In November 1977, with serial killer Peter Sutcliffe still at large, the police in Leeds advised women to stay inside after dark for their own safety. But why were women expected to take this kind of precautionary action? It’s a question that prompted Britain’s first Reclaim the Night march, organised by activists from the Women’s Liberation Movement.

Drawing on BBC archives, journalist Krupa Padhy traces the subsequent history of Reclaim the Night. The movement declined in the 1990s, but marches resumed in the 2000s. Closer to the present, the documentary recalls the rise of the #MeToo movement and the protests that followed the murder of Sarah Everard in 2021.

Krupa also speaks with Farah Naz who’s campaigned all her life against violence against women and girls but on 26th June 2022 the issue impacted her family in the most devastating way. Farah talks to Krupa about her niece Zara Aleena, a law graduate, who was sexually assaulted and murdered on the 26th June 2022, while walking home in Illford, East London.

I mixed the episode.

Listen on BBC Sounds here: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m0033ypw