Sohanlal Valmiki: The forgotten rapist

“𝐈𝐭’𝐬 𝐚𝐥𝐥 𝐊𝐚𝐫𝐦𝐚”, he gestured. I heard when she died. How couldn’t I? I had been praying for her recovery. 𝐁𝐚𝐡𝐚𝐮𝐭 𝐭𝐚𝐤𝐥𝐞𝐞𝐟 𝐡𝐮𝐚. 𝐀𝐢𝐬𝐚 𝐬𝐮𝐧𝐧𝐞 𝐬𝐞 𝐬𝐚𝐛𝐡𝐢 𝐤𝐨 𝐝𝐚𝐫𝐝 𝐡𝐨𝐠𝐚. I completely comprehend what I have done. I don’t wish to live anymore,” Sohanlal Valmiki says, staring lifelessly in the darkness. (Source: India Today)

Image Source: Jansatta

What remarkably ironic is, Aruna Shanbaug helplessly waited for 42 years for her nightmare to get over, whereas, on the contrary, her assaulter walked free costing nothing.

He was a ward boy at King Edward Hospital in Mumbai in 1973, where and when he ferociously sodomised Aruna Shanbaug, after he found out she was menstruating at the time, choking her with a dog’s leash ( now remember, the forthright nurse had only rebuked him for stealing food that was reserved for the dogs) mislaying her in irreparable damage (vegetative state) for 42 years. Sohanlal was sentenced to a bare seven-year jail term (on charges of robbery and attempt to murder), but the world couldn’t trace him since his release in 1980.

Well, apparently the Dean of the Hospital had strictly instructed the doctors to stay mum about the anal rape. And hence, the doctors followed. Not only just in today that reputation has forever been overruling the gravity of crimes.

So how did Bombay happen in his life? His “𝐏𝐢𝐭𝐚𝐣𝐢” (father) worked in the same city, in the same hospital. And when the world could not do much but thought about his “𝐦𝐲𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐨𝐮𝐬 𝐝𝐢𝐬𝐚𝐩𝐩𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐜𝐞” after his jail term, he was all caught up earning a stable livelihood as a labourer in Delhi. (Source: India Today)

Now, here’s the distressing part that is worth a boil down in blood. If you ever happen to read Journalist and Writer Pinki Virani‘s book “Aruna’s story”, you’ll read the horrendous section that says- “The worst part: he was not sentenced for rape because he had not committed the rape vaginally; it was anal.”  After minutely reading almost every possible article that detailed the then incident, this one portion of a report by the Times of India, that strikingly pinched my core read, that the examination of Aruna’s delicacy after she was found the next morning was by just the “two-finger test.” That was it!

Allow me to brief you on how the two-finger test plays a role in this context because, like most of you, even my thoughts regarding this were only limited to imagining a misogynist husband belonging to a patriarchal society checking his wife’s virginity beforehand on their wedding night. So, a virginity test is a practice and the method of determining if a girl or a woman is a virgin. The examination generally involves a check for the presence of an untouched hymen, on the mistaken theory that it can only be torn as a consequence of sexual intercourse. Virginity testing is widely counted as controversial, both due to its intimations for the tested girls and women, and because it is viewed as unethical.

In May 2013, the Supreme Court of India held that the two-finger test on a rape victim violates her right to privacy. In 2021 the Lahore High Court banned the use of virginity tests in cases where women claim they were raped. Now note this, here we are talking about the shape of a four-decades-old Indian Law. Why the two-finger test is illegal, illogical and unscientific, clearly didn’t knock anybody at the spot where Aruna was found. The test just confirmed that her hymen was intact. And? That was it. Hence, the matter of anal rape got concealed.

This is May 2021. India’s Aruna took her last breath in May 2015. It’s been 48 years since she had been the epitome of living death and 6 years since she faced a pathetic death. On today’s date, as an Indian woman, I would still admit and continue admitting that India failed Aruna big time.

And has been failing every such girl, every such woman, who could neither assemble the entire nation who claim that “𝐁𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐚𝐭 𝐌𝐀𝐓𝐀 𝐊𝐢 𝐉𝐚𝐢” (Victory for Mother India) is the national personification of India nor could they witness the Justice System abide by its promises. For, when the blindness of the Law finally unfolds itself, the normal life of 1 woman in every 15 minutes turns abnormal.

𝐒𝐡𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐭𝐡𝐚 𝐒. 𝐏𝐮𝐫𝐤𝐚𝐲𝐚𝐬𝐭𝐡𝐚