{"id":7822,"date":"2013-06-04T03:00:05","date_gmt":"2013-06-04T02:00:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/unitedexplanations.org\/english\/?p=7822"},"modified":"2013-06-04T01:04:35","modified_gmt":"2013-06-04T00:04:35","slug":"sonali-mukherjees-story-or-why-acid-attacks-must-be-stopped-immediately","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/unitedexplanations.org\/english\/2013\/06\/04\/sonali-mukherjees-story-or-why-acid-attacks-must-be-stopped-immediately\/","title":{"rendered":"Sonali Mukherjee\u2019s story, or why acid attacks must be stopped immediately"},"content":{"rendered":"

In 2003, when she was 17, Sonali Mukherjee<\/a><\/strong> had a bright future in front of her<\/strong>. She was captain of the National Cadet Corps (NCC), president of the student union and an honors student, wishing to pursue a degree in sociology.\u00a0All she wanted to do was provide a better life for her family, whom she had seen struggling for the most basic things.<\/p>\n

Everything changed on an April night, when one of her suitors, whose advances she had turned down, alongside two other friends decided to punish her for rejecting him. They broke into her home as she slept and\u00a0poured<\/a>\u00a0Tezaab –<\/strong>\u00a0a chemical used to clean rusted tools – over her face, leaving 70 percent burns on her skin, melting her eyelids, nose, mouth and ears, and leaving her partially deaf and almost blind<\/strong>. In an interview, she\u00a0recalled<\/a>: “I woke up feeling strange. Within a few seconds it felt like my whole body was on fire. I kept screaming in pain till I passed out.”<\/p>\n

Life after the attack<\/strong><\/h3>\n

For Sonali, the attack “changed<\/a>\u00a0the entire meaning of my life. It felt like the light had gone out all of a sudden, and darkness had surrounded me on all sides. I had no hope, I didn’t know what to do.” It also profoundly affected her entire family<\/strong>. Her mother went into depression, while her grandfather\u00a0suffered<\/a>\u00a0a heart attack which caused his death.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Hands of an acid attack survivor [by Zoriah, on Flickr]<\/p><\/div>\n

The young Indian woman has had to\u00a0undergo<\/a>\u00a0reconstructive surgery<\/strong> 22 times<\/strong>, costing hundreds of thousands of rupees. She still has nine operations to go, for which she\u00a0needs<\/a>\u00a0at least 1 to 1.5 million rupees (\u00a311,600 to \u00a317,400), in order to recover her eyesight and look even remotely human.\u00a0In order to pay for her treatment, her family had to\u00a0sell<\/a>\u00a0their ancestral land and her mother\u2019s jewelry, as they received no help from the government.<\/p>\n

Her three attackers were sentenced to nine years in jail, but quickly managed to be released on bail<\/strong>. Her appeal for justice led to no results, as the three men\u00a0continue<\/a>\u00a0to\u00a0freely\u00a0roam the streets of her hometown. In an interview, she\u00a0reacted<\/a>\u00a0to their release: \u201cMy father spent every penny, hoping I would get justice. But in the end we lost everything, while the criminals are out there.”<\/p>\n

Incidence of acid attacks<\/strong><\/h3>\n

There are many women in the world, just like Sonali, whose life is changed forever by an acid attack. The exact number of annual acid attacks is unknown, as many women and their families often choose not to report their attackers<\/strong>, knowing that, as in Sonali\u2019s case, justice is not delivered<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

The attackers are quickly released from jail, while the family\u2019s victim is left to live in shame. Acid Survivors Trust International (ASTI) reports<\/a> that the six\u00a0NGO\u00a0organizations that\u00a0it supports in Bangladesh, Uganda, India, Cambodia, Pakistan and Nepal together treat a total of around 1,000 acid attack patients per year<\/strong>.\u00a0 At the moment, ASTI is the only organization<\/a> whose sole mission is to end acid violence around the world.<\/p>\n

Sonali\u2019s new struggle<\/strong><\/h3>\n

By 2012, Sonali felt fed up with life, so she petitioned the government to approve her euthanasia<\/strong>, which is considered illegal in India. In her letter, she expressed her growing feeling of hopelessness, of living without a future and the burden imposed by the lack of justice. As her request was rejected, she decided to fight back<\/strong>, in order to prevent other girls suffering a similar attack.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Set of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire [by sprocket003, on Flickr]<\/p><\/div>\n

The first step in her rekindled fight was to participate in and win India\u2019s Who Wants to be a Millionaire<\/em><\/strong>, which brought her one million rupees. She confessed to CNN that she\u00a0entered\u00a0<\/a>the contest for the money prize, which she desperately needed for her treatment, but also to raise awareness about the suffering of acid attack victims<\/strong>. She also\u00a0revealed\u00a0<\/a>that the newly found media attention gave her “a platform to air my grievances. After that, support poured in from all quarters. Now I know I am not alone, so I have dropped that idea and am determined to fight like a soldier till the end. If I am alive today, it is all because of media support.”<\/p>\n

Sonali has been using the fame brought by winning the contest to advocate women\u2019s rights in India<\/strong> and to put an end to acid attacks. In an interview, she\u00a0said<\/a>: “People like these three men, who can spoil someone’s life like this in a fraction of a second should be brought to justice. These incidents [of acid attacks] will stop only when people involved are given hard punishments according to the crime they have committed.”<\/p>\n

Steps to end acid attacks<\/strong><\/h3>\n

In April 2013, India finally\u00a0passed<\/a>\u00a0a law punishing perpetrators of acid attacks with 10 years in prison and a fine<\/strong>. Sonali believes that the prison sentence for acid attackers should be non-bailable and that the government must increase the compensation amount for victims.<\/p>\n

The young woman also believes that it is imperative that legal measures be coupled with grassroots measures<\/strong>, such as the establishment<\/a> of vigilance committees, voluntary and non-official bodies aiming to assist local authorities in the detection of crimes and criminals. She also advocates government regulation of the sale of cheap and easily available locally-produced household cleaners containing highly concentrated acids<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

\n

Sonali worriedly\u00a0stressed<\/a>: “You can buy highly concentrated chemicals like those used on me in most markets for less than 50 rupees a bottle. This is enough to ruin a woman’s life. They may not have killed me, but I might as well be dead.”<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\"\"<\/a>

An acid attack survivor [by Zoriah, on Flickr]<\/p><\/div>\n

While, as Sonali points out, national governments have the responsibility and the ability to stop acid attacks, which represent a grave violation of women\u2019s rights, the international community must also take action<\/strong>. The latter must put pressure on governments of the countries where acid attacks still occur to pass stronger legislation on punishments for attackers and on the availability of dangerous acids. Moreover, it must help the victims, by providing financial, medical and any additional support required as well as by helping organizations whose mission is to fulfill these goals, such as ASTI. At the same time, citizens from around the world must put pressure on their own governments to take action against acid attacks<\/strong>, in order to ensure that women\u2019s rights are protected everywhere and that cases such as Sonali\u2019s will not be allowed to occur again.<\/p>\n

This is a nonprofit explanation.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One night and a bottle of household chemicals changed a young woman’s life forever. Sonali Mukherjee, one of India’s acid attack victims, has moved past despair to raise awareness for this cause and the justice that is sorely missing.
CONTINUE READING<\/a>","protected":false},"author":182,"featured_media":7825,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[83,853],"tags":[3556,3544,3546,3551,3552,3547,3549,3557,3558,3545,3550,3555,3554,3553,3548],"class_list":["post-7822","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-asia","category-gender-2","tag-acid-attack-victim-on-who-wants-to-be-a-millionaire","tag-acid-attacks","tag-acid-attacks-in-india","tag-acid-survivors-trust-international","tag-asti","tag-awareness-raising-on-acid-attacks","tag-incidence-of-acid-attacks","tag-india-legislation-on-punishing-acid-attacks","tag-international-action-against-acid-attacks","tag-justice-for-acid-attack-victims","tag-number-of-acid-attacks-per-year","tag-sonali-mukherjee","tag-sonali-mukherjee-on-who-wants-to-be-a-millionaire","tag-sonalis-euthanasia-request","tag-tezaab"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/unitedexplanations.org\/english\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/06\/The-Isolation-of-the-Burned-by-ReSurge-International-on-Flickr.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitedexplanations.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7822","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitedexplanations.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitedexplanations.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitedexplanations.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/182"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitedexplanations.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7822"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/unitedexplanations.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7822\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7824,"href":"https:\/\/unitedexplanations.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7822\/revisions\/7824"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitedexplanations.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7825"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitedexplanations.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7822"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitedexplanations.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7822"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitedexplanations.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7822"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}