Controversial: India's first handgun
The first handgun for women has gone on sale in India, but it has come under fire for being named after the Delhi rape victim.
The model is called Nirbheek, meaning bold or intimidated, in tribute to the 23-year-old student gang-raped in December 2012, who was named in the Indian media as Nirbhaya, or ‘fearless’, while reporting restrictions on naming rape victims were in place.
However, Binalakshmi Nepram, founder of the Manipur Women Gun Survivors Network, strongly objected to the weapon, which is made by the Indian Ordnance Factory (IOF) in Kanpur, Uttar Pradesh, an arm of the country’s Ministry of Defence.
She told The Independent that it was ‘an abhorrence to [the Delhi student’s] memory’.
She added: ‘Our work over the past 10 years has shown that if a woman involved in an incident has a gun on her person she is 12 times more likely to be killed.’
No comments:
Post a Comment