Rapist not the victim to be ashamed, says Naseeruddin Shah

MUMBAI: In response to a question asked during the trailer launch of his upcoming venture titled ‘Hope Aur Hum’, veteran actor Naseeruddin Shah stated that it is in fact the rapist, not the victim, to be ashamed of committing such a heinous crime.

“In fact, there is a very wonderful thing that I read yesterday in a newspaper where a rape survivor was saying that why should the victim has to hide her face? It, in fact, the accused, who committed the crime should be ashamed, they should hide their faces. It’s a threatful [sic] situation… I guess it’s a good thing that media is so alert about all these things nowadays,” he said.

Naseeruddin Shah, further talking about the barbaric rape and murder incident of eight-year-old Asifa Bano that took place in Jammu and Kashmir earlier this month, stated that it is a positive thing now that more and more cases of the same stature are reported and brought to light.

“Well, rape is not a new phenomenon, such horrors have always happened; but the positive thing is, these days such cases are reported more.”

He said that the alarming increase in the occurrence of rape incidents against girls can only be controlled by a ‘generational change of mindsets’.

“We are talking about a generational change of mindset that cannot happen overnight. What we can do, is to trend set the example in our personal lives. We cannot keep on policing or not every girl possibly keeps a pistol or learns martial arts. It has to begin with us, with each one of us,” the Ghalib actor stated.