article: Writer Sudhiti Naskar ensconced herself in this community to find out more about the daily lives of women and she discovered that many women did not report rape or acts of sexual violence. Here she explains why, even though West Bengal has the third highest rate of crimes against women in India, these women chose to remain silent. I heard a story in the village, about a teenage girl who was raped here four years ago. She was attacked when she went to defecate in the open, a way of life for most of these villagers. Her parents did not press any charges even though they knew who did it. In fact many villagers told me he had been accused of another rape in the village. "The girl needs to be married off in a few years," one of her relatives said. Finding a suitable groom would be hard if her rape was made public, virginity being an essential criteria for marriage in such rural societies. The girl and her parents - who don't want to be identified - have found solace in anonymity and the sympathy they get from their relations and friends. Even with all that support, they have not been able to confront the rapist. Apparently, bringing the culprit to justice would mean going public. It isn't worth the pain for them. The girl who now studies in a college wants to move on and heal while keeping quiet. Bandana Bagdi, a landless farmer's wife, says she was accosted in the same village. "I could have been raped, but I ran away," she says, in her ramshackle hut by a pond. When, along with her husband and brothers, she went to confront the culprit she was turned away by the villagers. "They said I was a bad woman after a good man," she says. Traditional rural societies, such as here, are swift to put the blame on the victim. In remote Kelai village, Golechera Bewa, 60, feels helpless. Her youngest daughter Ajida Khatun, 19, was coming home at dusk past a deserted stretch when a man tried to drag her in a corner. Ajida ran to save herself. Going to the police would be "too much [of a] trouble" for an "illiterate, poor old woman", she said. The village council was an option, but going there would give the girl a "bad name". Ms Bewa says: "Honour is the only thing that we have. Without that we can't live in these villages." Some of her hesitation comes from the fact that the perpetrator is well-off, making her feel powerless. With men going to the Middle East for manual labour, there has been an influx of money and that has changed power dynamics in the area. The "new money" has caused arrogance, says Rajib Lochan Roy, a lawyer in the area who has represented several rape victims. "There's a tendency to justify the bad behaviour through money and power," he says. He says it is like the old times, when "the feudal lords would assert their will on the women
summary: Murshidabad in rural West Bengal is in many ways a typical rural Indian district: a dusty, remote place dotted with villages that have little access to healthcare or infrastructure.