VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN
Violence against women is a severe problem in India. Women of India are trapped by new issues and encountered many challenges and have become victims of violence both inside the family and outside. Women have become a severe concern of modern issues. Even though women are admired and preached to them in the name of Durga, Saraswati, Parvati, and Kali, women are abused in the form of child marriage, female infanticide, sati, sexual harassment, dowry, and so on.
Violence can be defined as overtly threatened or all overtly accomplished application of force that results in the injury or destruction of a person or property or reputation. Generally, violence can identify four types:
Social norms and social organization which socialize the individual.
The personal characteristics of offenders and victims.
The inter-personal characteristics of offenders.
The ecological or environmental factors.
Violence against women is not a new phenomenon. Women have to bear the burns of domestic, public, physical as well as emotional, and mental violence against them, which affects their status in society to a larger extent.
The problem of violence against women in Indian society has been victims of ill-treatment, humiliation, torture, and exploitation. The attitude of indifference and negligence can be attributed to factors like lack of awareness of the seriousness of the problem, general acceptance of man’s superiority over women because of which violent acts against women were not viewed as violent or deviant, and the denial of violence by women themselves owing to their religious values and socio-cultural attitudes.
The Declaration on the Elimination of Violence Against Women issued by the UN General Assembly in 1993 defines violence against women as “any act of gender-based violence that results in, or is likely to result in, physical, sexual or psychological harm or suffering to women, including threats of such acts, coercion or arbitrary deprivation of liberty, whether occurring in public or in private life.” On 7 February 2000, the General Assembly adopted resolution 54/134, officially designating 25 November as the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women and, in doing so, inviting governments, international organizations as well as NGOs to join together and organize activities designed to raise public awareness of the issue every year on that date.
In India, women are way ahead of their counterparts elsewhere in the matter of social legislation. Still, the implementation of laws granting rights to women has been so slow, lopsided, and haphazard that socially, economically, and politically, women are kept far behind men.
In recent years incidents of aggressive violence against women are reported to be escalating alarmingly in our country. According to the latest report prepared by India’s National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), a crime has been recorded against women every three minutes in India. Every 60 minutes, two women are raped in this country. Every six hours, a young married woman is found beaten to death, burnt, or driven to suicide.
Crimes against women are broadly classified under two categories:
Crime identified under the Indian Penal Code (IPC):
Murder (other than dowry homicides) [Section 302]
Dowry death [Section 304B]
Outrage her modesty [Section 354]
Kidnapping [Section 363]
Importation of girl [Section 366B]
Selling minor for purposes of prostitution [Section 372]
Buying minor for purposes of prostitution [Section 373]
Rape [Section 375]
Husband or relative of husband of a woman subjecting her to cruelty [Section 498A]
Word, gesture, or act intended to insult the modesty of a woman [Section 509]
The crimes under the special laws include four types:
The immoral traffic (prevention) Act, 1956
Dowry prohibition Act, 1961
The Indecent Representation of Women (Prevention) Act, 1986
Commission of sati (prevention) Act, 1987
Types of Violence against Women in India
The various types of violence against women in India will be discussed below in detail:
Sexual violence:
Though it is difficult to indicate the causes of an increase in the incidences of this crime, some factors could be identified by Ram Ahuja, such as urbanization and urbanism, industrialization and the growth of slums, better reporting by the police, co-education, and co-work, movies, obscene and pornographic literature, changing attitudes towards women, decreasing religious restrictions, fall in moral values, and the emergence of the neo-rich people.
A very large percentage of rape cases go unreported either because the victim does not dare to face the shame and humiliation poured on her by society, because of the disgrace it will bring to her family, or because of the police harassment or threats of retaliation by the rapist.
Sexual harassment:
As per the data presented in Lok Sabha from 2014-2018, Uttar Pradesh, the country’s most populous state, reported the most cases (726 or 29%), followed by Delhi (369), Haryana (171), Madhya Pradesh (154), and Maharashtra (147). Eve teasing is a euphemism used for sexual harassment or molestation of women by men; many activists blame the rising incidents of sexual harassment against women on the influence of “Western culture.”
Kidnapping and abduction:
Kidnapping is taking away a female of less than 18 years and a male of less than 16 years of age without the consent of the lawful guardian. Abduction is forcibly, fraudulently, or deceitfully taking away a woman with the intent of seducing her to illicit sex or compelling her to marry a person against her will.
Like rape, it has also been increasing in our country. There have been sporadic reports of poor girls being abducted and sold either as wives to rich Arabs or as potential prostitutes to pimps. The number of abducted girls and women rescued is woefully small. Police stations also offer little protection to rescued women. Instances have been reported abducted of women having been criminally assaulted in police custody.
Dowry:
The Dowry Prohibition Act of 1961 has banned the practice of dowry, but in reality, the demands for dowry have escalated over the years along with dowry-death. In India, due to non-payment or partial payment of dowry, around 5,000 deaths occur in a year. Most dowry-homicides occur in the privacy of the husband’s house and with the collusion of the family members. The term for this is “bride burning,” and it’s criticized within India itself.
Courts, therefore, admit their inability to convict anyone for lack of proof. Such incidents have their origins in social, economic, and psychological factors, too deep-rooted to be tackled by amending the law.
Child Marriage:
Child marriage has been traditionally prevalent in India and continues to this day. Historically, young girls would live with their parents till they reached puberty. In the past, child widows were condemned to a life of great agony, shaving heads, living in isolation, and shunned by society. Although child marriage was outlawed in 1860, it is still a common practice. The Prohibition of Child Marriage Act, 2006, means a person who, if a male, has not completed twenty-one years of age, and if a female, has not completed eighteen years of age.
Female infanticides and sex-selective abortions:
India has a highly masculine sex ratio, the chief reason being that many women die before reaching adulthood. Many experts, therefore, suggest that the highly masculine sex ratio in India can be attributed to female infanticides and sex-selective abortions. The abuse of the dowry tradition has been one of the main reasons for sex-selective abortions and female infanticides in India.
Murder:
The murder of a woman is inspired by many factors, such as illicit relations, petty quarrels, feelings of revenge, the desire to get rid of a person who is to get a share in the property, and so forth. Many murders are disguised as suicides and natural deaths, and some are even called ‘accidents.’
Wife battering:
In the context of marriage husband, who is supposed to love and protect his wife, beats her. The violence can range from slaps and kicks to breaking bones, torture and attempted murder, and even murder itself. The battering may be occasional or frequent. It is not always poor and the illiterate who are battered, but their husbands similarly torture even the rich and highly educated. As wife battering is concealed from the public eye, it is difficult to estimate its extent in society.
Domestic violence:
The incidents of domestic violence are higher among the lower socio-economic classes. There are various instances of a drunk husband beating up the wife, often leading to severe injuries. Domestic violence is also seen in the form of physical abuse. Domestic violence includes harassment, maltreatment, brutality or cruelty, and even the threat of assault-intimidation. It includes physical injury, as well as “willfully or knowingly placing or attempting to place a spouse in fear of injury and compelling the spouse by force or threat to engage in any conduct or act, sexual or otherwise, from which the spouse has a right to abstain.” Confining or detaining the spouse against one’s will or damaging property are also considered acts of violence.
Trafficking:
The Immoral Traffic (Prevention) Act was passed in 1956. However, many cases of trafficking of young girls and women have been reported. These women are either forced into prostitution, domestic work, or child labour.
Eve-teasing:
Eve teasing is an act of terror that violates a woman’s body, space, and self-respect. It is one of the many ways through which a woman is systematically made to feel inferior, weak, and afraid. Whether it is an obscene word whispered into a woman’s ear; offensive remarks on her appearance; an intrusive way of touching any part of a woman’s body; or a gesture that is perceived and intended to be vulgar; all these acts represent a violation of a woman’s person, her bodily integrity.
Rape:
One-quarter of the reported rapes involve girls under the age of 16, but the vast majority are never reported. Although the penalty is severe, convictions are rare. Crimes such as rape as a form of sexual violence are said to be on the increase. Around the world, one in five women has been found to be victims of rape in their lifetime. Many rapes go unreported because of the stigma and trauma associated with them and the lack of sympathetic treatment from legal systems. The insecurity outside the household is today the greatest obstacle in the path of women. Conscious that, compared to the atrocities outside the house, atrocities within the house are endurable, women not only continued to accept their inferiority in the house and society but even called it sweet.
In recent years, there has been an alarming rise in atrocities against women in India. Every 26 minutes, a woman is molested. Every 34 minutes, a rape takes place. Every 42 minutes, a sexual harassment incident occurs. Every 43 minutes, a woman is kidnapped. And every 93 minutes, a woman is burnt to death over dowry.
Acid attacks:
At times, acids such as sulphuric acid have been used to disfigure or kill women and girls for reasons such as family feuds, inability to meet dowry demands, and for rejection of marriage proposals. The Government of India should come out with some more stringent laws to protect the rights of women who are victims of violence of any kind occurring within the family so that it will work as a preventive measure to eradicate the crime. A strict law to be passed to punish those women who are filing a false complaint against husbands or relatives by misusing of Domestic Violence Act, 2005 so that there will be fair justice for all.
Thus, in our society, violence is bursting. It is present almost everywhere, and nowhere is this eruption more intense than right behind the doors of our homes. Behind closed doors of homes all across our country, people are being tortured, beaten, and killed. It is happening in rural areas, towns, cities, and metropolitans as well. It crosses all social classes, genders, racial lines, and age groups. It is becoming a legacy being passed on from one generation to another.
Theoretical Explanations
Some of the theoretical explanation of the cause of violence against women is explained in different theory like:
System Tension and Feedback Systems Theory:
Straus developed it to explain intra-family violence. According to this theory, violence is precipitated by factors such as stress and inter-individual conflict. It is followed by consequences that maintain or escalate violence in the family and society.
This theory has been criticized on the basis that there has been little research specifically concerned with the learning of marital violence. It also over-emphasizes the social system and completely ignores the role of an individual’s personality.
Anomie Theory:
Robert Merton explains that some social structures exert a definite pressure upon certain persons in society to engage in non-conformist rather than conformist conduct. When there is a tendency to overemphasize goals without sufficient attention to institutional means, it leads to a willingness to use any means, regardless of their legality, to meet the goal.
Theory of Sub-Culture of Violence (Wolfgang):
This theory claims that the life circumstances of certain groups trigger violence in urban slum areas. Grinding poverty, unstable community organization, and disorganized family life in such areas lead to the emergence of certain lower-class values. This sub-culture of poverty explanation for criminal violence has been challenged on the ground that generally, the poor are law-abiding and the affluent are not.
Resource theory (Blood & Wolfe):
This is the theoretical approach applied explicitly to family violence. Goode explains that the family is a power system in which four sets of resources are in operation to maintain stability:
economic variables
prestige or respect
love and
force or threat of force.
As a child, the batterer, torturer, murderer, or humiliator learns to use force or threat of force if he feels there is an imbalance in family transactions. For example, when he feels he is not getting respect or love, or faithfulness, force is the only resource he has at his command.
Patriarchy Theory:
It maintains that throughout history, violence has been systematically directed toward women. He argued that patriarchy leads to the subordination of women and contributes to a historical pattern of systematic violence directed against females.
Symbolic Interaction Theory (Mead):
Applying Blumer’s views on violence against women, it could be said that the offender uses it because he considers it as the only means to achieve his end. In other words, violence seen as means to ends is preplanned.
Social Exchange Theory (Goode):
By applying the principles of the Exchange Theory in explaining family violence, they expect that people will use violence in a family if the cause of being violent s not higher than the reward. For example, Goode suggests that force is used more by those in the poorer classes partly because they have less alternative resources and partly because their socialization experiences teach them to depend more on the force.
Role Interference Theories:
According to this theory, an individual becomes violent towards the person he perceives to be frustrating his attempts satisfactorily to play out competing roles.
Structural Theory:
It explains that those individuals would be more violent when combined with high stress with low resources.
Conflict and Control Theories:
Some scholars like Foucault, Thompson, and Rothman have presented a domination model of deviance. They have talked of rules imposed on the powerless by the powerful. Imposing varied restrictions on women and compelling them to remain dependent on men economically, socially, and emotionally to make them realize that they are ‘weak’ and powerless in all respects stands as an example of this argument.
Interactionist Deviance Theory:
According to deviance theory, norm violations tend to trigger forces aimed at making the violator conform to expected standards of behaviour. Thus, when they do not behave like the male’s ideal of wife, husbands use violence against them to make them conform to norms.
Social Learning Theory:
This theory explains both the variations of persons and situations in their tendency to respond aggressively by reference to prior experience, reinforcement patterns, and cognitive processes.
Preventive Measures for violence against women
Patriarchal norms and removing gender bias:
This means making people realize that violent acts against women can occur in circumstances where people normally will not acknowledge them.
For example, rape can be committed by a person very well known to the victim, and a bride can be burnt when she brings dowry worth thousands but fails to bring a few additional thousands demanded by her greedy in-laws. The misuse of traditional patriarchal norms working against women has to be brought to the notice of the people, both men, and women, by women’s organizations.
The cultural definitions and values pertaining to “the way women ought to behave” place women in a structurally disadvantageous power position. It is, therefore, important that violence against women and gender biases and discrimination to redefined and delegitimized.
Changing victims’ and their parents’ thinking:
There is a great need for change in the attitudes of victims’ parents. Suffering violence is so deep-rooted in our cultural milieu that not only illiterate, less educated, and economically dependent women but also sophisticated, highly educated, and economically independent women do not seek legal or police protection. This fact is necessary to keep in view while pondering over measures to control woman’s abuse in our society and to deal with female depersonalization trauma.
Strengthening women’s organization:
The voice of an individual woman perhaps carries no weight. However, if several women with like-minded views join hands, form an organization, and raise their voices against women’s suffering, they can make their presence felt and also make an impact. These organizations can undertake the following activities regarding women’s oppression. The following are to be accounted for, such as:
Hold protest morchas, demonstrations, public meetings, and poster campaigns on women’s oppression.
Help oppressed women.
Organize women’s meetings in different localities to discuss with them not only their specific problems and struggles but also general problems of women’s interest.
Create awakening among women for setting up ‘parishads.’
Create public pressure.
Hold discussions with the general public and create an environment of hostility against specific offenders.
Provide emotional support to women who are victims of male exploitation.
Pressurize the police to act speedily.
Try to involve in the case the victim’s neighbours, who are sympathetic and active.
Organize street plays which would arouse general interest in women’s oppression.
Put up poster exhibitions in various parts of the city.
Organize lectures, followed by discussions on news items, books, or articles relating to women’s issues.
File writ petitions against offenders, police, magistrates, etc., and demand review of the ongoing cases.
Undertake follow-up work in specific cases.
Hold press conferences to highlight specifically cased of women’s torture and cruelty.
Adopting a humanistic approach to victims:
It is necessary to develop a humanistic approach to victims of crimes committed against females by males. This approach includes two things:
Changing in Sex Roles.
Evaluation of Organizational Procedures.
Changing the criminal justice system:
Three changes in this context may be suggested:
Change in attitudes and values of judicial officials.
Establishment of women courts.
Change in the police attitudes.
Inter-professional cooperation:
The five main groups of professionals who work with victims are:
The police
The doctors
The lawyers
The magistrates
The Rescue Home officials
It is, therefore, necessary that all these agencies and professionals combine their efforts and try to tackle the problems of the victims of violence jointly.
Policy recommendations:
Violence against women deserves scientific study, and the victims of crimes require an objective approach in our reactions and a more humanistic response in our dealings. It also seeks efforts to concentrate on the treatment of women exploiters, as well as a well-defined criminal justice system.
Apart from the preventive measure for violence against women, some strategies do need to look into it. The following are some preventative strategies and rehabilitative measures to be taken for the victims:
Preventive strategies:
Introducing self-defense training to girls in school or colleges, or universities.
Imparting legal education to girls in schools or colleges and on the radio and TV.
Protecting the living environment by asking for the identity of the visitor before opening the door.
Arranging a signaling system with reliable neighbours if living alone.
Keeping a watch on the youth by teachers in college or universities and wardens in hostels.
Giving more rights to women in services, business dealings, insurance schemes, taxation law, social affairs, and household chores to improve their status.
Keeping a more strict watch on the daughter by parents.
Increasing patrolling duties of policemen in public places.
Showing programmes on TV suggest measures for the psychological protection of women so that they act and think of themselves less as weak and helpless creatures and learn to escape bring hurt by means of active resistance such as screaming, fighting, and running away.
Restraining mass media from practicing indecent exhibition of women in all types of advertisements and humiliation of women in serials and movies.
Introducing legal reforms which may reduce difficulties in prosecution.
Rehabilitative measures
Providing some financial help to victims.
Establishing centres for rendering help to victims of rape, torture, kidnapping, and harassment.
Providing free legal aid to exploited women both by the government and voluntary women’s organizations.
Special investigation units comprising predominantly women police officers may be created.
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