TNM visited Bharatipuram, residents were still in shock. “I have lived here for four decades, and this is the first time such an incident has occurred,” said Valluvamma*.
According to neighbours, the girl and her family moved to Bharatipuram less than a month ago. Their home is located on a narrow road surrounded by other houses. About 100 metres away is the house where Karthi lived. He was allegedly known to the family.
“We don’t know Karthi either. He is also new to the locality. I have only seen him roaming around a few times,” Valluvamma added.
She also claimed she’d been among the residents who had first entered the house with police and found the mother allegedly intoxicated.
“Us mothers worry if we lose sight of our children for even a few minutes. This child was missing for hours and the mother was not even aware of it,” said another neighbour.
Many other residents TNM spoke to repeated similar arguments, suggesting that the mother is responsible for what happened.
Neha added: “I felt justice was being denied to the child, and people should know the truth.” Though Neha later deleted her video, it had already been reused by other accounts and went viral across social media platforms.
Bias and deflection
Speaking to TNM, senior journalist Kavitha Muralidharan pointed to the systemic social biases that consistently shift the responsibility for violence and moral failings from male perpetrators to women.
“In cases of sexual assault, accountability is deflected as society scrutinises a woman's clothing, behaviour, or choices instead of condemning the men involved. The burden of guilt is often placed solely on women, and this has always been the case,” Kavitha observed.
Beyond the moral burden placed on women, such conversations can provide governments and law enforcement the means to deflect and absolve themselves of responsibility.
In the 2017 Walayar case in Kerala, two minor Dalit girls were found dead within 52 days of each other. Public scrutiny rapidly shifted away from the crime to the mother’s morals. The investigating officer even went to the extent of questioning the girls’ characters, leading to protests by the mother. They were only 13 and 9 years old.
Despite support for the mother from a section of Kerala society, the CBI eventually wanted to charge both parents for ‘wilful negligence’. The CBI also held them guilty for abetment of rape. The chargesheet also alleged that the mother consumed alcohol and that strange men regularly visited the house.
In 2025, in Kannur, a man identified as Kaladharan allegedly killed both his children and died by suicide amid a custody dispute with his wife. He had previously been booked in a POCSO case based on the wife’s complaint. After the deaths, the wife faced widespread online abuse accusing her of irresponsibility and seeking vengeance.
Recalling these and other cases, Father Augustine Vattoly, who was part of the Justice for Walayar Girls Forum, said, “In a highly patriarchal, male-chauvinistic society, it becomes very easy to shift responsibility from the perpetrator to the victim. It reflects ignorance and deep-rooted misogyny. Anti-women attitudes are embedded everywhere—in families, religious institutions, and political systems.”
Vattolly also raised concerns about how public outcry can influence a government's and law enforcement agencies’ reactions to such a crime. “The misogyny that exists in society makes it easy to blame a mother and divert attention away from the far more serious issues,” he added.
He condemned the criticism targeted at the mother’s demand for compensation. “Often victims come from communities that are economically and socially marginalised. Why should asking for compensation be treated as a crime? Why is the blame shifted from the actual perpetrators onto the mother? This is clearly a strategy designed to protect the offenders.” Vattoly said.
Further, Vidya Reddy highlighted how the POCSO Act explicitly indicates that child survivors are legally entitled to be considered for both interim and final compensation for medical expenses, mental trauma, and rehabilitation. When a child has died as a result of the offence, the Tamil Nadu government issued a government order which gives Rs 10,000 to the family for funeral expenses, Vidya further said.
*Name changed
Editor's Note: Though Neha's Instagram profile is public, she spoke to TNM on the condition that she would not be named in the story.