Why Delhi’s Astha Kunj ‘gangrape case’ raises questions about access to safe public dating spaces
The minor survivor and her male friend had reportedly gone to the park after visiting a temple on the occasion of the girl's birthday, when they were allegedly targeted by the accused 'posing as policemen'. While the case again highlights the lack of safety for women in public places, couples also talk of being scrutinised, judged and harassed.
Simran (identified by first name only) was six years old when the Nirbhaya gang-rape case — where a 23-year-old paramedical student was brutally raped and assaulted in a moving bus on a December night in 2012, leading to her eventual death — shook the country to its core. There was nationwide outrage, protests, demands for reforms, movements by women to ‘reclaim the night’ (safe...
Simran (identified by first name only) was six years old when the Nirbhaya gang-rape case — where a 23-year-old paramedical student was brutally raped and assaulted in a moving bus on a December night in 2012, leading to her eventual death — shook the country to its core. There was nationwide outrage, protests, demands for reforms, movements by women to ‘reclaim the night’ (safe public spaces for women)... The perpetrators were caught and eventually convicted. But Simran, now 20, has little first-hand recall of the incident; she was too young when it happened and what she knows about it came from others’ recollections.
The 2024 rape and murder case of a postgraduate resident physician in Kolkata, which she read about in the newspapers, was troubling, but being in Delhi, the incident was still physically too removed to cause her any real feelings of fear.
That changed last month, with the alleged rape of a 17-year-old in Delhi’s Astha Kunj park, by “three men posing as policemen”. The minor and her male friend had reportedly gone to the park after visiting a nearby temple on the girl’s birthday.
Simran, who has a boyfriend, says they meet in cinema halls and malls, but also often in “secluded public spaces”.
The accused in the Astha Kunj case have since been arrested, but the case has again ignited the familiar public discourse on women’s safety in public spaces in the country.
Following reports of the case, Lady Shri Ram College (LSR) for girls, which is in close proximity to the park, shifted classes online “for the safety of students”. The girls protested the move, questioning the “shutting and locking” of women instead of addressing the issue of women’s safety.
In protests, the students spoke about “men loitering near the college back gate”. An ex-student, who goes by the name of @sundrysanj on Instagram, wrote, “that park separated the college from the neighbourhood where most of us lived as PGs [paying guests]. Crossing it would be the easiest way to get to class. After classes, when they ended around evening, we would all walk back together because we knew there were men watching, following, catcalling, making the space feel really unsafe”.
There have also been reports written on the lack of lighting at Delhi’s parks, with the authorities restricting entry to parks after sundown — another example of closing access to public spaces rather than making them secure.
Beyond the sad but familiar narrative of the lack of women’s safety in public spaces, the Astha Kunj case also further highlights the absence of ‘safe’ public dating spaces for couples in the country. A mall, multiplex or cafe is likely to offer greater security, but what options remain for young people with limited means?
Couple talk of the fear of voyeurism, scrutiny, moral policy, judgement and downright harassment or security risks while meeting in public. Photo: iStock
Nisha Siddhu, general secretary of the National Federation of Indian Women (NIFW), insists that a “young woman should not have to choose between an expensive restaurant or mall and an unsafe, poorly lit public space simply because she wants to spend time with someone she knows. Public parks and other common spaces belong equally to everyone, including young couples. The fact that a woman was simply sitting in a park after visiting a temple should never become a circumstance in which her safety is compromised.”
Siddhu also talks about implementation and accountability. “Laws and technology alone cannot guarantee safety. The real question is implementation and accountability. If a public park is poorly lit, lacks adequate surveillance, has no visible security presence and becomes a vulnerable space after dark, then the responsibility lies with the agencies responsible for maintaining and securing that public space. Young people have a right to meet, talk and spend time together with dignity and without living under a constant fear of violence.”
But couples The Federal spoke to repeatedly talk about issues of voyeurism, scrutiny, moral policy, judgement and downright harassment or security risks.
Also read: How the Gen Z protest may have impacted campus politics in the country
“It is extremely uncomfortable to be out on the streets of Delhi with your partner,” admits Namit (identified by first name only), a Delhi resident. “There are constant stares and because of the fear of being called out, we even fear holding hands in public. A hug feels like crossing all boundaries of intimacy.”
The problem is not restricted to Delhi.
"There was this time when I was travelling by the Bengaluru Metro with my boyfriend; we were sharing our earphones and he had his arms around my shoulder. We were laughing over a video we were watching. Suddenly, a man older than us started abusing me in Kannada," recalls Sowmya (identified), a 23-year-old Bengaluru resident.
Sowmya, who is not originally from Karnataka, adds that she does not speak Kannada fluently, but she knows the language well enough to understand what the man had been saying. "He called me a whore and accused me of ruining the city's culture." She adds: "Both my boyfriend and I froze, but another passenger our age spoke and asked the man to shut up. My boyfriend and I got down at the next station even though it was not our stop. Ever since, I don't meet my boyfriend in public places. I don't want to put myself in a situation where I feel unsafe and vulnerable."
Last year, a couple in Bengaluru were reportedly harassed outside a park, allegedly for their “interfaith interaction”.
Smaller towns can be especially brutal in their gaze and moral policing.
Earlier this year, there were reports of a group of “saffron-clad men” harassing a couple in a park in Ayodhya. In Berhampur, Odisha, a couple were reportedly assaulted with sticks on a busy road by a group of men in May this year, though a “past enmity" was alleged to be the trigger here. In January, there were horrifying reports of a couple jumping from the second floor of a pizza outlet in Uttar Pradesh’s Shahjahanpur to escape alleged harassment by a “Hindutva group”.
Valentine’s Day, which is supposed to celebrate romance, can get especially brutal with the moral police out in full strength.
“Couples are always frowned upon by these so-called ‘protectors of the faith’. There’s this constant fear that you can get unnecessarily questioned or attacked just for sharing the same public space. It’s even worse for inter-faith couples; I’ve witnessed grown men threatening teenagers in parks and colonies for walking or sitting together,” claims a 22-year-old in Delhi, speaking on condition of anonymity.
Sometimes the law itself — its ambiguity and interpretation — can increase risks of targeting by both the moral police and the cops. Couples The Federal spoke to cited “harassment” by police under the garb of upholding Section 296 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (earlier section 294 of the Indian Penal Code), which talks of “obscene acts in public”. While courts have repeatedly ruled that holding hands, sitting together or hugging do not constitute obscenity, it does not stop either cops or the moral police from targeting couples.
The law against obscenity in public spaces risks being used by the moral police and law enforces alike to target couples. Photo: iStock
A 30-year-old in Kolkata, speaking on condition of anonymity, recalls the time when she and her now husband (then fiancé) were subjected to harassment under this very clause. “He was dropping me home one night; we stopped the car a little distance from my house and were sitting in the car and talking. It was literally weeks before the wedding. The local police station was not far. Suddenly a couple of officers tapped on the car window and demanded to know what we were doing. Our explanation was not thought good enough and they demanded we either “settle” or be taken to the police station,” she says. The 30-year-old, a journalist, continues, “My husband wanted to avoid a scandal at any cost, but I asked the cops to be taken to the station. This was not to their liking. They kept trying to persuade us to pay up, till the time I told them I was a journalist. They couldn’t leave fast enough after that.”
Not all couples get off that easily.
Namit talks of the psychological pressure of being subjected to constant scrutiny. “You tend to withdraw more from society and stay confined to homes because of the constant judging,” he says.
In the wake of the Astha Kunj gangrape case, several activists have spoken up about the right of young people to safe public spaces. “Public spaces have become way worse in the last 10 years. Although there are a lot more girls out on the streets now who should ideally feel safe and secure. But it is just the opposite. Instead of the culture opening up, there is reactionary rolling back, particularly by this regime, which does not inspire confidence,” says feminist activist Kavita Krishnan.
She alleges: “There is a whole culture about how rape is talked about. Several Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP, the party in power at the Centre) leaders like Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh, whom women wrestlers had accused of sexual harassment, or Kuldeep Singh Sengar, who is now convicted of raping a minor in 2017, were shielded. Others, like Tirath Singh Rawat, have [reportedly] expressed dismay on seeing women wear ripped jeans and questioned her ‘sanskar’. There is more moral policing now than ever before. There is no education about consent; under the guise of protection, instead of Beti bachao, it is like put Beti in qaid (lock them up).”
The activist also talks of “increased scrutiny on couples, live-in and queer relationships”.
Her concern is shared by Tara Krishnaswamy, activist and policy advisor. “In Indian cultural paradigms, there is extreme fear in women having agency over themselves. Indian culture would like to control women from birth to death in terms of everything in what they wear, whether they work, how much they earn, who they fall in love with, who they marry, to how they should behave with their husbands to what she studies. Everything is controlled, policed and supervised, so it is apparent the present Indian culture is very scared about women’s agency over their lives, bodies, minds, over choices. So when a couple sits down and exhibits love in a public space, that means the woman is exercising her agency.”
Krishnaswamy adds: “Even the police may ask, ‘what are you doing outside, why are you here, or why are you wearing what you are wearing etc’. You may get slut shamed right there in public for no reason and the man who is harassing you may walk free.”
Also read: Is the state shaping our private choices? From what we eat to who we love and what we read…
While Siddhu insists that the responsibility to avoid sexual violence can’t rest with women and that the authorities need to be accountable for “preventing and responding to crime”, one’s own and the family’s apprehensions can make a woman change herself in ways that she should not have to.
Simran should not have to worry about the consequences of meeting her boyfriend in a public place. But she is. The 20-year-old says that after reading about the Astha Kunj case, she has promised herself not to be alone in a secluded public place with her boyfriend and to hangout in a group as far as possible.
(With inputs from Suhani Prakash and Monashree Sankar)
