विकास की सीढियाँ फलाँगते विश्व के किसी कोने में अभी भी ऐसा संसार बसता है कि सुन -जान कर रोंगटे खड़े हो जाते हैं|
..... यद्यपि भारत में भी लड़कियों और महिलाओं पर एसिड फेंका जाना या अन्य प्रकार के शारीरिक मानसिक उत्पीड़न बहुत ही सर्वमान्य व सामान्य घटना हैं| यह बात दीगर है कि इनकी रपट या प्राथमिकी कहीं किसी थाने और फाईल में दर्ज नहीं होती; क्योंकि वे अपने आप में एक ऐसी सर्वग्रासी नाँद का मुख हैं जहाँ से कभी कोई बच कर सुरक्षित नहीं लौटता| बहुधा इसीलिए स्त्री अपने प्रतिकार के विभिन्न औजार ईजाद कर चुकी है जिनमें त्रिया चरित्र से लेकर प्रतिक्रियात्मक व्यवहार, निंदा, बुराई जैसे न जाने कितने सामाजिक दोषों में गिने जाने वाले कृत्य-व्यवहार सम्मिलित हैं| इन सबके लिए वह अपने प्रति निरंतर सामाजिक सहानुभूति भी यद्यपि गँवा देती है किंतु सच तो यह है कि अपने प्रति या अपनी माँ, दादी, बहन,सखी आदि संबंधों के प्रति बरती गयी यंत्रणा से उबरने के लिए शायद वह ऐसा हर दाम चुकाने पर विवश हो चुकी होती है और यह प्रतिकार उसकी आदत का हिस्सा बन चुकते हैं| स्त्री को उसके ऐसे व्यवहारों का दोष देने वाले या खिल्ली उड़ाने वाले समाज के तथाकथित सभ्य पुरुषों ने कभी इसका मनोवैज्ञानिक विश्लेषण करने की जहमत नहीं उठाई| अस्तु !
..... यद्यपि भारत में भी लड़कियों और महिलाओं पर एसिड फेंका जाना या अन्य प्रकार के शारीरिक मानसिक उत्पीड़न बहुत ही सर्वमान्य व सामान्य घटना हैं| यह बात दीगर है कि इनकी रपट या प्राथमिकी कहीं किसी थाने और फाईल में दर्ज नहीं होती; क्योंकि वे अपने आप में एक ऐसी सर्वग्रासी नाँद का मुख हैं जहाँ से कभी कोई बच कर सुरक्षित नहीं लौटता| बहुधा इसीलिए स्त्री अपने प्रतिकार के विभिन्न औजार ईजाद कर चुकी है जिनमें त्रिया चरित्र से लेकर प्रतिक्रियात्मक व्यवहार, निंदा, बुराई जैसे न जाने कितने सामाजिक दोषों में गिने जाने वाले कृत्य-व्यवहार सम्मिलित हैं| इन सबके लिए वह अपने प्रति निरंतर सामाजिक सहानुभूति भी यद्यपि गँवा देती है किंतु सच तो यह है कि अपने प्रति या अपनी माँ, दादी, बहन,सखी आदि संबंधों के प्रति बरती गयी यंत्रणा से उबरने के लिए शायद वह ऐसा हर दाम चुकाने पर विवश हो चुकी होती है और यह प्रतिकार उसकी आदत का हिस्सा बन चुकते हैं| स्त्री को उसके ऐसे व्यवहारों का दोष देने वाले या खिल्ली उड़ाने वाले समाज के तथाकथित सभ्य पुरुषों ने कभी इसका मनोवैज्ञानिक विश्लेषण करने की जहमत नहीं उठाई| अस्तु !
जहाँ तक भारत की ऐसी घटनाओं से इस घटना के साम्य का प्रश्न है, तो इतना अन्तर अवश्य है कि भारतीय समाज में ऐसी घटना बहुधा व्यक्तिगत विद्वेष या असफल प्रेम(?) आदि सन्दर्भों के साथ घटती आई हैं| २१वीं शती के दूसरे दशक के कगार पर खड़े अत्याधुनिक विश्व की इन लड़कियों की सुध कौन लेगा ? हाँ, यह तो निश्चित है कि सुध लेने का अर्थ मरहम पट्टी करना या हमालावरों को दंड देने भर का प्रश्न नहीं है| विचार करना होगा कि क्या संसार में ऐसी विचारधारा का शमन करने के कोई कारगर तरीके हैं, वरना कम से कम ऐसी मान्यताओं वालों को शक्तिसंपन्न न होने दिया जाए, बहिष्कार किया जाए, कुचला जाए या प्रतिबंधित किया जाए | पशुता का, नहीं नहीं, पाशविकता का खूँटा धरती में गहराई से गाड़ना पड़ता है।
- ( क. वा. )
Acid Attacks Scar Afghan Schoolgirls
Noor Khan & Heidi Vogt, AOL news
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (Nov। 14) - No students showed up at Mirwais Mena girls’ school in the Taliban’s spiritual birthplace the morning after it happened.
A day earlier, men on motorcycles attacked 15 girls and teachers with acid।
The men squirted the acid from water bottles onto three groups of students and teachers walking to school Wednesday, principal Mehmood Qaderi said. Some of the girls have burns only on their school uniforms but others will have scars on their faces.
One teenager still cannot open her eyes after being hit in the face with acid.
“Today the school is open, but there are no girls,” Qaderi said Thursday. “Yesterday, all of the classes were full.” His school has 1,500 students.
Afghanistan’s government condemned the attack as “un-Islamic” and blamed it on the “country’s enemies,” a typical reference to Taliban militants. Qari Yousef Ahmadi, a Taliban spokesman, denied the insurgents were involved.
Girls were banned from schools under the rule of the Taliban, the hard-line Islamist regime that ruled Afghanistan from 1996 to 2001. Women were only allowed to leave the house wearing a body-hiding burqa and accompanied by a male family member.
Qaderi said he believes there were multiple teams of assailants because the attacks took place at the same time in different neighborhoods. Provincial Police Chief Mati Ullah Khan said three people have been arrested. He would not provide further details because the investigation was not completed.
The country has made a major push to improve access to education for girls since the Taliban ouster। Fewer than 1 million Afghan children — mostly all boys — attended school under Taliban rule. Roughly 6 million Afghan children, including 2 million girls, attend school today.
But many conservative families still keep their girls at home and the acid attacks are a reminder that old biases remain.
“They don’t want us go to school. They don’t like education,” said Susan Ibrahimi, who started teaching at Mirwais Mena four months ago. She and her mother, also a teacher at the school, were wearing burqas on their walk to work when the motorbike stopped next to them.
“They didn’t say anything. They just stopped the motorbike and one of the guys threw acid on us and they went away,” Ibrahimi said in a telephone interview.
The acid ate through the cloth covering Ibrahimi’s face and left burns down her left cheek. The acid also burned her mother’s hand.
“I am worried that I will have scars on my face,” said Ibrahimi, who is 19 years old and not married.
Fifteen people were hit with acid in all, including four teachers, Qaderi said.
Ibrahimi said it was the Taliban that attacked her but then explained that she used the term to refer to anyone who was against education for women.
The United Nations called the attack “a hideous crime.”
First lady Laura Bush on Thursday decried the attack as cowardly, saying in a statement the “shameful acts are condemned by honorable people in the United States and around the world.”
The attacks are “contrary to previous assurances Afghans have been given that there would not be further attacks against schools or students,” the U.N. said in a statement.
Arsonists have repeatedly attacked girls’ schools and gunmen killed two students walking outside a girls’ school in central Logar province last year. UNICEF says there were 236 school-related attacks in Afghanistan in 2007.
The Afghan government has also accused the Taliban of attacking schools in an attempt to force teenage boys into the Islamic militia.
In Wednesday’s attack, three young women were hospitalized for burns. Two were released Thursday morning, but 17-year-old Shamsia Husainai was still lying on a hospital bed unable to open her eyes. Her brother Masood Morbi said her body shook about every 10 seconds.
She could talk, but her brother said her words were mangled. Her face was covered with a cream to treat her burns. The doctors were giving her pills to blunt the pain.
Husainai’s younger sister told The Associated Press on Wednesday that they had been walking on the street with a group of friends, all of whom were wearing a typical Afghan school uniform of black pants, white shirt, black coat and white headscarf.
Fourteen-year-old Atifa Bibi was also badly burned on her face but she was released from the hospital late Wednesday.
Qaderi, the principal, said no one in the school had reported any direct threats but one of the teachers attacked Wednesday had reported an incident two days ago in which two men threatened her.
“She told me when she was walking two men said to her, ‘Oh, you are putting on makeup and going to the school. Okay, we will see you.’”
Husainai and Bibi’s aunt, Bibi Meryam, said no one had threatened them but they would consider keeping the girls at home until it felt safer.
A handful of teachers showed up Thursday, but Qaderi said the only students who tried to attend were about 20 primary school students who arrived late in the afternoon and were sent home because the school had already decided not to hold classes.
Ibrahimi, the young teacher who was burned, said she and her mother stayed home.
“Yesterday we didn’t go to school. Today we didn’t go to school. I don’t know about the future,” she said.
