Violence against women is a global phenomenon and its magnitude and effects are often underrated. It directly affects a third of the world’s female population, as more than one out of three women worldwide have been beaten, coerced to sex, or in other ways abused throughout their lives.Domestic violence is a pervasive problem in all regions of the world, occurring in every culture and social group. It has devastating physical, emotional, financial and social effects on the victims, families and communities. The victims are overwhelmingly female who face many challenges in accessing justice and protection. In many societies, persistent gender inequality and a culture of male domination socialize women to accept, tolerate and even rationalize domestic violence and to remain silent about such experience. International efforts have recognized the need for a comprehensive and multi-sectoral approach to this complex social problem, with the law enforcement and justice sectors having crucial roles to play. Domestic violence can have devastating effect upon the victim, families and the society. Victims suffer physically, emotionally and financially. The violence threatens the stability of the family and negatively impacts all family members, including the children who witness the violence and grow up in a conflict-ridden, unhappy environment. Domestic violence negatively impacts the safety, health and social order of the community. Violence against women in India is an issue rooted in societal norms and economic dependence. Female feticide, domestic violence, sexual harassment and other forms of gender-based violence constitute the reality of most girls’ and women’s lives in India. Wife battering affects the physical and psychological well being of the abused women and even that of their children. Although female participation in public life is increasing and laws have been amended, India still has a long way to go to make Indian women equal citizens in their own country. In our society, many women are violently treated by their intimate partners while they suffer in silence. In some cases, domestic violence leads to the death of these women. Domestic violence against women is an age-old phenomenon. Women were always considered weak, vulnerable and in a position to be exploited. Violence has long been accepted as something that happens to women. Cultural mores, religious practices, economic and political conditions may set the precedence for initiating and perpetuating domestic violence, but ultimately committing an act of violence is a choice that the individual makes out of a range of options. Although one cannot underestimate the importance of macro system-level forces (such as cultural and social norms) in the etiology of gender-based violence within any country, including India, individual-level variables (such as observing violence between one’s parents while growing up, absent or rejecting father, delinquent peer associations) also play important roles in the development of such violence. The gender imbalance in domestic violence is partly related to differences in physical strength and size. Moreover, women are socialized into their gender roles in different societies throughout the world. In societies with a patriarchal power structure and with rigid gender roles, women are often poorly equipped to protect themselves if their partners become violent. However, much of the disparity relates to how men-dependence and fearfulness amount to a cultural disarmament. Husbands who batter wives typically feel that they are exercising a right, maintaining good order in the family and punishing their wives’ delinquency – especially the wives’ failure to keep their proper place.
Domestic violence can be described as the power misused by one adult in a relationship to control another. It is the establishment of control and fear in a relationship through violence and other forms of abuse. This violence can take the form of physical assault, psychological abuse, social abuse, financial abuse, or sexual assault. The frequency of the violence can be on and off, occasional or chronic.“Domestic violence is not simply an argument. It is a pattern of coercive control that one-person exercises over another. Abusers use physical and sexual violence, threats, emotional insults and economic deprivation as a way to dominate their victims and get their way”. (Susan Scheter, Visionary leader in the movement to end family violence). The Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act, 2005 says that any act, conduct, omission or commission that harms or injures or has the potential to harm or injure will be considered domestic violence by the law. Even a single act of omission or commission may constitute domestic violence – in other words, women do not have to suffer a prolonged period of abuse before taking recourse to law. The law covers children also. Domestic violence is perpetrated by, and on, both men and women. However, most commonly, the victims are women, especially in our country. Even in the United States, it has been reported that 85% of all violent crime experienced by women are cases of intimate partner violence, compared to 3% of violent crimes experienced by men. Thus, domestic violence in Indian context mostly refers to domestic violence against women. According to the report Violence Against Women Prevalence Estimates, 2018, published jointly by different components of the United Nations system, 1 in 3 women experience domestic violence globally. Such violence, also known as ‘domestic abuse’ or ‘intimate partner violence,’ is defined by the United Nations as “a pattern of behavior in any relationship that is used to gain, or maintain, power and control over an intimate partner.” The Declaration on the Elimination of Violence against Women actually makes a very concrete call to “Promote research, collect data and compile statistics, especially concerning domestic violence.” This is one of the critical research areas for institutions of higher education around the world involved in gender studies and the overall promotion and protection of fundamental freedoms and human rights. Domestic violence can take various forms, and most often, it combines several types of violence, creating depression, injuries and illness. Moreover, domestic violence results in broader social and economic costs, including those of services to treat and support abused women and bring perpetrators to justice, aside from lost employment and productivity, undermining women’s capabilities, and even slowing down economic growth. This evidence enables an understanding of how domestic violence undermines households’ economic security and quality of life while limiting the effectiveness of programs to improve the well-being and capabilities of communities across low and middle-income countries.
(The Author is Research Fellow at United nations World Peace Institute. Views are exclusively his own)
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