Eve-teasing and a search for the solution

Eve-teasing is a slang language of sexual harassment related to the female and quite publicized due to its progressive and depressing effect on the society. It is day by day prevailing throughout the country with its gruesome effect that has already made all the philanthropists and the government so concerned about how they can totally eliminate it from the country so as to ensure that the girls will no longer fall victim to it and will live in safety with their respective rights. This is why so many numbers of processions, rallies, conferences, discussions, written articles in all the dailies, TV programs broadcast with the electric media and other campaigns are taking place across the country.

To technically define eve teasing, it comprises two wards; one is eve used to mean our first mom Hawa (A) as described in the Bible and another is teasing which is the synonym of annoyance. In view of practical terms, it refers to making the girls annoyed or embarrassed by the poor minded persons who laugh at the attractively dressed and lovely girls and make jokes with them in a coarse way or express vulgar attitude towards them, even sexually assault upon them to mitigate their sensuous appetite after a failed trial to persuade them to have petting.

The girls who are ever so beautiful in their youth and reveal their appearance or beauty to others while walking outside on their way to schools, markets, workplaces etc. typically fall victim to eve teasing. Their ill dress, sensual attitude, free movement with the boys, conversation with dulcet tone-all these types easily provoke the teenagers to be attracted and result in teasing the girls by them as those girls are the representatives of the devil. To say the truth, that they move around in the figure of the devil bears witness to the statement of the Prophet (Sm) where he says: إِنَّ الْمَرْأَةَ تُقْبِلُ فِي صُوْرَةِ شَيْطَانٍ وَتُدْبِرُ فِي صُوْرَةِ شَيْطَانٍ فَإِذَا أَحَدُكُمْ أَعْجَبَتْهُ امْرَأَةٌ فَوَقَعَتْ فِى قَلْبِهِ فَلْيَعْمَدْ إِلَى إِمْرَأَتِهِ فَلْيُوَاقِعْهَا فَإِنَّ ذَلِكَ يَرُدُّ مَا فِي نَفْسِهِ. "Woman comes in the posture of the devil and goes back in his figure. While a woman attracks someone of you and she appears at his heart, he had better come to his own wife and have intercourse with her because that must vanish what exists inside him (Muslim, Mishkat H\3105).  Anyway, when the degree of attraction is so acute the girl-addicts fall in love with those girls, eventually rape them in case of denial. Among them especially bad tempered students, unemployed boys, rickshaw pullers and drivers throw piles of abuses towards those girls to goad them. These are very prevalent features of hateful eve teasing being caused by such a group of boys with the girls who have no moral and religious knowledge as well. It is the most significant point that no boys or girls who lead Islamic lives have got vulnerable to or been accused of the crime so far. Accordingly dear readers, therein lies what would be the causes and the solution to the problem.

Not any single class of the people is responsible for it, but people of different races and other attributes are the main culprits in cultivating eve-teasing for example, some parents along with their issues, existing superstition, sophisticated culture, co-education with coarse movement among the young, decline of moral and religious passion and taking the restrictions and regulations issued by Allah under no implementation. Some parents enthuse their sons or daughters to be shameless in the spheres of dancing, singing, making fun with their counterparts simply raising an excuse of friendship and entertainment whereas shame is such an overarching asset to the humans that is capable of preventing one from a sin, therefore it is called a brunch of Iman (Muttafaqun Alaih, Mishkat, H\03).

In this way, blatant movement in almost every educational institution, shopping malls, recreational functions and other domains has been available in the extreme. In addition, a great number of mobile phones, musical instruments, CDs, VCDs, DVDs, Facebook, Internet etc. whereat nakedness is all along available for the oor minded young, has been added to the collapse of our society. All the afore-mentioned aspects rekindle romantic passion of the young who have no knowledge at all over the restrictions of Islam; as a result, they commit crimes like eve-teasing, ultimately assault upon the girls either with agreement or disagreement.   

To depict the consequence for that, it is beggar's description to express how much severe it is and how it damages one’s virginity, gets one depressed, sometimes inspires to commit suicide. In these days, the female are not as respected in our surroundings as they would be in the golden age of Islam. They are instead made to suffer from uncertain chastity and they are to drop out of their workplaces, schools and so on, thereby being deprived of well education, livelihood etc. and remaining illiterate and unemployed. Many a man or woman is to dedicate his life owing to protest against eve teasing and in the meanwhile, a great number of parents, brothers, other relatives, neighbors and bosom persons have been killed by the miscreants while stepping forewords to save their dear ones. Such events are so much heart rending that cannot be expressed in words, as it is merely a matter of feeling through nothing but the psyche. Let's have a short glance on the following survey published in the daily Amar Desh. During last year, the number of the victims to eve teasing is 434 girls and suicide committers are 28 with more 12 persons who lost their lives due to protest against it (1^st page, 25 November 2010). Out of them, the suicide of Pingki, Elora, Prova, Rupali, and Jaba is most notable here amongst the deceased on account of protest, the names of Chapa Rani Vowmic, Sadekur Rahman with his wife Roman Nurgis, master Mizanur Rahman and Harun are most familiar to all. Anyway, barely on last October, 40 girls were victims to it and 26 were raped (page no.6, 3-11-10). 

The government body being forced by the people from all walks of life to solve the case is altogether busy with the issue and has been committed to deal with it through the power of the state constitution but it is a matter of enquiry how far they would be triumphant in their campaigns. On the contrary, the constitution has a lack of a certain anti-eve teasing law; though there are few related laws, for instance, article no.509 in penal code, article no.10 over trafficking in women and children and article no.76 in metropolitan police ordinance in 1976. Some more strategies have been appended to them namely mobile court, jail sentence for---months with tk.---as fine etc. yet even worse pathetic phenomenons of eve-teasing are still breaking out. Have the wicked stopped their misdeed in the fright of punishment?

In the recent years, eve teasing seems to stay beyond control but won’t it be eliminated anyhow?—that is more than questionable to the concerned who are, we can precisely distinguish seeing those pursuing too much talking about it in the electric or print media, in deep meditation with a view to devising up the perfect solution after their failure to elevate it to a certain extent in spite of having enacted piles of anti-eve teasing laws. This state of theirs will never exhaust as long as they indulge in the enforcement of laws enacted by themselves irrespective of Allah’s restrictions.

Allah says, يَا أَيُّهَا النَّبِيُّ قُل لِّأَزْوَاجِكَ وَبَنَاتِكَ وَنِسَاء الْمُؤْمِنِينَ يُدْنِينَ عَلَيْهِنَّ مِن جَلَابِيبِهِنَّ ذَلِكَ أَدْنَى أَن يُعْرَفْنَ فَلَا يُؤْذَيْنَ وَكَانَ اللَّهُ غَفُوراً رَّحِيماً. ‘Oh prophet, tell your wives, daughters and the women of the believers to draw their cloaks close round them (when they go abroad). That will be better, so that they may be recognized and not teased. Allah is ever forgiving, merciful’ (Sura Al- Ahzab 59). In another verse, he saysقُل لِّلْمُؤْمِنِينَ يَغُضُّوا مِنْ أَبْصَارِهِمْ وَيَحْفَظُوا فُرُوجَهُمْ ذَلِكَ أَزْكَى لَهُمْ إِنَّ اللَّهَ خَبِيرٌ بِمَا يَصْنَعُونَ  "Tell the believing men to lower their gaze  and be modest. That is purer for them. Lo! Allah is aware of what they do (Sura An Nur-30). He urged to lower the gaze not only of men but also women, for exampl,eوَقُل لِّلْمُؤْمِنَاتِ يَغْضُضْنَ مِنْ أَبْصَارِهِنَّ وَيَحْفَظْنَ فُرُوجَهُنَّ 'And tell the believing women to lower their gaze and be modest` (Sura An Nur-31). So everybody ought to keep his gaze below no matter weither he is a man or a woman and this is an effective bar to what might awake latter in one's mind.  The Prophet (sm) says, "Adultery of human eyes is to see through, of ears is to hear, of tongue is to taste with, of heart is to cherish it and the genitals proves the truth or falsehood" (Muslim, Miskat H-86). Given the above statement, how can one commit those types of adultery as long as he keeps the teachings of the hadith under every implementation? Besides, there must not be any possibility for eve teasing to be committed in the long run. The prophet (sm) further says ‘‘the evil acts as third person when a male and a female get together in a lonely place (Tirmiji, Sanad Saheeh, Mishkat H-1318). It denotes that the evil stimulates them to commit sins. In our surroundings, it has been a very common feature that the boys and the girls spend their time sitting closer to each other in parks, forests and other congenial places.

Apart from the above references, there are, however, a great deal of quotations in the holy Quran and the authentic Hadith of the Prophet (sm) that can exactly direct us to the perfect solution to the problem. The pivotal treatment against eve-teasing is the cultivation of Taqwa (fear in Allah) which is definitely capable of keeping boys and girls away from all sorts of sins or crimes as well as guiding them to the ultimate success both here and hereafter. So taqwa, the indispensable adaptation must be inculcated in each human being and we can expect the long cherished society afterwards; a society where men and women would live in peace and comfort having their respective rights, abide by Allah’s orders-prohibition etc. and wouldn’t encroach upon others’ rights, respects and so on. Thus all types of major or minor difficulties would be effectively solved simply with the help of taqwa. Accordingly, it can be precisely stated that taqwa and fully obedience to the Creator had better be optimized as the catalyst for the removal of eve-teasing. May Allah give that taqwa in all of us. Ameen!!