Violence/crime against Women

• The National Family Health Survey (NFHS-4) suggests that 30 percent women in India in the age group of 15-49 have experienced physical violence since the age of 15.
• The report further reveals that 6 percent women in the same age group have experienced sexual violence at least once in their lifetime.
• About 31 percent of married women have experienced physical, sexual or emotional violence by their spouses.
• Violence/Crime against women is increasing every year. According to NCRB report, it has reached a peak in 2018. Close to 3.78 lakh cases of crimes against women were recorded in 2018, the highest since gender-wise classifications were initiated in 1992 by the NCRB.
• In recent years, more than 560 cases of rape reported in Delhi. Violence against Indian women is increasing and has widespread and deep roots in social psyche.
• As per World Health Organization (WHO)findings about 1 in 3 (35%) women worldwide have experienced either physical or sexual intimate partner violence or non-partner sexual violence in their lifetime.
• Violence against women – particularly intimate partner violence and sexual violence– is a major public health problem and a violation of women’s human rights.
• Globally, 38% of murdersof women are committed by a male intimate partner.
• Violence can negatively affect women’s physical, mental, sexual and reproductive health, and may increase the risk of acquiring HIV in some settings.

• Women who experience violence are more at risk of unwanted pregnancies, maternal and infant mortality, and sexually transmitted infections, including HIV.
• Such violence can cause direct and long-term physical and mental health consequences.
• Exposure to violence has been linked with a multitude of adverse health outcomes, including acute injuries, chronic pain, gastrointestinal illness, gynaecological problems, depression, and substance abuse.
• Mental health consequences include increasing women’s risk of depression, post-traumatic stress disorder, and substance abuse
• In many societies, women who are raped or sexually abused are stigmatised and isolated, which impacts not only their well-being, but also their social participation, opportunities and quality of life.
• Women who experience violence from their partners are less likely to earn a living and are less able to care for their children or participate meaningfully in community activities or social interaction that might help end the abuse.
• Women exposed to partner violence have higher work absenteeism, lower productivity, and lower earnings than working women who are not beaten.
• Women in formal wage work who are exposed to severe partner abuse (both lifetime and current) have 60 per-cent lower earnings.

They start with the practice of sex-selective abortion and infanticide, and continue through adolescent and adult life with high levels of female infant mortality, child marriage, teenage pregnancy, lesser wages for women, unsafe workplaces, domestic violence, maternal mortality, sexual assault and neglect of elderly women.

• Domestic violence
  • Domestic violence is abuse by one partner against another in an intimate relationship such as dating, marriage, cohabitation or a familial relationship.
  • It is also categorised as domestic abuse, spousal abuse, battering, family violence, dating abuse and intimate partner violence (IPV).
  • It can be physical, emotional, verbal, economic and sexual abuse as well as subtle, coercive or violent.
• Killings 
  • Female infanticide and sex-selective abortion
    • Female infanticide is the elected killing of a newborn female child or the termination of a female fetus through sex-selective abortion.
    • In India, there is incentive to have a son, because they offer security to the family in old age and are able to conduct rituals for deceased parents and ancestors.
    • In contrast, daughters are considered to be a social and economic burden
  • Dowry deaths
    • A dowry death is the murder or suicide of a married woman caused by a dispute over her dowry.
    • In some cases, husbands and in-laws will attempt to extort a greater dowry through continuous harassment and torture which sometimes results in the wife committing suicide.
  • Honor killings
    • An honor killing is a murder of a family member who has been considered to have brought dishonour and shame upon the family.
    • Examples of reasons for honor killings include the refusal to enter an arranged marriage, committing adultery, choosing a partner that the family disapproves of, and becoming a victim of rape.
    • Village caste councils or khap panchayats in certain regions of India regularly pass death sentences for persons who do not follow their diktats on caste or gotra.
  • Witchcraft accusations and related murders
    • Witchcraft is the practice of what the practitioner believes to be magical skills and abilities, and activities such as spells, incantations, and magical rituals.
    • Murders of women accused of witchcraft still occur in India.  Poor women, widows, and women from lower castes are most at risk of such killings.

• Sexual Abuse/ Molestation/ Rape
  • Rape is one of the most common crimes in India.
  • According to the National Crime Records Bureau, one woman is raped every 20 minutes in India.
• Marital Crimes
  • Marital rape
    • In India, marital rape is not a criminal offense.
    • India is one of fifty countries that have not yet outlawed marital rape.

• • Forced Marriage
    • Girls are vulnerable to being forced into marriage at young ages, suffering from a double vulnerability: both for being a child and for being female.
    • Child brides often do not understand the meaning and responsibilities of marriage.
• Harassment
  • Trafficking and forced prostitution
    • Human trafficking, especially of girls and women, often leads to forced prostitution and sexual slavery.
  • Online abuse
    • As internet becomes an increasingly important part of human existence to make their voices heard, a woman’s inability to feel safe online is an impediment to her freedom.
    • Women are regularly subject to online rape threats, online harassment, cyber-stalking, blackmail, trolling, slut-shaming and more.
  • Harassment at the workplace
    • The #MeToo movement is aimed at demonstrating how many women have survived sexual assault and harassment, especially in the workplace.
    • Scores of women, many journalists, came out with accounts of sexual harassment at workplace, mostly comprising of indecent remarks, unwanted touches, demands for sex, and the dissemination of pornography.

• Gender roles and relations
  • Men’s agreement with sexist, patriarchal, and sexually hostile attitudes
  • Violence-supportive social norms regarding gender and sexuality
  • Male-dominated power relations in relationships and families
  • Sexist and violence-supportive contexts and cultures
• Social norms and practices related to violence
  • Lack of domestic violence resources
  • Violence in the community
  • Childhood experience of intimate partner violence (especially among boys)
• Access to resources and systems of support
  • Low socioeconomic status, poverty, and unemployment
  • Lack of social connections and social capital
  • Personality characteristics
  • Alcohol and substance abuse
  • Separation and other situational factors
• No fear of law: Various laws like Sexual harassment at workplace, Vishakha guidelines are in place. Unfortunately, these laws have failed to protect women and punish the culprits. Even law has a lot of loopholes. For example, under Sexual harassment at workplace act, the law states that there has to be an annual report that needs to be filed by companies, but there is no clarity with the format or filing procedure.
• Lack of accountability and conviction:  Lack of accountability of the law and order institutions and lack of conviction of culprit lead to increase in crimes against women. A lack of centralised mechanism to collect data on women harassment, makes it difficult to analyse patterns on harassment that women face leading to poor law implementation.
• Patriarchy: Despite the increased education levels and various government efforts like Beto Bachao Beti Padao, women status has not improved much. People are not shedding their patriarchal mind-set. Honour killing, domestic violence are on rise due to increasing women’s voices that is challenging patriarchal mind-set.
• Police failure: Indifferent attitude of Police leads people to take law in their own hands. Police delays and inability to catch the criminals lead to more crime against women. The state police attitude is not good in implementing laws against sexual crime. Many cases of misbehave with women by police have been reported.
• A lack of public safety: Women generally aren’t protected outside their homes. Many streets are poorly lit, and there’s lack of women’s toilets. Women who drink, smoke or go to pubs are widely seen in Indian society as morally loose, and village clan councils have blamed a rise in women talking on cell phones and going to the bazaar for an increase in the incidence of rape.
• More reporting:  A recent report reveals that there is a 12% increase in sexual offences. With women shedding their shyness and more women being educated, reporting of crimes has increased. More women are raising their voice as was seen in #MeToo movement. This has led to increased reported cases as reflected in NCRB report.
• A sluggish judicial system: India’s court system is painfully slow, because of a shortage of judges. The country has about 15 judges for every 1 million people. This leads to delay in justice. The Indian justice system has failed to investigate, prosecute, and punish the perpetrators and failed to provide effective redressal for victims.
• Traditional and cultural practices:
  • Female genital mutilation: Can lead to death, infertility, and long-term psychological trauma combined with increased physical suffering.
  • Acid attacks: Acid attacks have emerged as a cheap and readily accessible weapon to disfigure and sometimes kill women and girls for reasons as varied as family feuds, inability to meet dowry demands, and rejection of marriage proposals.
  • Killing in the name of family honour: In several countries of the world including Bangladesh, Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Pakistan, Turkey, and India, women are killed to uphold the honour of the family due to varied reasons such as-alleged adultery, premarital relationship (with or without sexual relations), rape, falling in love with a person the family disapproves, which justify a male member of the family to kill the woman concerned.
  • Early marriages: Early marriage with or without the consent of the girl, constitutes a form of violence as it undermines the health and autonomy of millions of girls.
• Judiciary and law enforcement machinery: An insensitive, inefficient, corrupt and unaccountable judicial system and law enforcement machinery fails to deter against various forms of crimes.
• Sociocultural factors disfavouring women: Stereotypes of gender roleshave continued over the ages.
  • The primary roles for women have been marriage and motherhood.
  • Women must marry because an unmarried, separated or divorced status is a stigma.
  • The custom of dowry is still prevalent in Indian marriages.

• In India,the National Commission for Women (NCW) has recorded a more than twofold rise in gender-based violence.
• 1 in 3 women and girls experience physical or sexual violence in their lifetime, most frequently by an intimate partner.
• 200 million women and girls have undergone female genital mutilation (FGM).
• 71% of all human trafficking victims worldwide are women and girls, and 3 out of 4 of these women and girls are sexually exploited.
• As per NCRB data Majority of cases under crime against women under IPC were registered under cruelty by husband or his relatives (30.9%), followed by assault on women with intent to outrage her modesty, kidnapping & abduction of women and rape.
• 4% of cybercrime cases registered were for the motive of fraud followed by sexual exploitation.

• Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act, 2005
• Dowry Prohibition Act, 1961
• Indecent Representation of Women (Prohibition) Act, 1986
• Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act, 2013
• Prohibition of Child Marriage Act, 2006

The Government has also taken a number of initiatives for safety of women and girls, which are given below:

• Nirbhaya Fundfor projects for the safety and security of women
• One-Stop Centre Schemeto provide integrated support and assistance to women affected by violence, both in private and public spaces under one roof
• Online analytic tool for police called “Investigation Tracking System for Sexual Offences”to monitor and track time-bound investigation in sexual assault cases in accordance with Criminal Law (Amendment) Act 2018.
• National Database on Sexual Offenders (NDSO)to facilitate investigation and tracking of sexual offenders across the country by law enforcement agencies
• In order to coordinate various initiatives for women safety, MHA has set up a Women Safety Division.

MHA has issued advisories to all State Governments/UTs, advising them to ensure thorough investigation, conducting of medical examination of rape victims without delay and for increasing gender sensitivity in Police.

• Civil society participation: The role of community and state has increased to stop such crimes. Active participation of civil society against such crimes and helping state and law enforcement agencies in nabbing the criminal is critical.
• State action: State should be more proactive in police reforms. Strict action should be taken against any police officials who do not record such incidents in criminal records.
• Police reforms: The government should carry a recruitment drive for women and should focus on gender focused training in police and judiciary. There is a need to create women police stations and more women should be taken as judges.
• Judicial reforms: Women harassment cases must be resolved in a time frame. The court dealing with rape cases should be sensitive towards the conditions of rape victims and award punishments to rapists with great seriousness towards women conditions in the Indian society.
• Compensation: The need of the hour is the creation of state sponsored victim compensatory fund particularly for heinous offences including rape. This award should be totally free from the result of the prosecution that is conviction or acquittal and should come into action the moment FIR is registered or cognisance is taken of a complaint.
• Media: The media must be sensitive to the plight of the rape victim and must not highlight the name or any inference leading to the identification of the victim, as it will be counterproductive. The media must invariably highlight those cases where the offender has been convicted, as it will infuse the feeling of deterrence among the people.
• Crisis centre: Rape Crisis Centres are set up in countries like Australia, Canada, America, United Kingdom, etc. These centres provide their help through their telephonic help lines also. These centres provide the rape victims with medical help, counselling, and financial help by way of providing job opportunities etc. Such centres should be set up in India to provide for medical aid and counselling to the rape victims.

• Promoting gender equality is a critical part of violence prevention.
  • The relationship between gender and violence is complex. Evidence suggests, however, that gender inequalities increase the risk of violence by men against women and inhibit the ability of those affected to seek protection. There are many forms of violence against women; this briefing focuses on violence by intimate partners, the most common form. Though further research is needed, evidence shows that school, community and media interventions can promote gender equality and prevent violence against women by challenging stereotypes that give men power over women.
• School initiatives are well placed to prevent violence against women.
  • School-based programmes can address gender norms and attitudes before they become deeply ingrained in children and youth. Such initiatives address gender norms, dating violence and sexual abuse among teenagers and young adults. Positive results have been reported for the Safe Dates programme in the United States of America and the Youth Relationship Project in Canada.
• Community interventions can empower women and engage with men.
  • Community interventions can address gender norms and attitudes through, for example, the combination of microfinance schemes for women and methods that empower men as partners against gender-based violence. The strongest evidence is for the IMAGE microfinance and gender equity initiative in South Africa and the Stepping Stones programme in Africa and Asia. Community programmes with male peer groups show promise in changing attitudes towards traditional gender norms and violent behaviour, but they require more rigorous evaluations. Well-trained facilitators and community ownership appear to boost the effectiveness of these interventions.
• Media interventions can alter gender norms and promote women’s rights.
  • Public awareness campaigns and other interventions delivered via television, radio, newspapers and other mass media can be effective for altering attitudes towards gender norms. The most successful are those that seek to understand their target audience and engage with its members to develop content. We do not yet know, however, whether they actually reduce violence.
• Programmes must engage males and females.
  • There is some evidence that microfinance schemes that empower women (without engaging with men) may actually cause friction and conflict between partners, especially in societies with rigid gender roles. Further research is needed to explore how such possible negative effects might be overcome.

• Addressing the deeply entrenched patriarchal attitudes of the police, lawyer and other judicial officers that continues to contribute to low reporting and conviction rates.
• Bridging the gap between GBV laws and its correlated areas such as legal rights to property, land, inheritance, employment and income that allows a woman to walk out of an abusive relationship and specific emphasis on political and economic participation of women.
• Systematic intervention for multisectoral linkages between Health sector (medical and psychosocial support), Social Welfare sector (Shelters, counselling and economic support/skill), Legal (legal aid)
• Not just engage with “men and boys” as change agents but also acknowledge the expectations linked to masculinity, their position as victim of violence especially for young boys to address the perpetuation of cycle of GBV.
• Recognize sexual and reproductive health and rights by promotion and protection of women’s right to have control and decide freely over matters related to their sexuality, including sexual and reproductive health, family-planning choices and access to comprehensive sexuality education.
• Reclaiming the spaces for women to increase their presence in visibility through political and economic participation and diversifying their engagement in non-traditional sectors.
• Use of technology and emerging concepts such as Smart City in urban policy for ensuring safer and gender friendly infrastructures and spaces that prevents GBV.

Thus, women’s crime needs to be tackled at all levels with involvement of community and whole society. Everyday women are dealing with harassment from mild to extreme forms on our streets, workplaces, public transportation, and even in homes. This needs to be stopped by active vigil in society. Women’s issues need to be tackled with strong political will and government efforts.