As our legislation officially considers rape as an act done by men to women, it is clear that in every reported rape case the criminal is a man. Yet, our society believes in shared responsibility of rape, connecting the victim’s demography to why they get raped! This is a controversial concern where most feminist disagree to acknowledge shared responsibility of a women in rape, and rightly so. The past year, 2021 has been severely rough in rape reports of Bangladesh. More than one thousand cases has been reported and that is only the 50% of all rape incidents that are "reported". The alarming prevalence of rape initiates a debate over whether the victims and the survivors had any role in it. Popular beliefs like “ek haate taali baje na” and “khabare khola rakhle machhi boshbei” circulated throughout the forums of sensationalized rape headlines. Mainstream social media was dominated by this “shared responsibility” debate. Many cases initiated public protests demanding swift justice for rape victims. Question arises; will capturing and punishing the offender really bring justice to the girl who suffered the physical destruction and mental trauma? Will this eliminate rape from the society? Will men fear “justice system” and stop rape? Will the society acknowledge that there’s no shared responsibility of a victim for what was intended and committed solely by a man? I don’t have any answer to those. But if we study the pattern, we might see there’s little to no use of blaming the victims for an act where they did not contribute at all. The focus of rape discussion should rely on assessing offenders; rapists; men.

The year 2020 began with a rape case reported on January whose victim was a Dhaka University student. The case occurred in Khilkhet, Dhaka. After going through several sources, I failed to find any personal information of the offenders as they are referred as “some unknown men” everywhere. This case initiated several protests and hunger strike, yet the offenders are hardly talked about in the mainstream social environment. There have been 164 reported rape only in the first 2 months of 2021. According to the monthly statistical database by Ain o Shalish Kendra, the cases show that everyday 4 women are raped on average in Bangladesh, considering last year’s rape trend. The trend shows some interesting facts. The number of rape incidents is more than double of the number of cases filed against the rapists. Potential reasons include, secondary victimization of the woman, threats and blackmails by the offenders, victim blaming, harassment through mainstream media etc.

Rape cases were at its peak in October, 2020. On the other hand, October, 2020 was the time when a rape incident in Noakhali got viral which initiated massive outrage. As a result, protest, hungerstrike etc. were taking place. Again, the question is, how is it that the month of protests had the most number of rape at the same time? It’s not only the women who participated in those protests; there were male support and male participation. Then how is it possible that while some men were protesting against rape, some became rapists?

Another incident that shook the social media was the Kalabagan rape case where the offender named Dihan raped a girl and she bled to death. This was a very controversial case as reports say, they were in a relationship and the girl allegedly had consent over this. In another case, a 7 year old girl was raped in Mulghar village, Bishnopur union of Sadar upozila in Bagherhat by 22 year old Enam Sheikh. In this case, we see the use of patriarchal power in several stages. Firstly, the offender’s background reveals on why in the first place, he committed rape. He knew, in an influential and patriarchal setting, he can easily get away with raping a 7 year old minor. In January, 2021, the case of a 5 year old child has being raped by her madrasa teacher saddened the nation.The trend of 2020-2021 shows that sexual assault in madrasas in Bangladesh has become a regularly occurring incident. Reasons being, lack of supervision, lack of crime understanding and again, practice of power and patriarchy. Now let’s discuss a case happening in metropolitan area. A 25 year old student from Banani, Dhaka repeatedly raped after intoxicating the victim and later blackmailed her through their intimate videos. This case is an example of how area demography plays a vital role. In the cases where the demography is rural or semi-urban, the rape occurs by the direct execution of the offenders’ aim. In this case, the offender was dedicated to make sure nobody knows by constantly blackmailing and threatening the victim. So, to understand different ways of modus operandi, assessing age and area demography plays a vital role. Unbalanced gender roles between men and women, notably from the social purpose, have always been revered as a reason behind rape. Laws are created to ensure women’s safety, women's empowerment is acknowledged; very less effort is given on understanding why young males are more dedicated to commit sexual offence; particularly rape. The discourse of rape, as we speak, remains restricted within the role of patriarchy as the major reason. But as the cases show, although patriarchy is not the only reason here; it ignites other factors to collaboratively execute the modus operandi of rape. It's good that we tend to take measures studying the causes behind a crime, but, recognizing the demographic difference within comparable elements helps to understand the vastness of a crime; which can assist us to eradicate crime before the motive starts developing within the criminal.