‘One is not born, rather becomes a woman. No biological psychological or economic fate determines the figure that the human female presents in society; it is civilization as a whole that produces this creature; intermediate between male and eunuch, which is described a feminine.’1
The paper examines the prevalence and the factors associated with various types of violence against women and girls. Violence against women and girls is one of the most extreme forms of gender inequality and widely considered as a violation of human rights. It is a global epidemic that endangers the life trajectories of women and girls in multiple ways, with a wide range of negative consequences not only for them, but also for their children, families, and communities. The paper also highlights the gaps where intensive research or interventions might be undertaken. One of the objectives of this paper is to put an end on violence against women and girls and to examine the roles that laws, policies, and specific programs or interventions may play toward achieving those goals. This is done through both multi-country analysis and country case studies. 3According to United Nations Repot ‘Women constitute half the world’s population , perform nearly two-thirds of its work hours, receive one-tenth of the world’s income, and own less than one-hundredth of the world’s property’.2
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Human rights and fundamental freedoms should be birthrights, but across the globe some countries fail to accord human rights to women. Moreover, women are often victims of human rights abuses. Women’s human rights are abused when they cannot participate in decisions that affect their lives and are denied political participation and fair representation, when they are prevented from going to school or receiving health care, when they face discrimination in employment, when they are denied equal rights to own land and property, when they suffer from violence within their homes and when they are subjected to harmful traditional practices such as genital mutilation and honor killings. The fundamental principle is that women and girls are the first and main citizens, persons who should be granted the same rights and privileges of both men and boys. In our discussion, we integrate the ways in which violence against women and girls, violates this principle and emphasizes the practice they seek to empower women and girls as equal citizens.
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VIOLENCE HAS MANY FACES AND CONSEQUENCES
“Violence against women and girl is of pandemic proportions. At least one out of every women around the world has been beaten, coerced into sex, or otherwise abused in her lifetime with the abuser usually someone known to her.”3 The UN Declaration on Violence against Women, adopted in 1993, defines violence against women as encompassing “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 deprivations of liberty, whether occurring in public or private life”. Violence against women has many faces around the world. These range from female infanticide and the custom of genital mutilation at puberty to domestic violence in marriage and elder abuse. Being an infant facing female infanticide, emotional and physical abuse to an elderly woman facing sexual physical and psychological abuse. The society has witnessed several cases from Vishaka and Ors V State of Rajasthan4 where Bhanwari Devi a helpless women social worker in Rajasthan was brutally gang raped by a number of upper caste gujjar men, because she had tried to stop a child marriage to Kathua rape case referring to the abduction, rape, and murder of an 8-year-old girl, Asifa Bano, in Rasana village near Kathua in Jammu and Kashmir, India, in January 2018, the atrocities against women has got a far reaching effect on the community as a whole. Because of the sensitivity of the subject, violence is almost universally under-reported. Two factors result in violence against women which are extrinsic and intrinsic factors. The former includes male dominance and control and power hierarchy whereas the latter includes personal characteristics includes age, sex, personality and income. Poverty on another hand can enhance women vulnerability to violent situations. Lack of economic self-sufficiency is also one of the root causes of violence and women should be given enhanced provision of education and health benefit and decently paid job to overcome poverty and violence.5
Gandhi observed and said: “Woman has been suppressed under customary law for which man was responsible and on shaping which she had no hand. It is up to man to see that they enable them to realize their full status and play their parts as equals of men”
Violence against women can have a myriad of devastating consequences on women's short and long-term health and wellbeing. Along with the immediate physical and emotional impacts of violence, women's overall quality of life can be adversely affected over an entire lifetime, which can, in turn, impact their participation and engagement in various aspects of life and society
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Numerous studies have shown that children growing up with violence are more likely to become survivors themselves or perpetrators of violence in the future. Violence in childhood and later can also affect girls’ and women’s abilities to fully benefit from and participate in schooling and employment, thus constraining their lifetime opportunities for an education and a career. Violence not only affects the girls and women experiencing it and their families, but also can spiral across generations. An international review of evidence offers a chilling picture of high levels of gender violence in many countries. Violence against women is widespread and crosses all cultural, social, economic, class, religious, and regional boundaries. For example, in countries as different as Zambia and Guatemala, Sri Lanka and Japan, the percentage of women abused by their partners is similarly high. Violence against women also has an impact on the lives of many women beyond the survivors. The fear of violence can prevent women from pursuing education, working or exercising their political rights and voice. Gallup Survey shows that in every region of the world, women consistently feel more insecure than men, although the levels of insecurity significantly vary across regions.
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The violence that women and girls are subjected to throughout their lives prevents them from realizing their rights as human beings and as equal citizens. This fact in itself provides an imperative to act. Most directly, the physical, psychological and other forms of injury they sustain prevent women and girls from leading healthy, productive lives. Violence against women also has an impact on the lives of many women beyond the survivors. The fear of violence can prevent women from pursuing education, working or exercising their political rights and voice.
LEGAL ALERT
Law, as will be shown, has been a potent tool wielded by men to make women toe the line of patriarchy. Manu enunciated the perpetual tutelage in the following terms:
‘Her father protects her in childhood, her husband protects her in youth, and her sons protect her in old age; woman is never fit for independence.’
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‘The hypocrisy of Indian society is nowhere better demonstrated than in its attitude towards women. While our constitution and laws grant women equal rights and opportunities. Women’s struggle for a better social or economic deal have been suppressed by the state - since the state and the policies are committed to protecting and maintaining the status quo and frustrated by the judiciary.”6 States have an obligation to act with due diligence to address and respond to all acts of violence against women. The Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women and the Committee on the Rights of the Child have emphasized that States must “ensure that private actors do not engage in discrimination against women and girls, including gender based violence.” The Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women has further explained that States are required to “exercise due diligence to prevent, investigate, punish and ensure redress for the acts of private individuals or entities that impair the rights enshrined in the Convention. States need to strength efforts to prevent violence against women. The mandate of the Special Rapporteur on violence against women has highlighted the need to strengthen the work on prevention, including the obligation to transform patriarchal structures and values that perpetuate violence against women.7 Violence against women is preventable and States need to formulate comprehensive prevention strategies that take into account the particular contexts in which violence against women takes place.
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Gender-related killings are those killings that have as a main motive or cause gender based discrimination. Terms such as feticide and feminicide, among others, have been used to describe these types of killings. The most obvious examples of gender-related killings include, inter alia, rape-murder, intimate-partner violence escalating into murder, dowry deaths, crimes committed in the name of so-called honor and deaths arising from harmful practices or neglect. The Survey on violence against women has reported that their prevalence is increasing and a lack of accountability for these crimes is the norm. The Survey has also explained that these incidents are not isolated but represent the ultimate act experienced in a continuum of violence by women living under conditions of gender-based discrimination. Stopping gender-motivated killings requires a multifaceted approach including legal, administrative, policy and other measures to address the social, political, economic, cultural and other factors that perpetuate discrimination and violence. The Survey has recommended a holistic approach to preventing gender related killings in all the measures taken by States to investigate and sanction violence, in particular in designing, implementing and evaluating legislation and policies. Such an approach encompasses: promoting societal transformation, including the eradication of harmful stereotypes; developing information systems and good quality data on gender-motivated killings; ensuring adequate enforcement by police and the judiciary of civil remedies and criminal sanctions; and ensuring an adequate provision of legal, social and health services for women victims of violence.
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Justice Krishna Iyer observes that “our administration with its trinity of instrumentalities [Parliament, Judiciary, and Executive] still lives in the medieval age.”8 Therefore the law requires drastic alterations. Though there has been considerable legislation in regard to women during the post- constitution era. A major barrier to needed legal and social reform is the continued lack of recognition that women and girls are first and foremost citizens, individuals who should be accorded the same rights and privileges as men and boys. A perception of women as victims or subjects—rather than as individuals with rights to their own identities, sexualities, and other forms of self-expression—has circumscribed the social and legal provisions for women’s safety. This perception perpetuates the patriarchal belief that female household members must be protected by men and in ways that ensure female conformity to roles defined by traditional, patriarchal norms.
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Legal protection remains weak for sexual violence as a form of domestic violence, where laws are lacking in more than one in three countries. For economic violence, half of the countries do not have specific legislation. For two in three countries, unmarried intimate partners are not protected under the domestic violence laws. Gaps in legislation are most common in the Middle East and North Africa and in sub-Saharan Africa. More than one billion women lack legal protection against sexual violence by an intimate partner or family member and close to 1.4 billion lack legal protection against domestic economic violence, with little progress over time in both cases. In addition, in many countries, even when married women may be protected against domestic violence, women in unmarried intimate relationships may not be protected. One in five countries do not have appropriate laws against sexual harassment in employment. The proportion is six in ten harassment in education and four in five countries countries for sexual for sexual harassment in public spaces. Criminal penalties for sexual harassment are in place in only two thirds of countries and less than half for sexual harassment in employment. Estimates of the number of women lacking legal protection against sexual harassment in employment, education, and public places are at 359 million, 1.5 billion, and 2.2 billion.
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CONTRIBUTIONS
In recent years, governments have been increasingly active in implementing policies that may contribute to preventing violence and that strengthen support services for those who experience violence. Yet, many policies and services continue to reflect a gender bias. All eight countries in South Asia have specific constitutional provisions addressing gender equality and have signed the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, albeit some with reservations. All countries also have some legal protection against several forms of violence, including female infanticide, child marriage, and intimate partner violence. Yet, legal systems contend with significant barriers to reform as well as with structural deficiencies that inhibit women’s access to justice: implementation is poor, and legal awareness is limited. Laws should include a comprehensive definition of domestic violence, including physical, sexual, psychological and economic violence, and should apply at a minimum to individuals who are or have been in an intimate relationship, including marital, non-marital, same sex and non-cohabiting relationships; individuals with family relationships to one another; and members of the same household. Legislation regarding domestic violence has tended to address physical violence only, and it has often applied only to persons in intimate relationships and married couples. However, as a more nuanced understanding of the nature of domestic violence has emerged, laws have progressively been enacted to include the four types of violence, and also include other survivors of domestic violence, such as intimate partners who are not married or in a cohabiting relationship, persons in family relationships and members of the same household, including domestic workers.
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Decreasing violence against women and girls requires a community-based, multi-pronged approach, and sustained engagement with multiple stakeholders. The most effective initiatives address underlying risk factors for violence, including social norms regarding gender roles and the acceptability of violence. Governments have a critical role to play in ensuring that existing laws and policies protecting women and girls from violence are implemented effectively and that government instruments, such as health sector crisis centers, reach the intended populations. Moreover, governments need to commit adequate funding across ministries for policies and programs that address specific forms of violence. Most important, governments need to recognize and acknowledge that violence against women and girls is not the purview of a specific ministry or department but requires coordinated efforts across ministries.
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NGOs are on the front line of prevention and violence programs. The first, NGO need to improve the documentation of the processes to make comparisons between them merits of various intervention components. Secondly, there is a need for greater dialogue, sharing of experience and collaboration among NGOs. Thirdly, NGOs need to better identify the potential unintended consequences of their interventions. Finally, NGOs must improve their monitoring and evaluation capability. Ending violence against women and girls is an effort that includes everyone in our society. Violence is a violation of a basic human right for safety. Violence against women has been happening for a long time, but we can work together to prevent it in the future.
Violence against women can be prevented by strengthening women’s access to basic human rights and resources. Research shows that communities with more access to education, jobs, housing, health care, affordable child care and elder care, and equality for both men and women have lower rates of violence against women.
In addition to challenges in ending all violence against women, ending sexual violence against women requires more gender equality in all parts of society. Part of being human is our sexuality. Sex and gender influence many different parts of a person’s life. Sexual violence against women can happen when a woman’s value in society is seen only through her sexuality. When women are not seen as equals to men, they are more likely to be victimized through their sexuality.
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Women who have experienced sexual assault are often blamed for the assault. Blaming a woman for another person’s choice to assault her is wrong. Many women who report sexual assault are asked questions about what they were wearing, whether they were drinking or using drugs, or where they were during the assault. These questions imply that the sexual assault was the victim’s fault. Sexual assault is always the responsibility of the person who committed the assault. It is never the victim’s fault. In order to end sexual violence against women, we must agree as a society that sexual contact between people cannot happen unless there is clear consent.
It is clearly vital to support women and girls who encounter violence, for example ensuring they have access to justice, sheltering protection, whether violence is domestic or in workplace. But to break the violence cycle, policy intervention should focus on the longer-term by changing discriminatory social norms; closing gender gaps whether educational economic or social level; or building awareness about violence against women.
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CONCLUSION
Ending all forms of violence against women and girls is an important target under the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG). In SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT AGENDA 2030 Goal number 5 is addressing gender equality. Inside the framework of new SDG all goals are interconnected with each other. This goal is addressing empowerment and equality of woman with other targets like poverty, inequality and peaceful society.
Achieving this target would end the harm and suffering caused by such violence. It would also have a range of beneficial impacts in other development areas and generate substantial economic and social gains. Having adequate laws in place is fundamental for more effective responses to violence against women. Specific laws on domestic violence and sexual harassment provide a clear framework to address the various forms of abuse and mechanisms to protect and support women seeking assistance. Beyond the period of time covered in this note, over the past 25 years, the number of countries introducing laws on domestic violence has increased significantly, in part thanks to international and regional human rights conventions and campaigns. Legal protection is crucial to reduce impunity and open avenues for redress.
As quoted by Justice Arjith Pasayat from his beautiful thought that –“While a murderer destroys the physical frame of the victim, on the other hand the rapist defiles the soul of a helpless female”
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Simone de Beauvoir, The second sex (Harmondsworth: Penguin), 1984 p 295
United nations report, Copenhagen conference, halfway through international women’s decade (1975-1985)
Kofi Annan 2006 report on UN Development Fund for Women Website
AIR 1997 SC 3014
Ogrodnik Borzutzky, 201 para 64
Sumanta Banerjee “ reporting to each other “ economic and political weekly
Ending violence against women and children survey by world bank
V R Krishna Iyer, Indian social justice in crisis
REFERENCE
1. Singh Indu “Women, Law and Social change in India” Sangam Books ltd.
2. Claire M Kennedy” Violence against women” Third edition- Sage Publications
3. The World Bank – Sept 25,2019-www.worldbank.org/gender-based-violence
4. World Health Organization- Nov 29,2017-www.who.int/violence-against-women
AUTHOR: ANU VISWANATH
CO-AUTHOR: ANU ANNA BABY
[Students of Nehru Academy of Law]
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