How Does it Happen?

Earth is revolving around the Sun in an elliptical orbit and Moon is revolving around Earth in an elliptical orbit as well. Now, ideally, we should be witnessing an eclipse every time we have a New Moon but that is not the case because of the slight tilt in the Moon’s orbit i.e., of over 5 degrees. Although, this is just a small tilt but is the reason why Moon does not cast a shadow covering the obscuring the Sun’s light on every New Moon. But on rare occasions, i.e., when Moon happens to be at the right position and close enough to Earth that its shadow falls perfectly on it, people present in that region witness a Total Solar Eclipse. Moreover, regions neighbouring the Total Eclipse region are also able to witness a Partial Eclipse due to a scientific phenomenon called ‘diffraction of light rays.’

Different Phases of Sun During an Eclipse

Phases of the eclipse can be broadly classified into two categories i.e., Partial Solar Eclipse and Total Solar Eclipse.

• Partial Solar Eclipse: It happens when Sun and Moon are not in the exact position and Moon is only partially able to cover the Sun. This phenomenon is visible from a larger portion of Earth. Moon’s Penumbra is responsible for the formation of Partial Eclipse.
• Total Solar Eclipse: It is a rather rarer form of the eclipse as, during this, Moon totally covers the Sun leading to the famous formations also called as Ring of Fire where a fainter solar corona is visible. Moon’s Umbra is what causes a Total Solar Eclipse. A total eclipse can only be seen from a very narrow track on Earth’s surface which is called ‘Path of Totality’.

Apart from these two, there are two other types of solar eclipse that are:

• Annular Eclipse: This is when the Sun and Moon fall in exactly the same line with Earth, but Moon being rather smaller than Sun, a much brighter Ring of Fire is visible also called ‘Annulus’.
• Hybrid Eclipse: It is when there is a shift between a Total Solar Eclipse and an Annular Eclipse. Some parts of Earth witness it as a total eclipse while some witness it as an annular eclipse. This is the rarest of all forms of an eclipse.

Do’s and Don’ts During Solar Eclipse

DO’s:

• Use special solar glasses or solar filter fitted telescopes and binoculars to look at the Sun.
• Use a pinhole camera to observe the phases of the eclipse.
• Use special UV filters to take photos of the Sun during an eclipse.
• Follow different phases of eclipse online on websites.

DON’Ts

• Do not stare directly at the Sun.
• Do not point your camera lens without UV filters at Sun for longer periods as the photosensor might get damaged by high-intensity sun rays.
• Do not use home-made filters like X-Ray films, sunglasses, or CDs to look at Sun as they do only lower the brightness of rays but do not degrees the intensity of rays coming from the Sun.

There is an activity guide by NASA which consists of fun activities and projects to be done at home during the eclipse.

Formation of Crescents on the Ground During Solar Eclipse

Superstitions Related to Eclipse in India

• Temples are shut and it is prohibited to touch gods and idols are washed with water, Ganga Jal (water) to be specific.
• People are advised not to consume any food. Even cooking during the eclipse is forbidden. People even leave tulsi on cooked food items to prevent it from spoiling during the eclipse.
• People take bath as soon as the eclipse is over to wash the evil spirits away.
• People are prohibited from urinating, defecating, eating, and even sexual intercourse during the eclipse.
• In some parts of India, it is believed that pregnant women are most vulnerable during an eclipse hence they are prohibited from handling sharp objects during that period.

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According to National Crime Record Bureau or NCRB, more than 30-40% of acid attack victims are male in India. Here is a story of a male acid attack victim which was covered in India Today:

Chandrahass Mishra, a Meerut resident, was attacked with a bucket full of acid by his landlord’s son on 8^th September 2011. He was attacked by his landlord’s son as Mishra allegedly tried to prevent him from molesting a woman a day before.

They had a fight after which the accused threatened him that he will not even be for to show his face in public. Mishra had suffered nearly 40 per cent burns and the worst affected areas were his face, head and hand. Mishra was a small-time businessman who had to go through several surgeries and even through treatment for reconstructing his face via plastic surgery as a result of which he had to spend Rs 30 lakhs (300K) and was forced to borrow money and take loans.

What was even worse is that he himself had to run from one place to another for nearly a period of 10 months both for getting a medical board set up for calculating compensation which would be based on the burns he suffered and for disability benefits.

“Though Supreme Court had ordered a compensation of Rs 3 lakh for all victims, the reading of the state government authorities was that only woman victims are entitled to it. In the end, after five years, in 2016 I got compensation of one lakh rupees. Again, gender discrimination,” Mishra, now a coordinator with the NGO Acid Survivors and Women Welfare Foundation, told Mail Today.

Similarly, 52% of juvenile sexual attack victims are male. 

The whole nation comes to a standstill and candle marches are organised to mourn the rape and murdered of a five-year-old girl wherein the accused had inserted candles in her genitalia to stop the bleeding. It becomes a topic of discussion across the spectrum and everybody shows their agony and agitation right from the social media handles to Jantar Mantar (source).

But when a 15 years old boy is beaten up and sodomized and eventually succumbs to his injuries, no is even seen batting an eye about this ghastly incident of sexual assault on a minor who happens to be a male. His father had to dump his body as he didn’t even have enough money to perform his last rites. (source)

We believe that both cases mentioned above are brutal and should never happen in a civilised society. What pains us is the outrage (which is understandable) over sexual assault of a female toddler and utter ignorance by the very same society on the death of a teenaged boy.

Gender-related stigma to sexual assaults is such in India that our constitution does not have any specific provision to deliver justice to a male victim in the case of a sexual assault that too when it is recorded by NCRB that males are subject to sexual assaults too. India is not the only country, in this case, even a first world country, Singapore only recently brought in a law to give justice to such victims while it has been an independent nation for over half a century.

There is an abundance of fake sexual assault cases put on men by women for either financial favour or for any other reason. Men accused in this have to go through so much mental trauma and the societal pressure that many of them send up committing suicide.

Our motive behind writing this piece was, can we stop sympathizing for a particular gender while shunning and mocking their counterparts who have to go through the same amount of pain and agony? In a modern society where everyone is equal before the law, why is it that there are no constitutional remedies for male victims? Why does a society that claims to be modern and gender-neutral easily accepts these stigmas? 

It’s About time that we start introspecting about the fault lines in our societies and constitutions and extensively debate and take measures to fill in those gaps.

Used Image: https://akm-img-a-in.tosshub.com/indiatoday/images/story/201802/mishra_acid.png?iWhh9NWEWOg6oA0wW9br2FUWlIOBcR8T

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Female Genital Mutilation and how is it done?

FGM or Female Genital Mutilation is a procedure, wherein, clitoris along with few other parts of a woman’s genitalia is cut off and, in this case, to deprive her of sexual pleasures as they are considered sinful in some communities. It is a very common practice in many countries in the Middle East, Northern Africa and a few in South-East Asia.

From the map given above, it could be clearly observed that it isn’t very widespread in India. It is because most Muslims living in India are Sunni Muslims who follow Hanafi school of thought which does not follow this barbaric medieval act. Those <1% cases come from Dawoodi Bohra Muslim community which is a well off and prosperous community so to say. Here is a video by Hindustan Times which helps us understand how things are in that community in this regard.

Similar to FGM, there is MGM or Male Genital Mutilation also called circumcision, wherein, the foreskin of a male’s penis is cut off. This form of genital mutilation is extremely common among Muslim communities and many developed western communities as well.

These genital mutilations are usually performed in young kids. What makes is even more barbaric is that they are done by religious heads and not medical professionals without giving any form of anaesthesia and without any pain killer. Just thinking about the unimaginable pain and trauma that the child must be going through gives shiver down our spine.

We agree that the words quoted by BJP MP Tejasvi Surya are outrageous and is clearly an overstatement, but, does that change the fact that there are hundreds of millions of Muslim children that have to go through this heart wrenching and traumatic experience just to satisfy the ages-old tradition that their community members have been following.

In our race to prove how politically correct and ‘tolerant’ we are towards their religious sentiments, are we suppressing the silent screams of these innocent men women and children? Are we unknowingly suppressing their rights by not giving them the right platform to voice their opinions? How are we going to justify our silence over these horrific malpractices?

It is about time that we start drawing distinctions about what is acceptable in our modern societies and what is not.

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