Indian Women Fight Harassers on Bus

A video of two Indian sisters fighting back against a group of male harassers has gone viral. Aarti, 22, and Pooja, 19, were riding the bus home last week when three young men began assaulting them. “The men started to abuse me and touch me. I told them ‘If you touch me again, you’ll get beaten up,’” said Pooja. “They called a friend on the phone and told him to ‘Come over because we have to beat up some girls.’” The women took off their belts and started hitting the men. The sisters say the men pushed them out of the bus when it stopped and attacked them again, but they threw a brick at the men as they fled. A passenger filmed the incident on a mobile phone. Since then, the video has gone viral and prompted outrage in a country that has struggled with protecting women from physical and sexual violence, even in public places. The 2012 gang rape and murder of a female student on a Delhi bus highlighted the extent of the problems.