A report released in Delhi yesterday highlights the physical and psychological fallout of female genital mutilation at a young age and provides a framework the Indian government could use to enact a law banning this trauma-inducing practice among Dawoodi Bohras.

The report has been compiled by Speak Out on FGM, a group of Dawoodi Bohra women survivors of “khatna” (as the practice is referred to by the priests to legitimize its practice) and the Lawyers Collective.

The report comes close on the heels of the announcement last week by the Union Minister for Women and Child Welfare, Maneka Gandhi that FGM is a criminal offence, even as per the existing provisions of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POSCO) Act, 2012.

The minister has called on the high priest of the community [Syedna Mufaddal Saifuddin] to take steps to end the practice, failing which the government would bring in a new law to ban it.

(“Khatna” involves cutting a part of the clitoral hood or prepuce of girls at an early age. Sahiyo, another group of Dawoodi Bohra women campaigning for an end to the practice, prefers to call it as female genital cutting (FGC). But the group Speak Out on FGM maintains that what’s called khatna is among the many definitions of FGM adopted by the World Health Organisation.

“Our report is like a blueprint on the legal aspects of the practice. While drafting a Bill on the issue, the government should find our report provides a useful framework”, said Masooma Ranalvi, convener of Speak Out on FGM.

“Our document directly speaks to the government. Now it is up to the Women and Child Development Minister to demonstrate its commitment towards the rights of women”, added senior advocate Indira Jaising of Lawyers Collective.

Ranalvi said her group along with the Lawyers Collective had spent six months taking a close look at the existing laws in the country pertaining to women and children. They also looked at the laws against FGM already in place in US, UK, Australia, France and 20 countries in Africa, including Muslim majority Egypt.

Ranalvi referred to the recent arrest of a Detroit-based physician, Dr Jumana Nagarwala  and two others in connection with genital mutilation of two minor girls from the Dawoodi Bohra community.

The report provides details pertaining to rehabilitation of the victims on one hand and punitive action against parents, priests, cutters and doctors involved in the practice.

Read the full report.

Also read: Factsheet on FGM.
 
 

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Dawoodi Bohra activists are “absolutely delighted” over the statement of Union Minister for Women and Child Development (WCD), Maneka Gandhi that the central government will pass a law to prohibit female genital mutilation (FGM) unless the community’s headpriest [Syedna Mufaddal Saifuddin] voluntarily issues an advisory to the community to banish the practice.

Gandhi according to a report today in the Hindustan Times has described the practice of female genital mutilation (FMG, also referred to as female genital cutting, khatna) as a “criminal offence”.

On May 8, the Supreme Court has issued notices to the Centre and four state governments in response to a PIL seeking the outlawing of the shameful practice.

It is reliably understood that the WCD ministry has sent advisories to state governments pointing out that FMG is a violation of sections of the IPC and the POSCO Act.

Also read: "I do not believe in your wisdom and power anymore": A Dawoodi Bohra woman's missive to Syedna Mufaddal Saifuddin

“We will write to respective state governments and Syedna, the Bohra high priest, shortly to issue an edict to community members to give up FGM voluntarily as it is a crime under Indian Penal Code (IPC) and Protection of Children from Sexual Offenses (POCSO) Act, 2012. If the Syedna does not respond then we will bring in a law to ban the practice in India,” Gandhi told the Hindustan Times.

“This is fantastic news and absolutely welcome”, the convener of the group ‘Speak Out Against FGM’, Masooma Ranalvi told Sabrang India. The group had recently launched an online petition calling upon the WCD minister to bring a law banning the practice.

“We are very excited and very happy”, enthused Arefa Johari of Sahiyo, an organization of Dawoodi Bohra women campaigning to end the practice of what it prefers to call female genital cutting (FGC).

Also read: SC Issues Notice On PIL Seeking Complete Ban On Female Genital Mutilation

“This is something we have been working at for a very long time and we heartily welcome the minister’s statement”, Johari added.

Ranalvi told SabrangIndia her group has been holding talks with the minister on how to banish the FGM practice which is “un-constitutional, against human rights and against existing Indian laws of the land”: Indian Penal Code (IPC) and The Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, 2012 (POSCO Act).   

Johari stated that individual members of Sahiyo who were victims of FGC had also made representations before the WCD ministry.

Also read: Bohra women want an end to the practice of “female genital cutting": Sahiyo report

“We hope that Syedna saheb (head priest of the global Dawoodi Bohra community will abide by the laws of the land and issue an advisory to all his Indian followers to give up the practice of FGM just as he has already issued advisories to all Dawoodi Bohras living in the West,” she told Sabrang India.

Ranalvi categorically asserted that what is referred to as khatna or khahafz is not “female circumcision” as the community’s priests pretend it to be but falls within the Type 1 and Type 4 categories of FMG as described by the World Health Organisation (WHO).

Also read: Jain fasting or Bohra female circumcision, why should children bear the brunt of religious fervour?

It may be noted that FMG is considered a serious criminal act with severe consequences both under IPC and POSCO.

Section 326 of IPC: “Voluntarily causing grievous hurt by dangerous weapons or means—Whoever, except in the case provided for by section 335, voluntarily causes grievous hurt by means of any instrument for shooting, stabbing or cutting, or any instrument which, used as a weapon of offence, is likely to cause death, or by means of fire or any heated substance, or by means of any poison or any corrosive substance, or by means of any explosive substance, or by means of any substance which it is deleterious to the human body to inhale, to swallow, or to re­ceive into the blood, or by means of any animal, shall be pun­ished with 1[imprisonment for life], or with imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to ten years, and shall also be liable to fine”.
 
Section 327 of IPC: “Voluntarily causing hurt to extort property, or to constrain to an illegal act.—Whoever voluntarily causes hurt, for the purpose of extorting from the sufferer, or from any person inter­ested in the sufferer, any property or valuable security, or of constraining the sufferer or any person interested in such suf­ferer to do anything which is illegal or which may facilitate the commission of an offence, shall be punished with imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to ten years, and shall also be liable to fine”.
 
Section 9 (h) (i) and (j) of the POSCO Act define Aggravated Sexual Assault as:
“(h) whoever commits sexual assault on a child using deadly weapons, fire, heated substance or corrosive substance; or
“(i) whoever commits sexual assault causing grievous hurt or causing bodily harm and injury or injury to the sexual organs of the child; or
“(j) whoever commits sexual assault on a child, which —
“(i) physically incapacitates the child or causes the child to become mentally ill as defined under clause (l) of section 2 of the Mental Health Act, 1987 or causes impairment of any kind so as to render the child unable to perform regular
tasks, temporarily or permanently”.
 
The punishment for aggravated sexual assault under the Act is “rigorous imprisonment for a term which shall not be less than 10 years but which may extend to imprisonment for life and shall also be liable to fine”.
 
In the past year members of the Dawoodi Bohra community held responsible for FMG have been jailed in Australia last year. In USA last month federal authorities have made arrests and the accused face prosecution for performing, aiding or abetting FMG.
 

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With federal agents in the US recently nabbing a second doctor and his wife for conspiracy involving female genital mutilation (FGM), or female genital cutting (FGC) with the global head of the Dawoodi Bohra community coming under fire in the British Parliament, a sense of shame, frustration and anger is building up among Dawoodi Bohras worldwide over the alleged double-speak of  Syedna Mufaddal Saifuddin. Whatsapp messages are flowing thick and fast between community members worldwide, including a letter addressed to the Syedna by an American woman who prefers to remain anonymous for fear of reprisal. Sabrang India is publishing below the letter it has received from a member of the Bohra community along with some links. 

To Syedna Mufaddal Saifuddin,

We are the ones who showed up. We are the ones who wore the right thing, said the right thing, didn't ask too many questions. When you became our leader, we changed our license plates, our phone numbers to include the number 53. We came to you in our moments of deep grief and our moments of sweetest joy to ask for your permission to undertake life events. ​

We parted with our hard earned money in Dawoodi Bohra taxes. We kept photos of Syedna in our wallets and on our walls. We traveled to Texas, Nairobi, Mumbai. We prayed to you and for you. We did it because we needed to, because we believed in you.

We did this in the name of community. in the name of feeling supported by the ballast of history. We did this in the name of our financial wellbeing, our family's security. We believed in the sanctity of this community. We believed in your goodness, your wisdom. We believed that when we called to you for help, you would come.

Last year, on Syedna Taher Saifuddin's death anniversary – a day when you knew that people around the world were watching – you, Syedna Mufaddal Saifuddin, spoke out about "keep[ing] our things strong, stay[ing] firm. Even the big sovereign states, whatever it is they say, if it makes any difference to our things, then we are not prepared to understand!…The act has to happen! If it is a man, then it is right, it can be openly done, but if it is a woman then it must be done discreetly, but then the act has to be done. Please understand what I am trying to talk about…"

We understood; we all knew what you were talking about. You were speaking about khatna, a globally reviled practice in which a part of a woman's clitoris is cut. You instructed us to continue carrying out khatna on our young girls regardless of what the “big sovereign states” (read: US law) had to say.

One month later, US-based jamaats published letters stating that community members should follow the law and not practice khatna in the US. You never said that it was inherently wrong; you just impliedly encouraged us to travel elsewhere for the procedure.

So here we are, April 2017. Jumana Nagarwala did an appalling thing in flagrant disobedience of her role as a healer and doctor. The issue has gone global – The New York Times, the BBC, UK Parliament (video) – are associating the Dawoodi Bohra community with this heinous act. They are not besmirching us – they are accurately reporting on a practice that expresses your attempt to denigrate women.

But we can’t place blame entirely on Jumana Nagarwala. She didn't come up with this idea. She did it for you, in your name, under your instruction. On Wednesday, a federal jury indicted her, Fakhruddin Attar and Farida Attar.

Your followers are in hot water now and what did you do? You washed your hands of them. Less than a year after your pronouncement that you were "not prepared to understand" what "big sovereign states" say, you did a 180.

You issued a statement saying that it was "unfortunate" that Dr. Nagarwala had not followed US law, that the Dawoodi Bohras do not support any violation of local, state or federal law. You threw Dr. Jumana under the bus and bailed.

So now we know. We know that even if we show up and wear what you want, say what you want, do what you want, you won’t show up for us when it matters.

It doesn’t matter how much we gave and prayed and observed. You will not take responsibility for your actions. You will not stand by your followers.

I will continue to go to the jamaat and pray alongside my fellow Bohra women. But I do this now only for the love of my family, for the peace that this brings them, for the Allah who sees everything we do (including you). I will not do it for you.

I do not believe in your wisdom and power anymore. I will not listen to your edicts about what I should wear, how I should educate my children, how I should live my life. You have lost that from me. I know now that when the reckoning comes, you will not stand by me, and so I will not stand by you anymore.

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Image Courtesy: Jonathan Stening/Flickr, CC BY-NC

One in three women around the world currently experience gender-based violence. Harmful practices such as trafficking, forced marriage, domestic violence and female genital mutilation occur both in public and in private spaces. Today, these forms of violence are recognised as a major violation of human rights, a public health challenge and one of the clearest forms of gender discrimination. It’s also widely acknowledged that women experience heightened levels of violence in cities.

Tens of thousands of delegates from right across the globe met in Quito, Ecuador, to discuss the future of cities at the UN’s Habitat III conference, where the fifth and final version of the New Urban Agenda was adopted by member states. The document will help to guide urban policy around the world for the next 20 years. Which begs the question: how have women’s voices and gender issues been incorporated into it?

Impressively, with each new draft of this latest document, women’s views are increasingly being taken on board. Consultation took place at a range of levels, with notable contributions from important global networks that fight for women’s rights and gender equality, such as Slum Dwellers International (SDI), Women in Informal Employment: Globalising and Organising (WIEGO) and the Huairou Commission.

Living without fear

From the first draft to the final document, references to women more than doubled from 14 paragraphs to 32, out of 175. The final document explicitly states that cities should:

Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls, ensuring women’s full and effective participation and equal rights in all fields and in leadership at all levels of decision-making, and by ensuring decent work and equal pay for equal work, or work of equal value for all women, as well as preventing and eliminating all forms of discrimination, violence and harassment against women and girls in private and public spaces.

The fact that these commitments explicitly address the prevention and elimination of violence against women and girls in public and private spaces, as well as safety and security for women in cities, is a major achievement.

In particular, there are three commitments that have the potential, not just to empower individual women, but also to transform gender power relations in cities. These include land tenure rights for women, which gives women individual titles to land. When integrated into land regulation procedures, measures like these can transform gender power relations because it means women no longer have to depend on men in order to access land, as seen in Recife, Brazil.

Another key commitment relates to informal economy opportunities for women in terms of “livelihoods, working conditions, income security, legal and social protection”. Access to an independent income for those working in the informal economy – such as waste-pickers and recyclers – empowers women, while successfully contesting legal rights can change structural power relations by reducing their dependence on men for financial resources.
 

Image Courtesy: Jonathan Stening/Flickr, CC BY-NC

The third commitment relates to calls for cities with “public spaces and streets, free from crime and violence, including sexual harassment and gender-based violence”. This empowers women by enhancing their mobility, and access to both education and employment opportunities, which can allow them to live more independent lives.

Watered down

Yet some measures to address violence against women and girls were diluted throughout the five drafts. The first draft not only identified the importance of preventing and eliminating violence against women and girls in cities, it also specified how it should be addressed: through a range of measures, including the “investigation, prosecution and punishment of the perpetrators”.

It also called for the provision of services for survivors, recognition “that the treatment of women and girls can be a broader reflection of societal norms” and a commitment to “using education and public awareness campaigns as a further tool against abuse”.

But by the final draft, making places safer for women and girls had become a matter relating merely to the design and management of infrastructure and urban public spaces – for instance, by ensuring transport is accessible and improving urban sanitation. There was no acknowledgement that many of the problems faced by women and girls are caused by underlying gender inequalities in society. And in the paragraph on urban safety, crime and violence prevention, women are entirely ignored.

Throughout the agenda, women are typically referred to as part of a composite, monolithic and vulnerable group. There are continual references to “age and gender-responsive” interventions – but very little clarity as to what this means or involves in practice.

In fact, only one practical commitment was made, to age and gender-responsive budgeting. This involves strengthening the capacity of national, sub-national and local governments to ensure that there are equal numbers of women represented throughout all state institutions, and to take women’s needs into account in the allocation of state budgets.

Compromises have to be made when agreeing on global agendas and the inclusion of women is complex and contradictory. But if the UN’s agenda is to effectively address issues of violence against women and girls, it needs to clarify the meaning of generic “gender-responsive” commitments, and consider women specifically, rather than as part of a larger group of “vulnerable” citizens.

While design and management can play an important role in forging safer cities, it is essential to move beyond these aspects, in order to transform gender relations in urban spaces around the world over the next 20 years.

(Cathy McIlwaine,professor of Geography, Queen Mary University of London; Caroline Moser, Emeritus Professor, University of Manchester).

(This is part of a series on publicly funded UK research at the UN Habitat III summit in Quito, Ecuador. It is a collaboration between the Urban Transformations Network, UK Economic and Social Research Council and The Conversation UK. The original story may be accessed here.)
 

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