Last week a male friend of mine told me that he felt sexually harassed.

He thought I had reacted quite casually. It raised a storm – when men face harassment, it’s just not the same. It doesn’t make headlines. “Why is it atrocious when a woman feels harassed and almost a joke when a man gets molested?” he asked me angrily. Quite naturally, I began wondering about it.

Yes, it's Holi time again... Time for women all over India to don 'modern' outfits and allow the men to revel in the festivities.

In keeping with the secular spirit of our fine nation, women across religions and castes join in. They offer to be moving targets for the balloons. They enjoy having their freshly-moisturised body parts felt up. Don’t they?

Last weekend I hiked to some mountains just outside Bombay. It was pleasant, except that I felt harassed by a male co-hiker.

And to my utter surprise, I stayed quiet and avoided confrontation. Whatever happened to the won’t-take-bullshit rebel/feminist inside me?

Eve teasing is South Asia’s euphemism for mauling hands and foul-mouthed comments.

Catcalls, suggestive remarks, rubbing against women in a crowd, or full-on groping. In the street, on the bus, on the metro. Almost every woman experiences it. Every woman hates it. So what on earth makes guys do it? Love Matters asked two Indian men for their take on the street sexual harassment plague.

A SlutWalk march in protest at street harassment will take place in Bangalore on Sunday.

The SlutWalk movement started in Canada when a policeman controversially said women should “avoid dressing like sluts” to stay safe. Love Matters asked a group of women in Bangalore to give us tips on how to stay safe and avoid ‘eve teasing’ in their home town.

Most women working in Indian IT and outsourcing companies say they’ve experienced some kind of sexual harassment at work.

As part of the Men Say No blogathon to act against gender based violence, we have this second blog about the reality of harassment in the workplace. 
 

For the next 16 days, Love Matters is blogging! We've joined the OneVoice campaign against gender based violence and the Men Say No blogathon. The goal? To get people thinking and acting to end violence wherever it happens. 

Our first blog is about how gender violence (in this case 'eve-teasing') can turn a simple thing like getting dressed in the morning into a nightmare.

Earlier this week I got a Facebook request asking me to join a group paying tribute to Keegan Santos and Reuben Fernandes. I joined, with a creepy it-could-have-been-me feeling.

I’m sure most Bombay girls share the sentiment. 'Eve teasing', for all its nastiness, is still alarmingly common. So common that you wouldn’t find ONE girl in the city who’s never been sexually harassed.

HarassMap, a campaign group battling Egypt’s street sexual harassment plague, has celebrated the Eid holiday with the launch of a new short SMS number for women to report hasslers and gropers.

The reports show up on a map on the group’s website, exposing Egypt’s harassment hotspots. “The key to stopping sexual harassment is in the hands of each of us,” HarassMap says.

“I’ll hit you with a sandal” – Chappal Maarungi in Hindi – is a radical Mumbai campaign to deal with ‘eve teasing’, or street sexual harassment.

It’s the brainchild of five media students, who developed the idea as part of their syllabus. Following a big response in local media and on social networking sites – 600 Facebook likes in a fortnight – Chappal Maarungi now aims to spread to other cities.