New Delhi, Oct 26 (UNI) Husbands and parents-in law harassed by their wives and
daughters-in-law in the guise of 'biased women laws' today highlighted their
grievances by staging a novel protest at the Jantar Mantar here.
The protest was organised by Men Cell, supported by Save Family Foundation and
My Nation to observe a 'Black Day' on what they called the first barsi of the
draconian Domestic Violence (DV) Act.
The DV Act, which was enforced on this day in 2006, had according to these
groups, proved to be a tool of legal extortion for men in cases of marital
discord.
''This world-wide first barsi of the DV Act is being celebrated by the
harassed husbands in India and abroad and their relatives, tortured,
blackmailed and implicated in false DV and anti-dowry cases all over India and
abroad by their unscrupulous wives and daughter-in-laws for ulterior motives,''
said R P Chugh, Supreme Court advocate and President of Men Cell.
Participating in the protest was another Supreme Court lawyer Mahesh Tiwari
who said '' The DV Act is an extortion Act. Its sole aim is to harass the
already harassed men. When we had Section 498 A IPC, under which a woman can
file a case for cruelty, what was the need of this Act''.
''Man has been made sn animal with no law to his aid. We want this Act to be
done away with or else amended after taking the opinion of the men
organisations and lawyers to make it unbiased,'' he said, adding the National
Commission for Women (NCW) has been unnjust in bringing this biased Act. There
were protests before 2006 but these women groups are very powerful and with
high reach.
''This Act is nothing more than a false occupation Act wherein a wife can
occupy the house of the husband and throw him and his relatives out,'' said
Sandeep Bhartia, the organiser of the protest.
The protestors, including victims of the Act, demanded that 498-A be made
bailable and non-cognizable and it, along with DV Act, be made gender neutral
and penal provisions for those misusing them.
Raising slogans against NCW and Minister for Women and Child Development
Renuka Chaudhary, an engineer and one of the victim of the ''false'' 498 A case
said, ''I and my wife have been living in judicial separation for one-and a
half year now. But this Act has given her another provision to harass me.'' Mr
Swarup Sarkar of the Save Family said ''DV Act is the blood cancer in Indian
society. How can we give selfish and fraudulent wives the right to occupy the
matrimonial home? She can ask for maintenance under other provisions but this
DV Act allows forced occupation of the house,'' he iterated.
Unlike 498-A IPC for wives, the DV Act also protects sisters, mothers,
mothers-in-law or any other female relative living with a violent man, who can
be jailed for a year for beating, threatening and even shouting at them.
A glaring loophole in the Act is its Section 14(5) which says the respondents
shall not be allowed to plead any counter justification for the alleged act of
domestic violence, a clear violation of Human Rights.
UNI AKJ MSJ DS1632
Be the first to comment this article.