India’s women are angry.
Those are slogans from thousands of women and students who have taken to the streets in Delhi over the past week, demanding something that should really not have to be a demand: the right to study, work, travel, and simply exist in public without being afraid of sexual violence.
The immediate trigger was the gang rape of a 17-year-old girl at Aastha Kunj Park in south Delhi. The response was swift, but not in the way the protesters wanted.
Lady Shri Ram College, a women’s college close to the park, was forced to switch to online classes.
Delhi authorities wanted to restrict access to public parks after dark, and announced security measures for vulnerable areas- which they should have done much before.
And for many women, that is precisely the problem. Because this isn't really about one case, or even one city. It is about a pattern that has become painfully familiar.
A woman is assaulted, there is outrage. And sooner or later comes the advice: don’t go there, don’t stay out late, dress differently, carry something for protection, call someone when you reach home.
In other words, the crime happens to a woman, and somehow it’s still the woman who gets saddled with a new set of rules.
And this policing of women very easily escalates to harassment as well
In Jamui of Bihar, two teenagers were physically harassed by a group of men claiming to be enforcing “morality”. A video of the incident also went viral, eventually leading to police action.
So why does every conversation about women’s safety seem to come with another rule for women?
Why does an unsafe public space become a reason to restrict the women who use it? And why, exactly, are women so angry?
Let me explain.
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A few weeks ago, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had his own cultural shock.
It was a total cultural shock for the PM to hear “our daughters” use abusive language. He thinks the young women protesters were misguided and should be shown the right path, rather than be punished for the crime of language.
And that is interesting, because “our daughters” are saying plenty of things right now.
They are angry about being followed on the way home. About being told not to go out after dark. About having their locations tracked. About having to explain where they are, who they are with, and when they'll be back.
And, increasingly, they're angry about being told that the answer to sexual violence is for them to make themselves smaller.
Which brings us to the remarkably long list of solutions that our governing politicians have offered women over the years.
Step 1: Draw a Lakshman rekha and do not cross it. Because it was when Sitaji crossed the Lakshman Rekha that she was kidnapped by Ravan.
Step 2: Wear good clothes so you don’t look like Shurpanakha.
Step 3: Don’t go out after dark.
Step 4: Learn judo or karate because no government can stop rape.
Step 5: Maybe visit a temple.
Step 6: If all else fails, apparently, do some moral policing — but please do it decently and elegantly.
The last suggestion was by a woman, Bihar minister Shreyasi Singh, who is also the MLA in Jamui, where a teen girl faced brutal harassment in the name of morality.
While discussing the incident on a TV debate, she said this.
But that’s not all.
The state president of JD(U), a partner in the state’s ruling coalition, called what happened an ‘isolated incident’. The Chief Minister himself said the accused could have got away with the crime had they refrained from filming the incident.
These political takes are not new.
From ‘you should not be adventurous’ to boys will be boys, we have really heard it all for decades.
And this is always accompanied with the questioning of the survivor herself.
Her clothes were inspected, her company was examined, and her choice to be outside at a certain hour was questioned.
The verdict seems to be that this ‘isolated incident’ of slightly less ‘decent’ moral policing could have been avoided had the girl remained home, covered in an ‘appropriate’ amount of clothes.
Once the bad political takes and victim blaming is over, there’s also the regular stream of advice to women — carry pepper sprays, safety pins, keys, learn martial arts, download apps that will make you safe. Press the red button damn it!
One viral advice said- Learn to shoot air pistols, they cost just Rs 60,000–70,000 a piece
As if any of this can really work. It’s no wonder that women are angry.
There are never real solutions. There is just victim blaming, and then abundance of advice
Why didn’t the Delhi police make Aastha Kunj a safer place? The place where the rape happened was among the 'dark spots' identified by the Delhi police's survey of poorly lit areas areas.
So, are we making our cities, towns and villages safer? What about our laws? And, perhaps more importantly, are we trying to prevent violence before it happens?
Sweden, for example, changed its law in 2018 to make consent central to its definition of rape: sex without voluntary participation can constitute rape, even without threats or violence.
Spain went further with its “only yes means yes” law.
But it is not just about changing laws after a crime has happened. Some countries are also asking what happens much earlier — in schools, in classrooms, and online.
In the UK, new guidance for schools specifically addresses misogyny and harmful ideas about women.
Boys are being taught to recognise healthy relationships and positive models of masculinity.
Australia, meanwhile, has a national Consent and Respectful Relationships Education programme for primary and secondary schools.
All around us, we have examples of countries trying. They may not be fully successful, but they are trying.
But here, we are forcing women to come out to the streets in pure desperation.
A decade ago, the women students of Delhi University had rallied behind the Pinjra Tod movement, calling for an end to discriminatory curfews and moral policing.
A couple years before that, the capital city’s streets had been swollen with crowds seeking justice in the Nirbhaya rape case.
Now in 2026, young women are forced to once again take to the streets, raising decade-old demands for safety, and condemning efforts to once again shut them in the ‘pinjras’ their predecessors had strived to break free of.
No wonder women are angry.
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