Women Continue To Face Sexual Abuse

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) is a milestone document in the history of human rights. It was proclaimed by the United Nations General Assembly in 1948. The UDHR defines human rights as universal, inalienable, and inherent entitlements belonging to every person, regardless of status, based on the principle that all people are born free and equal in dignity.  However, there is a big question: 'Even though these rights are protected by international law, are they implemented in reality?'

Recently, a news story related to the Epstein files was published by the international media, which made people's eyes go wide open. The release of these files triggers a public debate globally. When I read about Jeffrey Epstein, I got furious. How can people be so cruel to children? In fact, he has been on news since 2005 when his criminal activities were exposed. That year, the Florida police started investigating him when the parents of a 14-year-old girl reported that she had been molested at the millionaire's home in Palm Beach. Epstein turned to be a wealthy convicted sex offender. 

Sex trafficking 

He was arrested in 2019 on federal charges of sex trafficking of minors. It is said that the same year, he died by suicide in jail while awaiting trial on sex trafficking and conspiracy charges. This year the US Department of Justice has published more than three million additional pages related to the Epstein files. What is surprising in this document is that many high-profile world people are listed there who seemed to be somehow connected to Jeffrey Epstein. These people include Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, Elon Musk, Bill Gates, Sarah Ferguson, Ehud Barak, Donald Trump, Bill Clinton and many others. 

Appearing in the documents, however, does not mean that there is any implication of wrongdoing. Still, these people may be under surveillance until the investigation is complete. We all know that America is one of the most democratic countries in the world. In such a country, children are also not safe and what can we expect in places like ours? Human trafficking is the biggest problem in Nepal as well, where women and girls are the most vulnerable. Anuradha Koirala, a social activist and the founder of Maiti Nepal, has been fighting against this issue for years and the problem remains the same. Who doesn't know about a 13-year old girl, Nirmala Panta? She was found raped and murdered in 2018. Sadly, justice for her has not been delivered yet.

The other day, I heard a terrible story of a woman from Arghakhachi who was extremely tortured physically and mentally by her own husband. She was kept hostage in a house by him. She was sexually abused every day, because of which her vagina was torn up. She could not hold either her urine or stool, as both of them came out from the same organ. To terrorise her, the husband used to put a knife to her chest while sleeping. The couple had two children and the father had threatened them not to tell anything to anyone; if they did, he would kill their mothers and them as well. So, the children were terrified. 

Luckily, the son was able to take a photograph of her mother with a knife on her chest and show it to the local social activists. Eventually, she was rescued by them after living a hellish life for nearly one and a half years. Let's take another case of Shobha Pathak, who has a lot of allegations against a CPN-UML leader, Mahesh Basnet. She claims that she got married to Basnet but he denied the fact and abandoned her. She shouts now and then that she has not got justice. She even blames the KP Sharma Oli-led government for covering Basnet's truth. She is still fighting her battle in the court. 

These are only a few examples. Every day, there are news stories published which are related to child marriage, child abuse, forced marriage, dowry, rape, domestic violence, murder, sexual harassment or gender discrimination. In most of the cases, females are the victims. We talk about women's rights or children's rights but these rights may not be experienced by all of the concerned people. A UN report shows that around 50,000 women and girls worldwide were killed in 2024, most by family members. The same report says that a French woman, Gisele Pelicot, was drugged by her husband and raped by dozens of men while she was unconscious for over nine years. 

Domination 

Whether it is in Nepal or elsewhere in the world, it is seen that more powerful people dominate the less powerful ones. Historically, this power has been given to men based on patriarchal norms. The label attached to women as the 'weaker sex' seems to be persistent at some level. This may be the reason why some men mistreat women and girl children. They should not forget that everybody has equal rights in all spheres of life. 

Human civilisation has come this far but the savagery of the ancient society follows in one or another form. Even if this is the case, we should not stop raising our voice continuously against each and every sort of discrimination until we are heard and appropriate action is taken. At the same time, we should be watchful that some people always want to silence our voice to prove their superiority or power. The fight for human rights goes on and on.

(The author is the director of Vidya Shilpa Academy, Damak, Jhapa.)