People defended my attacker, said it happens: B'luru molestation victim

Bengaluru: While the mass molestation of women in Bengaluru’s MG Road and Brigade Road on New Year kicked up a hornet’s nest on Tuesday, Chetali Wasnick, a working woman on her way back home, was forced to endure a similar humiliation in Indiranagar.

Speaking to NDTV, Wasnick recounted that she was walking back to her home after work when she saw two suspicious looking men walk towards her. Wary, she moved aside and let them pass, but what happened next left her struggling to get her bearings together. “He just groped me out of nowhere. I did not have any idea that he'll do that. I went totally blank,” she said.

But what outraged her the most was when bystanders, instead of coming to her aide, brushed off the incident and told her ‘it happens’.

“When I finally realised what really happened, I just went back to him and started hitting him and punching him and whatever I could do to take my anger out. After some time, something like 15 to 20 men came and they tried to stop me from hitting that molester. So I was very pissed off that why this person is stopping me from that molester. And they were like 'this is New Year, this happens so just let it be' " she said.

Similar incidents were reported from Bengaluru’s iconic MG Road and Brigade Road, where women were harassed, groped, pawed and molested in large scale by drunk men roaming in groups under the guise of revellers.

The state home minister had further triggered a controversy by claiming that the incident was to be blamed on the ‘western culture’ of partying and ‘revealing’ clothes. Samajwadi Party leader Abu Azmi had also shocked many by commenting that there is an increasing confusion among the younger generation between nudity and fashion.

The state police came under flack for the incident, as majority of those present in the spot claimed that they were of no help at all. This, despite 1,500 police perosnnels and paramilitary forces being deployed in the area alone.

"I was looking everywhere but there were no cops available at all. There were like five to 10 cops standing at the same spot but they did not come and ask me what happened or what is your problem or something," Chetali Wasnick said.

The city police, after three days of denying that there was monumental mismanagement of crowd in MG Road, on Tuesday, acknowledged that it had ‘credible evidence’, and also invited any one with any information to come forward and share it with them.