Understanding Violence against Women and our Experience
Violence against women is a global phenomenon and may be of many kinds. A report entitled ‘Women and Violence’ dated February 1996, published by the United Nations Department of Public Information, enumerates the following : domestic violence, violence sanctioned by traditional practices like genital mutilation or wearing of chastity belts, arising out of preference for sons, dowry related or due to early marriage. It emphasizes the fact that all over the world women are terrorized by rape within and outside marriage, sexual harassment at the workplace, trafficking and prostitution and by proliferation of pornography. It notes that women who are migrant workers, refugees or displaced, imprisoned by the state or residents of places facing armed conflict are especially vulnerable to violence. Underlining violence against women as a human rights violation that retards the achievement of the objectives of equality, development and peace for the entire community, it discusses the need to combat the growing menace at the level of change of attitudes, legislations, and human rights initiatives.
In the recent gender gap report 2008 released by the World Economic Forum, India ranked a dismal 114 out of 134 countries – in the health and survival category our rank was as low as 131, in economic participation and opportunity 127; in educational attainment 121. We were redeemed somewhat by rank 34 in political empowerment, no doubt due to reservations for women in panchayats and local bodies. Analysing the report Rajya Sabha M.P Brinda Karat opines, “Important indicators are not included in the present index. For example the incidence of violence against women has been identified repeatedly by women’s movements as a crucial measurement of gender equality. Women cannot be equal if they are vulnerable to domestic and sexual violence.” India may have well slipped down further in the ranking had this category been included in computing the gender gap. In spite of the passing of women friendly legislations, nationwide crimes against women have seen a phenomenal rise in the past two decades in India. According to the publication titled ‘Women and Men in India, 2006’ brought out by the Central Statistical Organisation (CSO), under the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation, there has been a continuous rise in the total incidence of crimes committed against women over the years. Crimes against women, it states, increased during 2004 by 9.8 per cent over 2003 and by 13.9 per cent over 1999.
According to the National Crime Records Bureau data Rajasthan has consistently been one of the highest ranking states in the entire country (along with Madhya Pradesh, Bihar, and Delhi) as far as crime against women are concerned. NCRB also recorded a shocking total of 4174 cases of crimes against the Dalits in Rajasthan in 2007 – the highest in the country in that year -and Dalit women were noted to be particularly vulnerable to violence. Rajasthan also holds the dubious distinction of having the highest number of cases registered under Domestic Violence Act in the year 2007. Of course, other indices relevant to gender equity are equally shameful in Rajasthan. According to census 2001, national sex ratio and literacy rate stood at the low 933 and 54.16 respectively. In Rajasthan overall sex ratio for 0-6 years is 909 (Demography- Total Populations and Sex Ratio, Census of India, New Delhi, 2001) along with the much lower literacy rate, i.e. 44% (Education-Literacy rate, Gross Enrolment Ratio and Teacher Pupil Ratio- Ministry of HRD. Selected Educational Statistics, 2001). Rajasthan also has one of the highest rates of maternal mortality in the country. According to a recent UNICEF national and district level family health survey report 2008 more than 40% girls in Rajasthan marry below the age of 18 at least in 13 districts, including Ajmer and Jaipur. Among married women more than 45 per cent had suffered from all kinds of physical, mental and sexual abuse and violence. . Add to this the recent media reports of sex crimes committed against foreign women in tourist spots and minor girls in small town of Rajasthan and a bleak picture of women’s lives in the region begins to emerge. Almost all the kinds of violence against women enumerated by the UN report on Women and Violence are present in Rajasthan in overt or covert ways. In the process of the country joining the global village and liberalizing itself, women, especially in a ‘traditional’ society like ours seem to be increasingly trapped in the double bind of tradition and commercialized modernity. As a voluntary organization working in Ajmer since 1970 in the field of education, health, gender and human rights we feel that all our developmental initiatives need to be qualified even more than before by gender sensitivity and a more activist intervention in women’s issues.
AAEA Initiative in Empowerment of Women
Started in 1971 by founder secretary, the late Mrs. Kanta Marwah, AAEA has been working in Ajmer to empower the poor, deprived and marginalised sections of society for 39 years now. Special care has been taken to address women in all our activities through the years.
However, to both expand and sharpen the scope of our work towards gender justice we initiated the ‘Amba Dalmia Women Empowerment Cell’ with the slogan ‘Own Your Body’ in April 2009.
The Women Empowerment Cell under AAEA is committed to ensuring that women in Rajasthan take their rightful place as citizens of a free democracy in the twenty-first century. To work towards that goal we need to re-build institutions, re-interpret laws and social customs so that social institutions begin to reflect the needs and demands of women. The definition of these needs and demands can start only when women declare ownership of their bodies - not because being a woman is only biological but because struggle for rights has to begin with the basics. Ownership of the body involves the mind in a proactive relationship to the self and is necessary to the appreciation and implementation of the following:
a. No to all kinds of sexual abuse
b. Anti-sexual harassment policy in the workplace.
c. Equality in love and sex for the adolescent girl
d. Empowered negotiations with glamour and beauty
e. Women’s rights in marital sex
f. No to all kinds of domestic violence
g. Reproductive Rights and decisions about motherhood
h. Reproductive health
i. Menopause and care of the ageing female body
Thus, owning the body means challenging the violence women suffer from infancy to old age in the name of custom, tradition, patriotism or progress. It has the potential to bring about far-reaching societal changes.
The Scope of Law in Combating Violence against Women
In our struggle for gender justice and equity it is important to use, in the most effective manner possible, the tools and the resources we have already. In an article about the Domestic Violence Act (2006) social activist Srilata Swaminathan, who has worked for decades in Rajasthan, admits the limitations of legal reform and underlines the need of revolutionizing the entire political, economic and social system in order to ensure equality to women. Nevertheless, she welcomes the recently passed Domestic Violence Act as a significant step in feminist legislation: “But there is no doubt that with this Act a whole Pandora's Box of litigation will be thrown open and all the degradation, brutality and cruelty to women that has been carefully swept under the carpet for centuries in our 'old, rich heritage and civilisation' is all going to be exposed - and about time! For those feminist groups that see the family or the male as the main cause for women's oppression, this Act will open up all sorts of possibilities in their struggles.”
In spite of an early limitation placed on the scope of the Act by the Supreme Court, the Domestic Violence Act may still be said to be weighted in favour of women. In a lot of ways it also builds upon an earlier feminist initiative: the Vishakha Guidelines issued by the Supreme Court to all public and private sector institutions directing them to institute in-house complaints mechanisms to tackle sexual harassment at the workplace in 1997.
Thus, the knowledge and awareness of the Vishakha Guidelines and the Domestic Violence Act may be valuable resources in combating violence against women. In the conference we are holding on the subject, we propose to focus on how activist groups have been using legislation to protect and empower women and how they might be use law more effectively for the purpose.
For instance, as discussed in ‘Staying Alive: Third Monitoring and Revaluation Report 2009 on the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act, 2005” by LCWRI, Protection Officers were only appointed in Rajasthan in 2008 and all litigation under PWDVA has been private or lawyer driven. A lot needs to be done in the state to bring about a change in general attitude and also in the attitude of the officials involved in the Domestic Violence Act towards violence against women. NGOs like AAEA can play an important role in facilitating such changes.
Conference and Workshop: Combating Violence against Women
Concept
Following internationally accepted legal principles PWDVA 2005 provides for the first time a comprehensive definition of domestic violence. “Violence against women shall be understood to encompass physical, sexual, and psychological violence in the family, including…dowry-related violence, marital rape…non-spousal violence.” The Act seeks to address the non-recognition of a woman’s right to reside in the shared household and accepts ‘relationships in the nature of marriage’ as a kind of domestic relationship – unprecedented legal strides.
The Act has been in the news since its conception with certain elements in the central government making an all out effort to abort it. However, its progress has been far from smooth even after it was delivered to the public in 2006. Vitriolic attacks on PWDVA in the media, the resistance of some state governments in implementing it , and cases filed to challenge its constitutionality have established beyond doubt that there is a big gap in the rights claimed for women through the definition of violence provided in the act and general conceptions (even in pre-existing laws)in India. The state of Rajasthan – that concerns us most here - appointed Protection Officers only in 2008 in response to a PIL although it had the dubious distinction of having the highest number of cases filed under PWDVA in the year 2007.
Perhaps the most worrying tendency that if not checked would defeat the purpose of PWDVA is denial of violence by the victims: too many women condone violence by refusing to recognise it in their lives. In rural Rajasthan, for instance, in the course of our work with health and education we have observed that most women report an absence of violence in the home; yet, go on to complain that the men folk abuse and beat them after getting drunk. How can such ostrich-behaviour be addressed? The writing on the wall is that mere knowledge of the law will not suffice unless it is accompanied with a vigorous campaign to bring about change in attitudes.
With this concern in mind we are entering the combat zone armed with our 39 years of grass-root experience in Ajmer, Rajasthan, with the belief that voluntary organizations like AAEA can play a crucial role not only in the dissemination of information about the act but especially in bringing about societal changes.
The beginning of our project is a conference and workshop. Conceptualising PWDVA 2005 and the ‘backlash’ that has followed its implementation as a climactic moment in the struggle for women’s rights in India, we propose to explore two broad areas: ‘Women and Law’ and ‘Activist initiatives in combating violence against women.’
The Programme
AAEA will host the event at Patel Indoor Stadium, Ajmer at 9.30 AM on 19-20 February 2010 with Kavita Shrivastava, Legal Activist, and Renuka Pamecha, Social Activist from Jaipur, and Shaktishalini, New Delhi and pandies’ theatre, New Delhi as resource organizations. The event would include a legal module focussing on the Protection of Women against Violence Act 2005, forum theatre, enactment of case histories, interactive workshop, distribution of resource material obtained from UNIFEM, New Delhi etc.
Participants in the conference and workshop would include Members and field workers of AAEA, Representatives and Field Workers from other NGOs in Ajmer, Lecturers and teachers from educational institutions, Members from judicial services, and representatives from police stations in Ajmer. Protection officers under PWDVA and Service Providers will also be present.
Objectives of the Conference and Workshop on ‘Combating Violence against Women’
The conference and workshop are an exercise in raising awareness about violence against women. The objectives include
1. Uncovering and recognizing violence against women
2. Recognizing the effects of violence against women
3. Making the participants aware of laws against violence
4. Discussing practical remedies against violence
5. Distribution of resource material like handbooks for legal redress
6. Preparing the participants to hold further workshops against violence
Technical Outcomes
1. Training and sensitization of Protection Officers under PWDVA
2. Training and sensitization of NGO representatives
3. Training and sensitization of teachers and lecturers
4. Training and sensitization of grassroot workers of AAEA and other NGOs
5. Distribution of material on legal redress from violence in Ajmer city and 50 villages of Arain block
Follow-up by AAEA
1. Documentation of the conference
2. Publication of a report on Effective Ways of Combating Violence Against Women in Rajasthan
3. Networking with other NGOs and institutions doing similar work in Rajasthan
4. Building a platform of like-minded individuals and organizations in Ajmer
5. Holding and supporting similar workshops in villages and educational institutions in Ajmer by providing resource people and material
6. Gender sensitization and theatre training programme by Pandies’ theatre for rural adolescents (21-25 February)
7. Information dissemination to villages in Ajmer
Organizing Committee
Convener: Anuradha Marwah, Secretary, AAEA.
Email: ajadultedu@gmail.com
Members: Dilip Jain, Gulab Lohra, Jameel Kazmi, Medhatithi Joshi, Neeta Mathur, Sulakshana Pareek, Sunita Tanwar
Office Support: Sanjay Palod. Tel. 0145 2424592
