ABSTRACT
India, December 2012: The gruesome gang rape of a 23-year-old woman in Delhi led to the victim’s death; the gang rape of an 18-year-old Dalit woman in Punjab, followed by police refusal to act on her complaint, led to the victim committing suicide.1 These two events brought to the forefront the extreme nature of gendered and sexualised violence against women in India today. The devaluation of female life, and the glorification of violence against women that is structurally condoned and socially permissible, lead to tragic forms of gendered and sexualised violence in the public, family and political sphere; to dowry deaths, acid throwing, torture through gang and collective rape, mutilation and honour killings.2 A woman is raped every twenty minutes; 95,000 rape cases are pending within the court system; and three of four perpetrators of such crimes go free.3
