I am in the midst of planning our 10 week trip to India starting January 2014. Like other posters I am disgusted and horrified by the rapes but it has not caused us to change our travel plans. I'm not sure how I would feel if I were traveling alone, though.

(and please excuse the subject change here)

Elizabeth - we registered the same month (January, 2003) - I had been posting on Fodor's for several years as "Elizabeth" but when they changed to mandatory registration that month you beat me to it.....so I became ElizabethS!

Good to point out there's two (at least!) of us!!

I also posted for some time before mandatory registration I think, now don't know what name I used.

Thanks kikiv - glad you've enjoyed my reports. Great that you're going for Durga Puja! Looking forward to hearing about it.

Back to rape... This piece is from last year but is enlightening:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-india-20765364

This is a very interesting review of how attitudes have (been) changed in the US (although recent events indicate that more still needs to be done):
http://www.salon.com/2013/08/25/how_...rce=newsletter

Unfortunately, having a male escort has been insufficient protection  in India so far. I am glad that I have already made two extensive trips to India, my calculation of risk might be different if I had never been.

Thanks kikiv. We R going for our nieces wedding. Should be fun.

Very interesting articles thursdaysd.

It is shocking just how brazen these "gangs" are that they even dare assault a woman who is accompanied by a man. It underscores how independent women are still viewed as chattel or "loose" in patriarchal societies no matter how much has changed in the last several years.

Just a couple of days ago I saw the documentary "Miss Representation" by Jennifer Seibel Newsom. One of the women interviewed said that when a woman is objectified it is much easier to commit an act of violence against the person.

I am sickened by this. My husband and I traveled to India last year and were blown away by the altered reality. Knowing that misogyny and violence are part of that reality make me less in Iove with India and less eager to return.

Teenager found guilty of Delhi rape gets a mere three years. Way to deter others, I don't think.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-india-23908176

I am speechless......

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/i...:/22196124.cms

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/i...w/22198232.cms

I am outraged! I am not going to India again.

once i found the link [had to search through the Times of India articles] it informed me that the maximum sentence in India for a juvenile [which this defendant was when he committed the crime] is 3 years.

therefore this was not a light sentence but the maximum allowed for by law. we may think that law idiotic, but the judge had no choice.

more interesting will be sentences handed down to the adults involved.

Alas, seems it's not just India.

Truly astounding statistics for Asia in general:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-24021573

the 4 adults involved were convicted today, but have not been sentenced yet.

I'm really not surprised by the figures in the survey thursdaysd quotes.

While, like everyone else, I find all of these terrible developments in India outrageous and disgusting, if the supposition is that travelers shouldn't visit a place due to moral outrage--or If the miscarriage of justice is the barometer for tourist dollars--then we need look no further than our front door here in the US.

I guess I wish sometimes we had the same level of standards we held ourselves up to than the places we love to visit.

Well stated filmwill

Thank you, filmwill. You expressed my thinking far more clearly and succinctly than I could.

The four men were finally sentenced yesterday.

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-202_162-...th-by-hanging/

The issue for me is not so much moral outrage ( although I would hope all posters here would feel that) as it is personal safety.

Excellent video on the NY Times website called A Sense of Insecurity, talking with a number of women who live in Delhi. Unfortunately, I can't seem to link to the video.

Thanks, Kathie.

I hope this works: http://www.nytimes.com/video/2013/09...nsecurity.html

As drawn to India as I have been... it's one place where I feel going isn't going to improve things through interaction or improving the economic outlook. Not just for the one incident or another regarding women but because also because of the systemic problems.

This is a site created by an Indian woman who returned from the US and who has been working on awareness of the issues, the largest of which, as the org's name suggest, the fact that statistically, 50 MILLION women are missing:
http://www.50millionmissing.info

This is a site created by an Indian woman who returned from the US and who has been working on awareness of the issues, the largest of which, as the org's name suggest, the fact that statistically, 50 MILLION women are missing:
http://www.50millionmissing.info>>

recently, papers were apparently sent to the Crown prosecution service with the intention of prosecuting two UK doctors for aborting female foetuses for sex selection of the child. for reasons which were not fully explained, they declined to prosecute so the papers are going to the GMC for them to take disciplinary action:

http://www.theguardian.com/world/201...ortion-doctors

the decision is now being reviewed by the Attorney general.