CHENNAI: In a bid to ensure social distancing, families have barely left their houses since the imposition of the lockdown. However, being locked indoors with an abusive partner has created a breeding ground for an increase in domestic violence against women, say experts.
Last week, the International Foundation for Crime Prevention and Victim Care (PCVC), had received a call over a week back from a woman who had said that her husband threatened to kick her out of the house for coughing. "Her husband had told her that she will kill the rest of the family by being the first one to fall sick," said Swetha Shankar, Director, Client Services at PCVC.
Statistics gathered by the National Commission for Women (NCW) showed that at least 58 women have complained about domestic violence between March 23 and March 30. National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences (NIMHANS) received a few hundred calls over its hotline in the past couple of days alone, according to a member of the task force handling the calls.
The hesitation to report:
Even, as helplines across the country have been receiving distress calls, many have said that the number of daily complains have shrunk after the imposition of the lockdown.
Swetha Shankar from PCVC said that a victim who had reached out to the police for help was asked to contact them after the 21-day lockdown period was over. For a victim, to stay in the same space as her abuser after reporting the violence puts her life at threat, she pointed out.
With restricted mobility and access to communication, it becomes much harder for women to reach out for help. Interestingly, women's helpline number 181 in Tamil Nadu has received fewer calls about domestic abuse since the lockdown, said one of the attenders. "We used to receive 15-20 calls a day before the lockdown and now it has come down to only a handful a day," she said. PCVC too has been getting only a third of the calls on its helplines, compared to a month ago, said Prasanna Gettu, the Co-founder of the centre.
There are at least two reasons for this. One of the reason is that women, who are confined in a small house with the abuser, often do not have the access or ability to call a hotline in secrecy, making it hard to reach out for help.
The other reason is that more women in Tamil Nadu have normalised domestic abuse, she said. "Studies have shown that women in Tamil Nadu, compared to those in other states, have accepted violence against them and perceive it as normal," said Swarna Rajagopalan, founder of Prajnya, an organisation working on gender issues. The National Family and Health Survey-4, for the year 2015-16, had revealed that over 40 per cent of women in the State had faced domestic violence. Yet, the previous edition of the survey documented that only two out of 10 women who experienced physical violence ever told someone about it.
Prasanna Gettu from PCVC said that their helpline operators observed a similar pattern during the Chennai floods and other disasters as well. "We received a surprisingly small number of calls during the crisis and the number of calls became five times or six times as much after the crisis ended," she said, adding that the chance of a victim reaching out for help during a crisis is lesser if children are present in the family.
While there are no accurate figures in Tamil Nadu that quantifies the increase, other countries have reported a spike in the number of cases. Domestic violence across France increased by 32 per cent in one week. At least 15 organisation in Scotland, which work against violence against women and girls, have written to the government, calling for action over domestic abuse increase during the lockdown.
Increase in vulnerability
Several factors contribute to domestic abuse. However, the increase in the number of incidents is directly linked to the increased vulnerability of the victim, reasoned Vasundharaa S Nair, Senior Research Fellow, NIMHANS. "During the lockdown, women are likely to face two to three times more violence as they have nowhere to escape. And nobody would come in to help because of the lockdown," she said.
Nair added that couples whose relationship functions only on need-based minimum communication are forced to spend all their time with each other. "This brings up repressed memories that leads to verbal arguments, increasing the chances abuse," she explained. Women also find it harder to walk out of situations arising from mal-adaptative practices like alcoholism.
The lockdown also increases the risk of incest-abuse and abuse of live-in domestic help as well. NCW chairperson Rekha Sharma had told PTI, “The 58 is just complaints we have received on email. The real figure is likely to be more since the bulk of complaints come from
women in the lower strata of society who send us their complaints by post."
It cannot, however, be the victim's responsibility alone to find help, said Swarna Rajagopalan from Prajnya. She suggested that everyone in the family and neighbourhood should be sensitised enough to intervene if they suspect an incident of abuse. "If we do not intervene when an incident happens, the lockdown will reinforce the patriarchal institution of violence against women again," she remarked.