PYTs don't take kindly to MMS

AHMEDABAD/VADODARA/RAJKOT: Rajesh Shah was at the Leo Club garba in Rajkot when he realised that a boy was taking pictures of his wife on his camera phone on the sly. Annoyed, he requested the boy to delete the pictures, but the latter did not oblige. What followed was an ugly brawl.
Girls wearing backless cholis are getting increasingly wary of cellphones because of what they call "electronic eve-teasing".The United Arkee and United Way garbas at Vadodara have banned camera phones. "We received several complaints on the first evening itself.
Some of these men were sending MMS messages of the pictures they had taken. Now, security checks ensure that camera phones do not get into the arena," says Yogesh Akolkar of Arkee. "We have banned camera phones after receiving a deluge of complaints from girls," echoes Yogendra Gangwal of United Way.
Ashish Trivedi (23) uses his phone to email 10-second videos of the Navratri action to his relatives in Birmingham. "My cousins in the UK are usually in Vadodara during this time, but this time they are busy with college," says Amit Desai, who admits most of his MMSs are of pretty women.
The girls are calling this an invasion of their privacy. "I believe it is rude to take pictures without permission," says Needhi Shroff. "The men with the camera phones get uncomfortably close and they have to be ticked off," she says.
Most girls acknowledge being wary of men wielding camera phones. "I have seen guys using such phones to click pictures of girls. The camera phone is a menace," says Bharvi Shah, a frequent garba-goer in Ahmedabad.
Seeing that camera phones were creating trouble, Race Course garba organisers at Rajkot impounded some of them on day one itself. Organiser Vinu Rajyaguru says, "We have noticed that boys misuse them while girls refrain from complaining fearing further harassment.
Whenever we notice it , we just confiscate the phone and return it when the owner is leaving the grounds." Krupa Godha, who danced at the Leo Club garba, says, "I suddenly realised that one of the boys in the group dancing near me was taking my picture. I immediately left the venue with my friends."
"When the girls approach us, we take the phone away and warn the man. We may even ask him to leave the venue," says Sheriyar Doctor of Docsuns Security Agency.
Cops are aware of such a practice, but have not received any official complaint. "We have directed our women constables who are at the garba venues to keep tabs on such mischief-makers," says Manoj Agrawal, SP of Ahmedabad (rural).