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Abstract
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India was recently shaken by the news of gruesome killing of Shraddha Walker allegedly by her live-in partner who strangled her, cut her up into 35 pieces, stored them in a refrigerator before dumping the parts in a forest, and went on with his life until he was caught.1 As more details emerged, Shraddha was a victim of intimate partner violence (IPV), which was known to her family, friends and also her employer, and she had even reached out to the police who persuaded her to go home even though she was terrified.1,2 She was also admitted and treated for internal injuries in a hospital but the connect to domestic abuse was not made.2 Her friends say that she had feared for her life but still could not walk away from this abusive relationship.
This case highlights monumental failure of the systems and of the society to protect her. The public discourse in India following this killing was centred around three issues – communal and political overtones, victim blaming for her decision to be in a live-in relationship, and the call for justice.3,4 Sadly, bringing inter-faith relationship or victim's choices into the conversation is a tactic to move away from the real issues facing women in India which are the absence of safety net for many women, and failure of the police and health systems to protect them. A recent analysis of nearly 20 years of government data on domestic violence has shown 53% increase in cases filed under ‘cruelty by husband or his relatives’ and a simultaneous decrease in the mean number of persons arrested for these cases between 2001 and 2018.5 Moreover, less than 7% of the filed cases had completed legal trial in 2018, and the majority of accused were acquitted in these cases.5 These data clearly highlight that protesting and shouting to hang the offender in Shraddha's case is not the solution.6 The solution lies in effective implementation of policies and safety net to protect women so that they do not meet such an end. Social safety net for women starts with her family and extends to friends. As evident from Shraddha's case, we need to better understand how these safety nets can actually work in real life to help abused women walk out of abusive relationships, and to seek appropriate care and action. Simply stating that social safety net is needed is clearly not enough if there are no means for it to be translated in real life to save a life.
Language: en |