Campaigning for the law

Campaigning for the law on Domestic Violence :

The Lawyers Collective (Women's Rights Initiative) began its campaign for a civil law on domestic violence in the early 1990s. The need for a specific law on domestic violence was obvious, given the fact that the Indian legal and political systems have denied adequate legal redress to women facing violence within homes and intimate relationships for long.

With the coming into force of the PWDVA 2005, this campaign has achieved a landmark victory. However, we believe that our task is only half done. We have to take our campaign to the next level i.e. working and advocating for the effective implementation of the law through public awareness, sensitization & trainings and ensuring that the mechanisms provided in the law are in reality put in place and made accessible to women. It is only when women are empowered to negotiate from a position of equality, will our campaign reach its logical conclusion.

The Need for a law on Domestic Violence

For women in India facing domestic violence, the remedies available prior to 2005 were under the civil law for divorce and under the criminal law provision of Section 498A of the IPC.

Under the civil law, a woman can initiate proceedings for divorce and judicial separation on the ground of cruelty. But this fails to provide any kind of immediate relief to the woman, besides leading to problems of costs and delays in litigation.

Further, the breakdown of a marriage in our society with its attendant discrimination means a virtual civil death for a woman. In the absence of any adequate recourse under civil law for emergency relief and immediate protection from violence, Section 498A IPC therefore, provided women with the only means for such protection prior to this Act. But the reluctance of women to approach the criminal justice system and the inadequacy of the criminal remedy itself are important realities of our social context.

Again, in India, a prominent manifestation of domestic violence is first for the woman to be made a prisoner of the house and then to be thrown out of it. Therefore, there was an urgent need for a law, which could address this phenomenon of depriving women of their Right to Reside in the shared household.

Hence, a more concerted legal strategy to combat domestic violence consisting of a judicious mix of both civil and criminal law remedies, which is sensitive to the experiences of women facing violence at home, the reasons and nature of the violence, the immediate requirements of the woman, and which addresses existing inequalities in domestic relationships was urgently required.

The Constitution of India guarantees substantive equality to women. Such guarantees of substantive equality include not just declaration of rights, but also facilitate access to justice to realize these rights. Therefore, a legislation that combined protection of women from domestic violence with mechanisms, which ensure access to justice in case of violation of this protection, was necessary.

At the start of the Lawyers Collective campaign, it was decided that the law should be primarily civil in nature, with important crossover elements of criminal law. However, the foundation of this effort was and still remains the recognition of the agency of the woman.