Domestic violence kills more than terror strikes

In-house terror, related to dowry, claims more human life in India than activities of militant organizations, including Naxals. Chetan Chauhan reports.

Updated on: Sep 22, 2011, 01:07:22 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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In-house terror, related to dowry, claims more human life in India than activities of militant organizations, including Naxals.

A new survey released by United Nations on Monday said that there were 8,383 deaths because of domestic violence in 2009 as compared to 2,231 deaths resulting for terror activities including left wing extremism.

In fact, domestic violence is one of the biggest contributors to domestic crime and is on the rise since 2005.

The India Armed Violence Assessment 2011 says that has been a 30 % increase in reporting of domestic violence even though the number of cases registered has not increased proportionally.

"In 2009 police received more than 6.6 million complaints relating to criminal incidents, compared with 5 million in 2005, a figure which represents an increase of 30 %," the report said.

Apart from deaths, about 90,000 complaints of domestic violence were received in 2009, indicating that dowry is considered as a perfect

instrument to "get rich quick" and "upward material mobility".

The report quoting a study by the Institute of Development and Communication, said the quantum of dowry exchange may be greater among the upper classes, but 80 % of dowry deaths and 80 % of dowry harassment occurs in the middle and lower strata.

This is despite India having watershed Domestic Violence Prevention Act, 2005. Four states have appointed independent protection officers and others have made ad-hoc arrangements.

“Only Kerala has a permanent cadre of protection officers under the government system,” said Bhumika Jhamb, programme officer at Centre for Budget and Governance Accountability.

Most state governments complain of lack of funds pay for regular protection officers, mandated to enforce the law, and their regular training. The National Commission for Women (NCW) has drafted a scheme to provide Central funding to implement the law which is yet to be accepted by the Women and Child Development ministry.

The report has also highlighted “endemic corruption” resulting in police becoming more susceptible to influence of criminals, unscrupulous politicians, and private entrepreneurs, a cause for complaints not getting registered.

It also said that there was widespread perception that police was not apolitical or impartial to application of law.

An analysis of the hospital records and National Crime Records Bureau data for 2009 showed discrepancy. Hospital records showed homicide rate as almost double of what the NCRB had quoted in its report. This trend is also seen in other countries such as South Africa, Brazil and Russian Federation.

The report also said use of illegal fire-arms in crime was very high and about 10 % of small firearms in the world were in India.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

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