Hazard of Young Women
In two incidents on Tuesday five young women were subjected to acid attack. Even after discounting the superstitious part of things occurring on the new year's day - that these would keep repeating round the year, we shudder at the sudden spurt in the acid-throwing crime.
This dastardly crime is nothing new. But only last year it made a stir in society when certain women's rights groups took up the challenge posed by this cowardly criminal act. The interest thus aroused in the public mind helped prompt some initiatives on both government and private levels to treat and rehabilitate the victims who happen to be all women. One expected that together with that the crime itself would be discouraged by the wideranging expression of social repugnance. That hasn't obviously happened.
There is no worse suffering for man and animals than turn injuries. And acid burns are the horriblest of them all. And when the victim survives the attack and her skin heals - if she is not killed that is - the suffering continues, on human terms. What can be the appropriate punishment for those that wreak such a havoc on the individual, on her family, on the society at large? The law prescribes a punishment but it doesn't lay down any time limit on the carrying out of the sentence. This accounts for the prescribed stringent punishment failing totally to act as a deterrent.
When about a decade back there was a spate of acid throwing incidents, the then government very wisely acted to make selling and buying of acids difficult. Professional criminals do not use acid. The jilted lover or the infatuated big man in the area would hardly take the trouble to jump restrictions on acid selling. The rate of incidence then responded well to the action. It would possibly do the same now.
Meanwhile, how are things proceeding on the curative aspect or plastic surgery arrangements for the victims? Let us hope the enthusiasm has not cooled off.
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