Amplify the voices of the vulnerable
To end gender violence, establish a culture of reporting, protection, justice and deterrence
Violence against women is a global pandemic and one of the most pervasive human rights violations today. It impacts one in three women worldwide. India, with all its humanistic traditions and the culture of non-violence, is unfortunately not an exception. The National Family Health Survey 4 data confirms that 28.8% of women who have ever been married have experienced spousal violence. This is probably the tip of the iceberg. The 2016 National Crime Records Bureau’s data shows an alarming trend of violence against women by their husbands or relatives (1,10,378 cases). Women and girls face violence often at the hands of those they trust and love, by intimate partners but also by strangers, institutions and the State. Violence takes many forms: rape, sexual exploitation, child sexual abuse, stalking, acid attacks, child marriage, trafficking, voyeurism, cyber bullying and gender biased sex selection to name a few.
Many of the poorest women and girls in rural areas and urban slums, women with disabilities, widowed women, Dalit women, tribal women, Muslim women, and women living in remote areas, face intersecting forms of discrimination, including violence. Violence against women also comes with huge economic costs for women and families, as well as for communities and societies. In India, women can lose an average of at least five paid work days for each incident of intimate partner violence.
A UN Women research in 2012 showed that in Delhi, 95% women and girls had experienced sexual harassment in public spaces. Entrenched patriarchy in the political, corporate and the media worlds, a culture of impunity, conspiracy of silence, and normalisation of violence often surrounds women’s experiences, sanctioned by prevailing socio-cultural norms and practices. The global outrage that the #Metoo movement in the US has triggered shows the pervasiveness of the problem, and may become a tipping point for awareness and accountability. India witnessed a similar outpouring following the December 16, 2012, gang rape, which was a wake-up call for India. We must not lose the momentum created then for State action, movement building and civic solidarity and continue our path to progress.
The theme of this year’s UNITE to End Violence Against Women Campaign and 16 days of Global Activism (November 25 to December 10), echoes the globally agreed Sustainable Development Goals’ commitment to ‘leaving no one behind’. In the lead up to the SDGS adoption in 2015, India championed the cause of the goal on Gender Equality. Legislation must be passed and swiftly enforced to protect women’s and girls’ rights and justice and law enforcement systems must work to hold perpetrators accountable.
The Government of India has recognised the need for legislation and, as also demonstrated it in the draft National Policy for Women 2016. The last five years has seen developments including the Criminal Law Amendment Act of 2013, which resulted in newer forms of violence against women being criminalised and the enactment of the Sexual Harassment of Women at workplace.
The creation and allocations under the Nirbhaya Fund and One Stop Centres (OSC) reflect the commitment of the government towards a multi-sectoral approach to the problem. Of the total 186 OSCS sanctioned, 166 have already been set up across the country. The objective should be to create a virtuous cycle of reporting, protection, justice and support prevention and deterrence. It is critical that such investments be continued and sustained for a considerable period to evaluate progress and efficacy.
Policies, strategies and interventions to end this violence must be defined by women themselves. This principle is at the heart of UN Women’s work, as demonstrated in its programme on Safe Cities and Safe Public Spaces in eight cities in India. The government will also need to collect, collate, analyse and disseminate reliable, comparable and anonymised data and statistics on a regular basis, disaggregated by sex and age at the national and local levels on different forms of discrimination and violence against women and girls, including the health costs and economic costs to society to inform laws, policies and programmes.
As laws and services change and become more responsive to eliminating violence against women and girls, their success depends on ending a culture of impunity and ensuring zero tolerance towards violence. All of us as responsible citizens, private sector, civil society, youth, men and boys, faith-based leaders, media influencers and celebrities are game changers and mass movement builders. We have a key role to play in amplifying the voices of those most vulnerable and impacted, and especially those who are marginalised, whose voices crying out for justice are not heard and those who are excluded from decision making.