Feminists have been demanding since long to include #MaritalRape in the Criminal code by shouting out a common myth - that no law in India deals with offence of Marital Rape.
I was just trying to understand as to why suddenly feminists have again started hue & cry on Marital Rape, following is what I could think of as plausible reasons that upset feminists and they are out, seeking vengeance:
- Supreme Court (SC) judgement in Arnesh Kumar vs State of Bihar seeking to curb unlawful arrests under IPC 498A - arrest is one of the most powerful tool to humiliate a man and coerce him into accepting his extortion!
- Curbs placed by current govt on funding of many feminist NGOs and their mastership - the Ford Foundation ; and you see even US is upset about such curbs (why??)
- Govt planning to make IPC498A bailable/compoundable - although this is just an eyewash given that IPC498A is already kind of compoundable thru CrPC 482 at High Court when wife's demands accepted by hubby/family. (Men's Right Activists are against making 498a as compoundable as it will only increase the misuse)
- There's a private member bill from a Congress MP asking to make Marital Rape a criminal offence.
- BJP is particularly perceived as entrenched in ancient customs/traditions that are supposedly patriarchal/anti-women
I've no special love for current BJP govt coz I find no courage in BJP ministers to tackle feminists, much like their predecessors in govt. In private, MPs from most political parties including Congress and BJP admit that the laws are gender-biased and heavily tilted in favor of women, but also convey their incapacity to make amends for the fear of backlash from feminist. (Infact, we can praise UPA govt atleast on one count - they proposed a Criminal Amendment bill in 2012 that recognized sexual assault as a gender-neutral crime, though full specifics to handle abuse against men were missing!!)
The latest debate on Marital Rape on NDTV is one such kind of backlash to paint that the govt is anti-women!
(If interested, read how Ford Foundation funded various NGO's to create outrage, influence policy decisions and make laws in India. One important thing to note is the Lawyers' Collective, an NGO with links to former ASG of India, Indira Jaisingh, which was instrumental in pushing Domestic Violence Act)
Myth: No law in India deals with Marital Rape
Domestive Violence Act of 2006 does cover "Sexual Abuse" in a marriage - see for yourself section 3 of DVAct that defines different types of DV.
Some legal luminaries with feminist bent of mind suggest that DV Act is a Civil remedy alone - well the truth is the "clumsily" drafted DV act has ingredients of both Civil and Criminal procedure. Wife can approach the court and seek protection order against hubby, under section 18 of DVAct, even for the very first instance of sexual abuse. This will mostly negate any possibility of future sexual or any other abuse by the hubby and if he violates the protection order, he can be fined and land up in jail under section 31 of DVAct. (This is apart from monetary reliefs and compensation u/s 20 & 22 of this DVAct)
If the sexual abuse was encountered along with other physical violence, then apart from DVAct, there are sections under IPC for causing hurt, grievous hurt etc. that can be used to punish the husband. Also, as pointed by many the, much misused, IPC 498A is already available to help women undergoing physical and mental harassment, even if it is in the form of sexual abuse.
Unnatural sex committed on wife is covered under both IPC377 and DVAct.
After the codification of stricter Anti Rape laws the rate of #FalseRape cases has increased significantly - not that the rape laws were not heavily misused earlier, it's just that post Dec 16, 2012, with popular sentiment on women's side, many more women find it a good way to gain sympathy and make moolah. These laws have been now reduced to "coercing" marriage on boy-friend or mainly to threaten/extort opponents into submission.
After the Arnesh Kumar judgement by SC that seeks to curb wrongful arrests in IPC498A (not the IPC498A misuse, by the way), there's now increasing tendency by wives to implicate hubby's male family members into rape/molestation and the hubby in IPC 377.
Rhetoric: Husband should not treat marriage as a license to have sex with Wife
Fact of the matter is - the personal laws in India allow for restitution of conjugal rights through court intervention viz. section 9 of Hindu Marriage Act, section 22 of Special Marriage Act which simply mean that if one spouse starts living away from the company of partner (even under same roof) the aggrieved spouse can request family court to direct the spouse who has withdrawn itself from cohabitation to come back.
And these sections are gender-neutral in everyway - so if a hubby(wife) walks away from cohabitation, the wife(hubby) can ask court to give direction in favor of latter directing the former to join the company of latter. Not honoring this direction of court can lead to divorce. So, marriage is sort of a license to have sex, but granted equally to both spouses, you see!!
Don't tell me that wives don't force their hubby to have sex!!
When a wife commits #MaritalRape
1) Husband does not have any options to report it as any crime or violence by wife against himself
2) If his stars are good, at best a hubby can get divorce against his abuser - "Court grants man divorce over wife's demand for excessive sex"
During MP outreach program, we met one MP who narrated story about his friend. This friend's wife used to suspect hubby, a businessman, so after end of long tiresome workdays daily when he reaches home his wife forces him to have sex with her to prove to her that he is not straying!!
Rhetoric: Misuse is because of implementation, no fault in laws
You'll always find that feminists keep passing the buck on law misuse to implementation agencies like police and courts!
Fact of the matter is that law mandates registration of complaints when made under women-centric laws - if police fails to register such complaints from women, they themselves will be at receiving end.
Courts have been systematically sympathetic to women complainants and seldom they act against false accuser/liar women complainants. Courts do not take suo motu cognizance of the lies by women, and reluctant to take action even when asked by respondent men. The acquittal orders of men are written in such a way that leaves little scope for the acquitted man to initiate any misuse proceedings against the liar woman.
Rhetoric: There's very small misuse / all laws can be misused
Well, yes, it's plausible that there will be cases of error of judgement, or few deviant people misusing laws, but does it mean that blatant false cases should not be tackled? No safeguards be build to have fair process and protection for falsely accused? Even when there's large-scale misuse?
Here I storified some prominent #FalseRape cases, news and courts' concerns on misuse. (stopped updating it further as there are just too many to keep track with).
Here's what Delhi State Commission for Women had to say themselves - 53.2 per cent rape cases filed between April 2013-July 2014 false
Newspaper The Hindu ran a proper story on Rape cases in Delhi to check convictions and they were shocked to find that 75%+ cases were false and conviction happened in around 23.7% cases: Many shades of Rape in Delhi
Now, don't assume that the misuse started only after more stringent Anti Rape Laws were passed - it had been going on since much earlier than that.
Domestic servant (maids) are known to use false Rape/Molestation for extortion
Rape on second thought - article published in 2010 stating 74% false rape in Pune
Rape/Molestation laws being used by female criminals to run business - The drug lady of Mumbai
There are many others in above storify link.
Here's a good read on why women lie about rape.
Rhetoric: Bowing down to Justice Verma Committee's biased reports, citing UN conventions etc
Feminists often cite UN conventions like CEDAW stating protection of women is paramount.
What they don't tell you is that gender-biased laws fail to uphold the much wider convention - the one of Human Rights - where Article 7, 10, 11, 12 etc, lay down that every human being should be treated equally, should have due process and access to justice, and be accorded equal protection by state.
Any law which give protection to only one side based on "gender" and punishment to only the other side based on his "gender" is clearly discriminatory and violation or Article 7,8!
Article 11 is important, in that, it asks to make laws with "presumption of innocence until proven guilty".
Although, this is the general jurisprudence in India, but when it comes to women-centric laws, this jurisprudence is packed and dumped in seas - MEN are considered "guilty until proven innocent".
It's like cherry-picking by feminist - ask to enforce what fits their narrative while ignore the rest - and of course, Equality before law be damned!
Coming to Justice Verma committee report, suffice it to say that the way this report went beyond rape into any and everything that feminists (and even some anti-nationals) stand for - I was very suspicious of it from the time the report came out - shockingly the report suggested to review implementation of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) in the insurgency prone areas of India. Why should a committee entrusted to work for women's protection be so worried about AFSPA implementation??
On Page 445, the report proposes to make a section 376F that basically puts vicarious liability of rape by a policeman/army personnel on his superior - logic(?? ) - feminists asked for it!!
See Pages 426-428 of the report that elaborates organizations/persons interacted with Justice Verma Committee, note how most of these are persons/organizations with feminist/communist backing and NO representation from Men's rights community despite MRA's sending many letters to the committee.
These instances are sufficient for me to form an opinion that Verma committee was totally hijacked by feminists and narrates their twisted/biased agenda only - and the very same report is now being quoted by the same feminists to press for making/amending laws!
Good circus!
Remember the #OneBillionRising? Stats that purports to paint that 1-in-3 woman will face some sort of abuse. Or many similar other stats .. start here to understand how the stats are corrupted to fit/further feminist narrative - The corruption of research on domestic violence , Lies, damned lies and Rape statistics and Refuting 40years of lies about DV
And feminists/media out rightly ignore any study that tells the other side, e.g. Harvard study showing 70% of DV is committed by women against Men
There were earlier attempts to tar India as a nation of rapes and rapists and rape culture - thru various news reports and also documentary on Dec 16 gang-rape case. However, social media exposed the bias against India and showed to the world the actual rape stats of developed countries like US.
Similar fudging is being done now to paint as if Marital Rape is the biggest crime happening in India.
Rhetoric: Misuse of law cannot be a ground to modify a law or not codify a law
OK. Let's start with agreement!
An analogy: There are huge leakages in Public Distribution System that seeks to deliver food security and is being replaced by AADHAAR linked direct benefit transfers. Now, if we use feminists' logic, govt should (have) continue(d) with the PDS so what if the intended beneficiaries do not get relief!
On the other hand, if misuse of law is of no concern - then why govt included a specific misuse clause in Lokpal bill (see section 46) to prosecute false complainants, unheard of in any other law?
Point is: Given the history of widespread false rape and false 498a/DV cases, what is the problem to learn from these laws while amending existing or making a new law?? Why new laws being sought when existing laws can very well address the sexual abuse in Marriage? Also, why can't we have gender-neutral laws - there's is lot of evidence now that intimate partner violence is a two-way street, with men and women perpetrating abuse? Marital rape not any different, both husband and wife can perpetrate sexual abuse - so if at all there's a new law, why not hear men too and make gender-neutral law?
Do you know that misuse of marital rape has already started -> Man, LLB, turns tables on wife’s rape charge
Consequences of Marital Rape
- Easy conviction possible : Coz Anti-rape law, via amended Evidence Act, puts highest premium on statement of the complainant (almost assumes it to be gospel truth if no other evidence found)
- It's natural that Hubby and Wife would have sex, and in such cases it is easy to find/plant semen as an evidence
- Medical tests will ofcourse show occurrence of sex.
- In 498A and 406 cases filed against hubby and family, it had almost become a police practice to raid the hubby's house, arrest him and family members and loot away valuables/jewelry/home-appliances etc in the name of "recovery of streedhan"
- DVAct moved this to one step further - now pack away the hubby to jail in 498A, loot him in 406 + get residence rights in his property with a protection order barring the hubby from entering the house!
Thankfully SC declared that residence rights can be given only for property owned by hubby, this helped save some joint family houses, yet in many cases where only husband-wife were living together, the situation is that the hubby gets dispossessed of the house even though he has to continue paying for the EMIs of that house (e.g. read "Man allowed entry in Mumbai house after six-year stay in hotel", and Man forced to live in bus stop for days by wife )
#MaritalRape will take it whole hog higher - not much need to file any other cases - file MR, hubby convicted and packed to jail for long duration - (based on sole testimony of wifey), get divorce based on this conviction, keep enjoying hubby's property.
Now, the Anti-Rape laws have made it possible to convert even a simple looking-in-girls-way into Rape - how Rape has been trivialized to mean just about anything - see this video,
Some suggested that have a consent form and get it signed by wife every single time you indulge in sex - well it's not gonna work - wifey will beautifully sob in court that she was coerced to sign - and you know, courts will dutifully rob you of your freedom!
Yet another suggestion is - install CCTV in bedroom - are you outta your minds - this is like giving wifey a fool proof evidence that hubby indulges in recording their sex act and threaten to upload on internet to malign wife's reputation!!
There's no frigging way you're gonna prove innocence and presumed guilty you already are!
Eventually, Marital Rape is also going to be tagged on just any kind of "abuse" - looking, touching, kissing, cuddling - anything, "without permission from wife" = MARITAL RAPE!! Jail!! Jail!!
Feminist/politician have also now achieved great success in inciting public passions to publicly lynch any man accused of rape/molestation - remember the episodes at Dimapur where alleged rapist was lynched by mob and Agra where a man lynched for alleged molestation ?
If you are a man, married or single, just think, there's every possibility that next lynch target could be YOU!!
BTW, some people saying that Marital Rape will destroy institution of marriage!! Hmm.. I'm not much impressed by that reasoning, for:
1) There are enough men who have no idea of what is their legal position and many who knowingly ignore..they are gonna continue this "institution of marriage"
2) May be it'll be better if this institution of marriage gets destroyed then, may be, the society will learn what mistakes it committed by embracing feminist narrative.
Just like feminists ganged up and got "Vishakha guidelines" passed thru SC, this NDTV debate , in my opinion, is an attempt to achieve something similar, swing public opinion to extract Marital Rape guidelines using PIL route, given the govt has declared that Marital Rape concept is not fit in Indian context.
