The Hindu Business Line : Violence against women on roads too

ONE dead girl and four ruined boys is how one may summarise the recent case of `eve-teasing' that ended in a tragedy in Chennai. Violence against women, or VAW as it is abbreviated, is too current to ignore.

"All forms of violence against women in educational institutions and workplaces increased in the last year," says a report by the Bangladesh National Woman Lawyers' Association. The site www.thedailystar.net adds, "5,207 incidents of violence took place in 2003 but police recorded only 2,671 incidents. Most victims are aged between 13 and 18." From the Philippines, www.sunstar.com.ph reports that cases of "violence against women reported in different police stations throughout the province are expected to go up this year." Allafrica.com speaks of demands in Angola for "the creation and enforcing of a law against gender violence in the country." All these are what one may find among latest-on-the-Net finds on the topic.

Wonder if many Indian women silently enduring domestic violence know that there is Section 498 A in the Indian Penal Code, for more than two decades now, prescribing punishment for husband or his relative subjecting the wife to cruelty. "What forms of `cruelty' are recognised by the Courts?" asks an article in Manushi, and gives instances that can be wrenching: "Persistent denial of food; insisting on perverse sexual conduct; constantly locking a woman out of the house; denying the woman access to children, thereby causing mental torture; physical violence; taunting, demoralising and putting down the woman with the intention of causing mental torture; confining the woman at home; abusing children in their mother's presence with the intention of causing her mental torture; denying the paternity of the children with the intention of inflicting mental pain upon the mother; and threatening divorce unless dowry is given."

Nearly one-third of the women experiencing abuse had thought about running away, notes a report on domestic violence in India (www.icrw.org/docs/domviol.pdf) . "But most said that they feared leaving their young children and had no place to go." For the employed women, there is at least some escape, assuming that roads and offices are safe.

Harsh it may sound, but Daryl Kahn writes in www.newsday.com that most women and children are "more likely to be victims of violence from a loved one at home than from a stranger on the street." That one out of four women is a victim of domestic violence in her lifetime may be true not only in the US but in many other countries. Kahn's report cites advocates as saying the most dangerous time for a battered woman is when "trying to leave an abusive husband or boyfriend" and the second-most dangerous time is when she is pregnant.

In the US, there is a law-in-the-works for tackling VAW: the SAFE Act, that is for Security and Financial Empowerment. It aims to promote "the employment stability, economic security and safety that victims of domestic and sexual violence need to leave abusive relationships and live violence-free." The Bill prohibits workplace discrimination against victims of domestic and sexual violence, and prevents them from being forced to leave their jobs as a result of the violence they face.

Experts advise that a law-and-order approach alone won't be enough. But don't feel too resigned to think that any solution to VAW is possible, as an interesting initiative in San Jose would show. Mercury News talks about `The Hairdresser's Project,' "a public campaign against what, for many, is still a private shame." Thus, nail salons and barbershops there are responding to customers who come with "bruised arms or hair missing from scalps," without having "to report abuses they see or hear about" — offering safety when homes are no longer sweet or safe.

Won't it be crueller then if our roads too are allowed to be dangerous for women?

ExParte@TheHindu.co.in

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