DOMESTIC: Indian Women Plagued by Controlling Men

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October 5, 2015

I don't know which is the worse, the Muslims or the Indians when it comes to the way how husbands abuse their wives.

What I do know is that I would hate to be a part of the environment wherever it may be. I really don't think there's anything worse than the feeling of being trapped in an abusive relationship.

From Reuters:  With stylish sunglasses on her head, brightly painted nails and dressed in black designer gear, the woman sitting at a trendy New Delhi cafe might not look like a battered wife, but the woman, who asked that her name be withheld to protect her identity and that of her children, was abused for years by her husband, a lawyer.

“He strangled me, he spat on me, he slapped me,” the woman, a 37-year-old mother of two who grew up in a wealthy London-based Indian family, told Reuters in an interview.

She is among millions of indian women, from all classes, who are abused by their husbands. A recent government survey said one in three Indian women were victims of domestic violence.

Long-held attitudes toward domestic violence in India are slow to change and justice can be murky and remote. A recent government survey found 54 percent of women, against 51 percent of men, say wife-beating is justified in some circumstances.

Also, there is a still a commonly held opinion in Indian society that women lodge false complaints of abuse, Manan said.

“There is always a stigma attached … to a divorcee, to a woman who goes and reports against the family,” said Kumud Sharma, vice chair of the Center for Women's Studies.

The battered wives of Delhi's rich say husbands use their wealth and influence to delay court cases and muddy proceedings.

Bribery is a common trick, they say, another is to hire private detectives to follow wives around and get false evidence of the wife's 'adultery' by photographing them near random men.

Poor women suffer most as they often don't have the means to leave their abusive husbands, but activists say domestic abuse can affect any home, rich or poor.

[mashshare]
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