THE controversy over a BBC documentary on a brutal gang rape in Delhi deepened this weekend after the Bar Council of India launched a probe into two senior defence lawyers for comments that appeared to justify sexual violence.
The lawyers are shown in the one-hour film, India’s Daughter, echoing the views of their client, Mukesh Singh, one of five men convicted of the 2012 rape and murder of a young student. The crime drew global attention to sexual violence in India.
“In our culture, there is no place for a woman,” said Manohar Lal Sharma, one of the lawyers being investigated. His colleague, AK Singh, said he would set his daughter on fire if he found her indulging in “premarital activities”.
Before an emergency meeting on Friday, Manan Mishra, the chairman of the Bar Council, said that the lawyers’ remarks appeared to be a “clear case of professional misconduct”.
The lawyers have three weeks to respond. They could have their licences revoked if found liable. Both deny wrongdoing, with Sharma saying he had “committed no crime” and Singh calling his critics “biased”.
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Leslee Udwin, the British director of the documentary, said she was shocked at the political storm it had provoked in India after it was broadcast on BBC4 on Wednesday (it is repeated tonight).
The Indian government imposed a ban on her film and threatened action against the BBC.
“It’s the last thing I expected,” said Udwin, who previously won a Bafta for the 1999 comedy hit East Is East.
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Udwin appealed to the Indian government to allow the broadcast to go ahead today, International Women’s Day. In an interview she said the fierce backlash had “torn my heart in two”.
The Indian government was incensed that the film had included an interview with Mukesh Singh, who is now appealing his death sentence.
Singh expressed no remorse for the crime, blaming the victim for being out at night and for resisting the rape. “A girl is far more responsible for a rape than a boy,” he said.
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Protests against the film were led by the home minister, Rajnath Singh, who said the convict’s comments were “an affront to the dignity of women”. He accused the makers of violating “permission conditions” by not showing the complete unedited footage to jail officials.
Udwin denied this claim, producing permission letters from the home ministry and Mukesh Singh for the interview. She said jail officials had declined to watch the complete footage as it was 16 hours long, but had seen the edited version. She emphasised that the letters had not granted the prison authorities editorial control.
After the Delhi police filed a court order to stop the documentary on the grounds that it could cause social unrest, Udwin said she began to fear she would be arrested and unable to return to the UK, to her cancer-stricken husband.
Senior Indian lawyers told her to leave on the next flight as she could be detained.
Despite her fears, Udwin remained in India for one more day to lobby for her film. “I stayed because I thought it would seem like fleeing, it would be letting down the documentary and its purpose.”