Boise Locker Room: Delhi Women's Commission serves notices to Instagram and Delhi police

While India fights Corona, and the country is under lockdown, the ever-prevailing rape culture and abuse of women has shown its ugly face yet again. An Instagram group 'Bois Locker Room' with members from 16 - 18 years to as young as 13 and 14 years of age, run allegedly by a group of teenage boys from South Delhi has been posting obscene content and pictures of minor girls, often their own classmates and making lewd comments bordering on discussing rape and sexual assault. The group members not just indulged in slut-shaming and objectifying the young girls, but also posted morphed nude pictures.

When the group was discovered by a few girls, who confronted the members, and reposted the objectionable posts and screenshots of the obscene chats and brought them to public knowledge; the members of the 'Bois Locker Room' began discussing making the manufactured nude pictures of these girls (as seen in one of the screenshots), public. Now that the posts have become viral, one is shocked reading the content and how these young minds are casually discussing gang rape of girls.

The heinous incident caught the attention of the Delhi Commission for Women and it sent notices to Instagram and Delhi Police, asking the latter for information on any FIR lodged. The notice said, "It is reported that the group is used for sharing objectionable pictures of minor girls and young women along with their personal information. The members of the group have been reported to have discussed techniques of raping women and gang-raping minors." The commission has screenshots of the chats, images, and the handle names and user names of the members, and it has instituted an inquiry and sought information from the social media platform by May 8.

The group is not just indulging in illegal activities, but also normalising rape culture, and that it is run by such young boys of impressionable age makes it worse. And that they manage to do it on a public platform and get away with it brings forth the question of safety of girls and protection of their privacy on social media platforms. Yet, there are many, who seem to be supporting the group and trolling Niska Nagpal, the Instagram user, who first discovered the group and made their posts public. As she continues to get hate messages; it is learnt that the members, on realising the gravity of the matter changed their account names. Meanwhile, several other such groups flourish on various social media platforms and continue to indulge in such unlawful activities.