In her unimaginable anguish, the survivor of the rape in the abominable Kuldeep Sengar case has made a searingly telling suggestion to the honourable Supreme Court of India: do not remove the stray dogs from India’s streets, remove the rapists. A stray dog is often a woman’s best friend, a stray male, not really.The writer knows of quite a few neighbourhoods in Delhi wherein stray dogs not only remain devoted to single working women who feed them and look after them, but are often a guarantee against stay male menace that lurks in the dark lanes of such colonies.It is much to be hoped that when the case of the heartless release of the predator, Sengar, comes up for reversal in the top court, as it should and will, the justices will accord credence to the argument proffered by the heroic and creative survivor.And a further observation may be also made for the deliberation of the all-powerful Sanatan priesthood establishment: all those so-called Hindus found culpable be it in heinous sexual crimes against women or in other forms of gender-related oppression be debarred from worshipping the pantheon of Hindu goddesses in their homes or in temples, or be formally excommunicated from the Hindu faith with formal notice to society at large.In its largesse of metaphysics, surely Hinduism must not allow this duopoly of worshipping women as goddesses and trashing them in flesh and blood.The time has come when this unendurable and blasphemous hypocrisy must be terminated as anathema both to moral piety and doctrinal consistency.To the best of our theological knowledge, there is no text in the Hindu faith that says you may pay obeisance to goddesses and do dirt on women.If Duryodhana paid for this folly, why not all the Sengars who patronise religious institutions, climb to power in their name, even as they rape defenceless minor girls, and never express contrition – even to their own wives, mothers, and daughters.It is of course another unique feature of our social order that the said wives, mothers, daughters more often than not think they must shield their Sengars from the comeuppance they richly deserve.It is another matter too that those pillars of society who go to marauding lengths to have grand temples built, and shoot arrows into Ravana’s effigy for abducting Sita (although he never once laid hands on her), think it kosher to protect from such retribution the living Ravanas within their own political and social formations.TailpieceIn the case of Sengar, it turns out that the law interprets that elected representatives of people, such as members of a legislative assembly, do not qualify as “public servants”.Remember that when the Sengars of this land go campaigning they never tire of describing themselves as selfless citizens out to do public service and public good.Thus, clearly, if we are not to think the law an ass (as did the merry Dogberry in a Shakespeare play), either electoral contestants must henceforth be debarred from calling themselves servants of public causes, or the said law must be rectified forthwith to make of it a law rather than a cruel gimmick to protect the Sengars of Bharat.Badri Raina taught at Delhi University.This piece was first published on The India Cable – a premium newsletter from The Wire – and has been updated and republished here. To subscribe to The India Cable, click here.