RIT Foundation is an Indian NGO fighting for women’s rights. One of their biggest challenges is marital rape in a country where it is legal to rape your wife. Despite stats saying 2 in 3 Indian wives are raped by their spouses, lawmakers don’t see the need to prioritise it. We need to create a campaign that raises awareness and sparks debate to pressure authorities to review rape laws.

Some say religion and tradition play a part and India is one of the most patriarchal societies in the world. While most countries have been progressing towards gender equality, India still lags behind. Despite movements like #metoo and celebrities speaking up for the cause in the country, there are still various laws and social rules that place women below men in terms of rights and hierarchy.

To prove the absurdity of the law, we sent an activist to turn himself into the police, pretending he rape his wife. We filmed the entire process — from preparation with lawyers and victims days before, to him being let go as innocent — exposing how police treat marital rape cases. We broke the story as a documentary online, sparking fierce debate on both sides.

In the short-term, we wanted to raise awareness by creating a debate surrounding marital rape. Supporters and naysayers both had fierce reactions to the campaign and soon, survivors of marital rape in India started coming forward and sharing their stories privately with us. To aid them in recovery, we connected them with counsellors in their state. Our long-term goal was to generate enough conversation to pave the way for the Delhi High Court to criminalise marital rape in India, something we achieved when we secured a petition hearing date.

We launched our campaign online and on social media on International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women. To maintain buzz, we latched on hashtags of news such as the 2019 Hyderabad gang rape and articles of marital rape acquittals in India. We targeted liberal Indian women living in Mumbai and Delhi as they would resonate with our cause most. We also looked at South Asian feminist groups, global equal rights advocates as well as high-profile Indian feminist influencers who our target audience followed. It previewed at our annual gala & launched on Intl Elimination of Violence against Women Day. It also screened at fests like Best Global Shorts, L'age D'or and Intl Film & Human Rights Fest Valencia.

Please Arrest Me made the headline news in several Indian states attracting many supporters, but also haters to our campaign for change. Soon, conservatives started flooding our social pages with messages of hate and ridicule, with thousands reporting and successfully taking down our content 4 times. Censorship didn’t shut the debate. Thankfully, the attention helped us gather supporters with a bigger influence. To pressure the Delhi High Court, Indian feminist influencers & advocate groups like @desifinesse, @southasiantribe, @feministflowercrown and even #MeToo advocate and actress Saloni Chopra (@redheadwayfarer) pushed back by sharing our content & encouraging their followers to do the same. Through this, we received countless messages offering to help us out in any way they could, with some even uploading our video on their own social channels. The conversation progressed and India has forced the patriarchal society of India to deal with the issue.