I was tempted into scrutinising the 2
reports by NDTV reporters
since a certain (Rohit
Pradhan) @Retributions
produced a rebut http://www.retributions.in/love-jihad-lies-damned-lies-and-statistics/
to the critique by
produced a rebut http://www.retributions.in/love-jihad-lies-damned-lies-and-statistics/
to the critique by
@rupasubramanya (Rupa Subramanya) http://rupasubramanya.blogspot.in/2014/08/how-ndtvs-claims-about-love-jihad-dont.html
Looking at his piece I thought, even I could do this. It doesnt really need any special skills.
Adding my comments/questions in between.
Before you begin,
keep in mind the bias of the reporters.
These people are ALLEGEDLY carrying out an investigation to report. They should
have refrained form turning this report into an op-ed styled article.
HERE WE GO
Updated: August 24, 2014 17:56 IST
Using the alleged gang-rape
of a Hindu woman in
Meerut, the BJP has chosen to
give a communal edge to
violence against women in Uttar Pradesh, saying in its political resolution
that crimes against women are rising, and that the increasing involvement of 'a
certain community' (implying Muslims)
is a matter of concern.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
You get
a sense here where this “report” is going
Alternative introduction they could have started with.
In the past few days, we have
witnessed BJP & Allies bringing up the term Love Jihad. For those readers
who are unaware, here is the wiki definition.
“Love Jihad, also called Romeo
Jihad, is an alleged activity under which young Muslim boys and men reportedly
target young girls belonging to non-Muslim communities for conversion to Islam
by feigning love.”
This term was first used in Kerala
and Mangalore, but subsequent investigations have found no evidence of such a
phenomena. Investigations are still going on.
Love Jihad was stirred up recently
after a string of kidnapping and rape incidents that have surfaced in this
region. We decided to check if there is
any substance to these claims.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
But it is
unclear on what basis the BJP has made that claim, given that the data of
violence against women - a serious
problem in UP - is never compiled on the basis of religion of the accused.
-----------------------------------FAIR ENOUGH-----------------------------------------
What the
official data (from the UP police) does tell us is that Meerut range is UP's
rape epicentre with 389 cases registered last year, the highest in the state.
In 2013, Meerut also clocked 423 dowry cases, also the highest in UP, and 1119
cases of kidnapping of women, the second highest in UP.
-------------------------------DECENT DATA COLLECTION--------------------------
There is nothing
to suggest that minorities are responsible
for these high numbers.
-------------At this
point of time just going to ignore this statement-----------------
NDTV reviewed
police data from rape cases in Meerut district from January to August this year
- so far there have been 37 cases. Of
these in only seven cases the accused are from the minority community.
In all the remaining cases, the accused are from the majority community.
Of the total number of accused, 58 are Hindus and 13 are Muslims.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Let’s take a pit stop here.
Last year rapes record , 2013
: 389
This year Jan-Aug (more than half
a year) : 37
Any sane person would raise a red
flag here.
1. Why is
the case count from this year only 10% of last years?
2. If this
data is authentic, were the cases reported last year abnormally high?
3. If yes
could they be attributed to the Riots?
4. If no
then what is the reason for this sudden drop? Is the state police not recording
the cases.
5. Are
these 37 only the solved cases or registered cases?
Next, pls drop this shitty minority vs majority reporting. Either use the community names all the times in a report or
don’t use them at all.
Rape Cases -- 7 Cases Muslims Accused , 30 Cases Hindu
Accused
Accused list – 58 Hindus , 13
Muslims
1. From
the accused list, were there cases with accused from both communities?
2. How
many from the accused have been convicted?
3. Was there
an overlapping of cases, that is one group accused in two or more cases?
4. How did
they determine the religion, based on the names? Don’t know in UP, in the
southern states you wouldn’t know the Christian names from the Hindu’s.
Now the next logical question is,
the Meerut case was initially a kidnapping case, which the police refused to
register. So can they ignore the 1k kidnapping cases?
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
And yet BJP
politicians and Hindutva groups have SELECTIVELY rushed to protest against
those cases of violence against women where the accused are Muslims and the
victims are Hindus.
We put this to
Rajendra Aggarwal, the BJP MP from Meerut, who has been involved in the
protests against the alleged Meerut gang-rape. He said that the BJP was not
being selective, but only jumped into this case because the state government
was going out of its way to protect the Muslim accused. When we asked him if he
had ever protested against any of the other rape cases in Meerut, he said yes,
but did not give specifics.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
We could also accuse NDTV of
selective reporting, where they avoided reporting on the Meerut “Alleged” rape.
What kind of reporter relies on
someone’s answers? They could and should have dug into their archives. Or else
just skipped the selective protest angle all together.
BJP has been very
effectively protesting against all the rape cases in UP. It works to their
advantage. Why would they just take up one case? They are in the opposition in
this State!
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
At Meerut
College, the oldest in the city, the young women we met say they have never
heard about 'love jihad', responding to our question with bemused puzzlement.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
DUH ! The whole premise of Love
Jihad is that the women are being duped!
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
What they do
know is daily harassment, which doesn't come with religious markers. 'Whenever
we go out, we face comments from the boys' was the refrain amongst all the
women students we spoke to. 'Its not as if the boys are from any one
community,' said a student. Almost all agreed that the harassment is getting
worse.
The facts
suggest the real risk to Hindu women of Meerut, or indeed UP, are not men of any minority but men in
general.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Couldn’t agree with you more here.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The 2nd News Article
Story First Published: August 26,
2014 10:41 IST
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
So its been
2 days now, the reporters have had a day to digest and process the data they
collected. So we should hope for a better analysis.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The BJP's new
rhetoric focusing on a communal twist to
crimes against women in Uttar Pradesh is not borne out by cold facts.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
UGH!
Its INNOCENT until proven GUILTY. Not Vice Versa
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Data accessed by
NDTV shows that in western Uttar Pradesh, where vociferous
campaigns have highlighted the alleged abuse of Hindu
women by Muslim men, women have been assaulted by men from their own community
in most rape cases this year.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Rapes
do not cover all abuses. But nonetheless lets carry on.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
On Sunday, we
had reported that in Meerut district, where the alleged gang-rape of a woman
took on a communal colour, Muslims were accused in seven of the 37 rape cases
reported this year. The accused were Hindus in the remaining 30 cases.
Detailed data
for rape cases covering a wider footprint of all nine districts of Western
Uttar Pradesh prove that the reality does not match the concerns raised by the
BJP, which in a political resolution
passed by its UP unit on Sunday, mentioned the increasing involvement of 'a
certain community' in crimes against women of a 'certain community'.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
That’s good, its always better to
bring in a larger sample space.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This year, there
have been 334 rape cases in the districts of Meerut, Bulandshahr, Ghaziabad,
Gautam Buddh Nagar, Baghpat, Hapur, Saharanpur, Muzaffarnagar and Shamli.
In 25 cases, the
accused are Muslim and the women are Hindu. This is almost the same as the
number of cases - 23 - in which the women are Muslim and their attackers are
Hindu.
In 96 cases, the
accused and victims are Muslim. And in 190 cases - the highest number - the
accused and victims are both Hindu.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Before we get into these numbers, pls
note their first report was on Love Jihad. Since BJP did not include the term
in its political resolution for UP, these 2 reporters also seemed to have
dropped the term very slyly. So this report is not for Love Jihad, just about
the increasing involvement of a M community against the crimes of an H
community.
So, to put it in perspective
whatever information they have shared here to debunk the BJP theory will work only if
it disproves the increase in these crime rates over the year. Obviously
also comparing the crime rate for the other H community, and a gazillion other
factors.
But since we have data from one year, not sure what kind of silly
conclusions do they want to draw.
MATH 101 They tell us 190 > 96 but so is 25 > 23
So what should one conclude from here ? Nothing. Zilch. But the spin doctors conclude their report right here.
If I had to spin the report, I would do a
MATH 102 25/96
> 23/190
Hence, Higher % Crime Rate against the other community is from the M community.
And to go a step further (@rupasubramanya does a much better job), I would bring in demographics in place and do a
MATH 103
75% x = H , 25%x = M , 55%H = H-male, 56%M = M-male
41%x = H-male , 14%x = M-male
Crimes by H-male = 213
Crimes by M-male = 121
Ratio of Crimes to Male Population
H – 213/41%x = 519/x
M – 121/14%x = 864/x
The point is numbers are useless
without context. We don’t have the
context here.
1. Previous
years data.
2. Demographic
distribution
3. Economic
Factors.
4. Details
of Repeat Offenders.
5. External
Factors like riots, calamities, elections.
6. No of
Marital Rapes.
These cases should only be
considered as a fraction of all the rapes. A lot of Hindu women wouldn’t
report the cases, and I am assuming a lot of Muslim cases would be resolved
within their local religious boards.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
It is important
to reiterate that crime data is not normally defined along religious lines. We
specifically asked for it, to check political claims. This is a time-consuming
and sensitive exercise that should be avoided.
If the BJP and
the Sangh Parivar have any data to counters these numbers, they have not shared
it so far.
When we asked
BJP's UP president, Laxmikant Bajpai, why, despite such data, they continue to
express selective outrage at rape cases, he said they are looking at crime
against women as a whole and not on the basis on caste or religion.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I am no data scientist, economist, journalist, columnist,
sociologist, no ist of any kind. Just
a regular jane who expects facts to be reported and conclusions best left to the consumer, unless it is printed under the oped section.
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