A news report said that a forum of men's rights organisations have urged all political parties to include in their manifestos the formation of a "men's ministry" and a "men's rights" panel to address issues concerning Indian males.
The National Coalition for Men (NCM) - a forum of 50 organisations fighting for male rights across the country - launched its own manifesto expressing concern over the steady rate of "innocent men" falling victims to "gender biased" laws.
Titled "Men-ifesto", it carries a host of issues concerning males and the need for governmental provisions to address those issues.
The news itself is unusual for common Indians who don't see men as victims in a marriage. Media space is always filled up with the stories that present 'women as victims', but that is not always true as more and more men have been bearing the brunt of anti-male laws. According to a website, www.498a.org, each year nearly 22000 Indian married men commit suicide because of women's atrocities. There are many more websites of Men Rights Oraganisations (MROs) in the country that have been highlighting the plight of husbands in the matrimonial disputes. In the absence of due media coverage, the Internet provided the much needed platform to the MROs to highlight their plight.
The common grudge of the MROs is that Indian laws are gender biased and inclined towards women. Is it true? If one goes by the general perception then the answer is no but if the silent war between the two sexes is scrutinized impartially then it can be said that there are many women, especially in rural India, who need a correct implementation of matirmonial laws to protect their rights and there are also many women, especially in urban India, who have been raping the women friendly laws. Probably this is the reason that the maximum members of the MROs come from urban areas and are well-educated.
Swarup Sarkar of Save Family Foundation says that India is the only country wherein only verbal or written statement of a wife/live-in-partner is capable of spoiling the reputation, career of an innocent man or his relatives.
"Countries like China, UK, USA have gender neutral laws to deal with workplace harassment and sexual violence. All countries treat the atrocities within a marriage under their prevalent criminal laws but in India we have duplicity of laws to deal with matrimonial disputes. As a result the problem has become complicated and moreover, they are being misused by clever women," says Sarkar.
So, which laws are that men say are gender biased? The first in the list is IPC Section 498A, an anti-dowry law, which was inserted into IPC in 1983 via an amendment after many dowry related deaths were being reported in India. It is probably the most abused law. Once, the Supreme Court of India had termed misuse of Section 498A as 'legal terrorism'. After Supreme Court's observation, the issue got traditional media's sporadic attention. As a result, the Malimath committee in 2003 proposed making amendments to this section although such amendments were opposed by women's groups. In August 2010, the Supreme Court asked the Government of India to amend the Dowry Laws to prevent their misuse. In January 2012, the Law Commission of India recommended to the government to make Section 498-A IPC a compoundable (bailable) offence, but the government is yet to act on the recommendation. The grouse of MROs is that men don't have any protection rights under 498A and a wife can go scot free after ruining the social status of her husband, in-laws, and relatives by just filing a false complaint. Men want protection against the misuse of 498A by making it gender neutral. The 2012 data shows that 2.6 lakh persons, including women, were arrested under IPC 498A. Swarup Sarkar says that despite amendment in the CrPC Section 41 that says no arrest without warrant, there is no decline in arrests related to matrimonial disputes. MROs say that police also play a dubious role and harass the husband and his family to extort money.
The MROs cry hoarse that the other weapon in the hands of unscrupulous women is The Domestic Violence (DV) Act, 2005.
Men rights activists say that the law is draconian and gender biased. The provisions of this law state that only woman, a wife or a female live-in-partner, can lodge complaint against husband, live-in-partner, or their relatives of committing violence. Under this law, the violence includes: physical and mental. In other words, a small altercation can be treated as mental violence under DV Act. The men rights activists allege that the clever women are misusing the provisions of this act to grab the hard earned unmovable assets, like homes, of their male partners. The DV Act states that a magistrate may: restrain the respondent (male) from disposing off the shared household, whether the aggrieved person (woman) has legal or equitable share in shared household or not; may direct the respondent to remove himself from the shared household; restrain the respondent or his relatives from entering into the shared household where the aggrieved person resides. Sarkar says that DV Act has become 'Maintenance Law' for women for extorting money. As per the government data, the conviction under this law is less than 1 percent.
Every Saturday evening, Sarkar and other Men Rights Activists meet at the grounds of Patiala House Family Court and give advice to the aggrieved husbands. Their main grudge is that since all the matrimonial laws are highly biased against husbands, so any clever woman can misuse these laws to grab husband's property, extort his money if she doesn't want to remain in marriage. Their demand is to make matrimonial laws gender neutral and punish the guilty who lodges false complaint.
Sarkar says that men's ministry is also very important because 16 crore Indian men are jobless and 1.6 crore men are homeless.
It will be interesting to see whether Men-ifesto manifests or not.
Original NEWS Source:- http://www.thenorthlines.com/newsdet.aspx?q=75159
The National Coalition for Men (NCM) - a forum of 50 organisations fighting for male rights across the country - launched its own manifesto expressing concern over the steady rate of "innocent men" falling victims to "gender biased" laws.
Titled "Men-ifesto", it carries a host of issues concerning males and the need for governmental provisions to address those issues.
The news itself is unusual for common Indians who don't see men as victims in a marriage. Media space is always filled up with the stories that present 'women as victims', but that is not always true as more and more men have been bearing the brunt of anti-male laws. According to a website, www.498a.org, each year nearly 22000 Indian married men commit suicide because of women's atrocities. There are many more websites of Men Rights Oraganisations (MROs) in the country that have been highlighting the plight of husbands in the matrimonial disputes. In the absence of due media coverage, the Internet provided the much needed platform to the MROs to highlight their plight.
The common grudge of the MROs is that Indian laws are gender biased and inclined towards women. Is it true? If one goes by the general perception then the answer is no but if the silent war between the two sexes is scrutinized impartially then it can be said that there are many women, especially in rural India, who need a correct implementation of matirmonial laws to protect their rights and there are also many women, especially in urban India, who have been raping the women friendly laws. Probably this is the reason that the maximum members of the MROs come from urban areas and are well-educated.
Swarup Sarkar of Save Family Foundation says that India is the only country wherein only verbal or written statement of a wife/live-in-partner is capable of spoiling the reputation, career of an innocent man or his relatives.
"Countries like China, UK, USA have gender neutral laws to deal with workplace harassment and sexual violence. All countries treat the atrocities within a marriage under their prevalent criminal laws but in India we have duplicity of laws to deal with matrimonial disputes. As a result the problem has become complicated and moreover, they are being misused by clever women," says Sarkar.
So, which laws are that men say are gender biased? The first in the list is IPC Section 498A, an anti-dowry law, which was inserted into IPC in 1983 via an amendment after many dowry related deaths were being reported in India. It is probably the most abused law. Once, the Supreme Court of India had termed misuse of Section 498A as 'legal terrorism'. After Supreme Court's observation, the issue got traditional media's sporadic attention. As a result, the Malimath committee in 2003 proposed making amendments to this section although such amendments were opposed by women's groups. In August 2010, the Supreme Court asked the Government of India to amend the Dowry Laws to prevent their misuse. In January 2012, the Law Commission of India recommended to the government to make Section 498-A IPC a compoundable (bailable) offence, but the government is yet to act on the recommendation. The grouse of MROs is that men don't have any protection rights under 498A and a wife can go scot free after ruining the social status of her husband, in-laws, and relatives by just filing a false complaint. Men want protection against the misuse of 498A by making it gender neutral. The 2012 data shows that 2.6 lakh persons, including women, were arrested under IPC 498A. Swarup Sarkar says that despite amendment in the CrPC Section 41 that says no arrest without warrant, there is no decline in arrests related to matrimonial disputes. MROs say that police also play a dubious role and harass the husband and his family to extort money.
The MROs cry hoarse that the other weapon in the hands of unscrupulous women is The Domestic Violence (DV) Act, 2005.
Men rights activists say that the law is draconian and gender biased. The provisions of this law state that only woman, a wife or a female live-in-partner, can lodge complaint against husband, live-in-partner, or their relatives of committing violence. Under this law, the violence includes: physical and mental. In other words, a small altercation can be treated as mental violence under DV Act. The men rights activists allege that the clever women are misusing the provisions of this act to grab the hard earned unmovable assets, like homes, of their male partners. The DV Act states that a magistrate may: restrain the respondent (male) from disposing off the shared household, whether the aggrieved person (woman) has legal or equitable share in shared household or not; may direct the respondent to remove himself from the shared household; restrain the respondent or his relatives from entering into the shared household where the aggrieved person resides. Sarkar says that DV Act has become 'Maintenance Law' for women for extorting money. As per the government data, the conviction under this law is less than 1 percent.
Every Saturday evening, Sarkar and other Men Rights Activists meet at the grounds of Patiala House Family Court and give advice to the aggrieved husbands. Their main grudge is that since all the matrimonial laws are highly biased against husbands, so any clever woman can misuse these laws to grab husband's property, extort his money if she doesn't want to remain in marriage. Their demand is to make matrimonial laws gender neutral and punish the guilty who lodges false complaint.
Sarkar says that men's ministry is also very important because 16 crore Indian men are jobless and 1.6 crore men are homeless.
It will be interesting to see whether Men-ifesto manifests or not.
Original NEWS Source:- http://www.thenorthlines.com/newsdet.aspx?q=75159
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