According to a report released last year, Andhra Pradesh has the dubious distinction of being the Indian state with the highest incidence of crimes against women. The National Crime Records Bureau statistics show that 12.8% of all the crimes committed against women nationally are from Andhra Pradesh.
Just in case you thought that the state administration isn’t doing anything about this, fret no more.
A notification was released telling clubs, pubs and bars to ask women customers to leave after 10 pm or face cancellation of their liquor licences.
The state government has also banned giving “free drinks” to women, which means no more “ladies’ nights” in Hyderabad pubs. For men, the deadline remains 11 pm. Also, despite the legal drinking age in India being 18, the Andhra Pradesh government has banned serving liquor to anyone under 21. State police chief Dinesh Reddy confirmed that the ban on under-21s was intended to curb teenage crime, including snatchings, attacks on women and even rape. Who knew grown men who commit such crimes are a minority?
Recently, four women students were harassed by a bystander and misrepresented by the local media as “belligerent and drunk”. This is, apparently, commonplace in Andhra media and this particular case received widespread response. While no reasons have been given for the notification that makes serving alcohol to women illegal after 10 pm, it’s possible that it’s a kneejerk reaction to this incident.
The Telegraph has reported that pub and bar owners in Hyderabad are alarmed by this new notice and they’re expecting a sharp fall in business. Local women’s organisations have complained at this blatant gender bias.
Perhaps the state government is also trying to improve that other dubious set of statistics that show Andhra Pradesh is the highest consumers of beer and cheap liquor in India. Because when you have, arguably, the most number of drunks in the country and the highest incidence of crimes against women, what is the most obvious solution? Not better policing or harsher punishments against those who harass or abuse women. But locking up women in homes once it’s ‘late’.
Because if they’re not in public spaces, then there’s no question of the state being unsafe for women. In any case, if she’s a good Indian woman, she’s not going to be out drinking at 11 pm, would she? She’ll be home, waiting for the drunk man, who will still be served drinks till 11 pm and is free to behave as he wants to in public spaces. If that doesn’t make you feel safe and sound, the excise commissioner who signed the notice telling pubs to not serve drinks to women after 10 pm doesn’t know what will.
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