The woman journalist, who has accused Tehelka editor Tarun Tejpal of sexually assaulting her in Goa earlier this month, has rubbished allegations that the case against him was politically motivated. She also said what Tejpal did to her amounted to rape.
The victim issued a fresh statement on Friday saying what she was “deeply concerned and very disturbed by insinuations that the complaint is part of a pre-election political conspiracy.” She called upon political parties to refrain from politicising the issue.
“The struggle for women to assert control over their lives and their bodies is most certainly a political one, but feminist politics and its concerns are wider than the narrow universe of our political parties. Thus, I call upon our political parties to resist the temptation to turn a very important discussion about gender, power and violence into a conversation about themselves,” she said.
On suggestions that she was acting on someone else’s behest, she said it is “only the latest depressing indication that sections of our public
discourse are unwilling to acknowledge that women are capable to making decisions about themselves, for themselves.”
“In this past week, television commentators who should know better, have questioned my motivations and my actions during and after Mr Tejpal molested me. Some have questioned the time it took for me to file my complaint, more inquisitive commentators have questioned the use of the word “sexual molestation” versus words like rape,” the statement said.
“Perhaps the hardest part of this unrelentingly painful experience has been my struggle with taxonomy. I don’t know if I am ready to see myself as a “rape victim,” for my colleagues, friends, supporters and critics to see me thus. It is not the victim that categorizes crimes, it is the law. And in this case, the law is clear: What Mr Tejpal did to me falls within the legal definition of rape,” she added.
“Unlike Mr Tejpal, I am not a person of immense means. I have been raised singlehandedly on my mother’s single income. My father’s health has been very fragile for many years now. Unlike Mr Tejpal, who is fighting to protect his wealth, his influence and his privilege, I am fighting to preserve nothing except for my integrity and my right to assert that my body is my own and not the plaything of my employer. By filing my complaint, I have lost not just a job that I loved, but much-needed financial security and the independence of my salary. I have also opened myself up to personal and slanderous attack. This will not be an easy battle,” she confessed.
She further said: “In my life, and my writings, I have always urged women to speak out and break the collusive silence that surrounds sexual crime. This crisis has only confirmed the myriad difficulties faced by survivors. First, our utterances are questioned then, our motivations, and finally our strength is turned against us: A politician will issue a statement claiming that speaking out against sexual violence will hurt our professional prospects; an application filed in the Delhi High Court will question why the victim remained “normal.””