Bengaluru molestation: Hard to spot wolf in a crowd, say experts about attackers

Bengaluru: Molestation of a woman by two unidentified men at Kammanahalli on New Year's Eve has shocked the city.

"Such men strike only when they have the opportunity and surprisingly, in their public life, most of them would be law-abiding citizens. There have been many studies that have tried to typify them into a group, be it sadomasochistic or anti-social personality and other such groups, but a molester does not fit into an anti-social personality group," explains Dr H. Chandrashekahar, Professor and HOD, Department of Psychiatry, Bangalore Medical College and Research Institute. But he stresses there are people who are anti-social and have this tendency too.

On the Kammanahalli incident, Dr Anand Jayaraman, a consultant psychiatrist at Vikram Hospital, Mallige Hospital and Maarga Hospital, says, "It is very difficult to spot one, maybe when they were young they went through some kind of abuse which continued for a long time and it transpires when they turn into adults. However, there is evidence that violence has a key role to play in their upbringing."

Many psychiatric journals stress that most of them come from lower economic and psycho-sexual backgrounds with a history of conflict and other troubles with women. They have marked inability to relate to women personally and sexually. "There are no telltale signs defined. They are very clever and can manipulate the system. They mostly work in groups and people like them for obvious reasons. Sadly, they have an uncanny knack in terms of picking the vulnerable of the lot," they say.

"Only the vulnerable get into trouble and it is always better to take precaution. A molester's mind is filled with such thoughts and he just waits for the right moment to unleash the wolf in him. Sadly, he just walks like sheep in the herd," sums up Dr Chandrashekhar.