India ’s Sexual Violence Bills Fail to Criminalize Marital Rape

A women is advised by a BLAST counsellor. Human rights experts are concerned that the law a law which legalizes marital rape will remain on the statutes. Credit: BLAST By Ranjit DevrajNEW DELHI, Dec 14 2023 (IPS) A batch of three bills introduced in India’s Parliament in August to replace archaic, colonial period laws and revamp the criminal justice system will, however, retain the existing law that legalizes marital rape. Section 375 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), originally introduced in 1860, criminalized rape but made an exception for “sexual intercourse or sexual acts by a man with his own wife, the wife not being under fifteen years of age.” Women’s groups and civil society organizations fighting for gender justice cite the persistence of the marital rape law almost eight decades after independence from British colonial rule as an example of the difficulties of bringing about change to the extreme patriarchal attitudes that pervade South Asian countries. Nawmi Naz Choudhary, global legal advisor to Equality Now (EN), a group that strives for a just and equal world for women and girls through legal expertise, advocacy, collaboration, and resourcing, says that the impact of colonization has led to many discriminatory policing practices that deny access to justice rights for women and girls, especially those from socially excluded or disadvantaged communities. Such practices prevent women and girls from seeking justice for sexual violence, and in cases w...
Source: IPS Inter Press Service - Health - Category: International Medicine & Public Health Authors: Tags: Asia-Pacific Crime & Justice Development & Aid Editors' Choice Featured Gender Gender Violence Headlines Health Human Rights Humanitarian Emergencies Population Sustainable Development Goals Women's Health Youth Bangladesh Source Type: news