New Delhi, Oct 7 Senior-most Supreme Court judge Justice Vikram Nath on Wednesday said the voice of a woman speaking about fear, violence or distress must not be overlooked or normalised.
Justice Nath lauded the efforts of protection officers, who are appointed under the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act, in helping the women in distress to get justice.
Giving a valedictory address at the national conference of protection officers organised by the National Commission for Women (NCW), Justice Nath said that women should know that they will be heard, the law will respond and they will have the support they need to live with dignity, security and the freedom to make choices about their own lives.
"A daughter should not grow up believing that silence is the price of preserving a family, and a son should not grow up believing that the reputation of a family depends upon a woman's willingness to endure. There is a point at which adjustment ceases to be part of sustaining a relationship and becomes an expectation that a woman endure what she should not have to," he said.
Justice Nath, who is next in line to become the Chief Justice of India next year, said that recognising that line and ensuring that the law responds when it is crossed is an important part of addressing domestic violence.
He said changing that understanding may take time, but it begins with the choices one makes in their own families and institutions today.
"When a woman first speaks of fear, violence or distress, that voice must not be overlooked or normalised. She should know that she will be heard, that the law will respond, and that she will have the support she needs to live with dignity, security and the freedom to make choices about her own life.
"The women of our country are equal citizens, entitled to the full protection and promise of our Constitution. It is the responsibility of each of us to ensure that this promise is realised in their everyday lives," he said.
Justice Nath, who is also the Executive Chairman of National Legal Service Authority (NALSA), said every day in court, judges see women from different social and economic backgrounds facing domestic violence and they may be highly educated, financially independent and socially privileged, or they may have very limited education and no independent means of support.
"Yet, the pressure to adjust, to remain silent and to preserve the marriage can exist across these differences. And often, that pressure comes from the woman's own family.
"She may be asked to tolerate what is happening because the marriage must be saved, because the children will suffer or because the family's reputation is at stake," he pointed out.
Elaborating his point further, Justice Nath said one needs to question the idea that preserving the appearance of a marriage is more important than confronting what is happening within it and when a woman speaks about violence, the first response from those closest to her should be to understand what she is experiencing and offer support and safety, rather than to ask her how she can adjust to it.
He said the latest National Family Health Survey (NFHS) gives us an important starting point and NFHS-6, for 2023-24, records a decline in reported spousal violence from 29.2 per cent in NFHS-5 to 22.3 per cent.
"We should certainly recognise this decline. At the same time, even a figure of 22.3 per cent tells us that domestic violence remains a significant reality in the lives of Indian women," he said, adding that statistics also have their limitations because they tell us about what has been reported and measured but not what remains unspoken.
He added that the research has shown how limited formal help-seeking can be among women experiencing intimate partner violence and the gap between experiencing violence and reaching the formal justice system is one of the most important challenges before all.
"Our ultimate measure of success cannot be only how many complaints have been registered. The more important measures to judge the improvement are whether women are actually safer, whether they know where to go, whether they are able to leave if they so choose and whether the protection granted to them actually reaches them," Justice Nath emphasised.
He said it is important to remember that domestic violence is not confined to matrimonial relationships and the law recognises that violence may arise within different kinds of domestic relationships -- between parents and children, siblings or other persons who share or have shared a household, as well as relationships in the nature of marriage.
"It is also significant that the definition of domestic violence is not confined to physical violence. The Act recognises sexual abuse, verbal and emotional abuse and economic abuse.
"This was an important legislative recognition for its time because it acknowledged that domestic violence does not always present itself in the form that we instinctively recognise as violence," he said.
NCW chairperson Vijaya Rahatkar, while welcoming Justice Nath, flagged that although women get relief in domestic violence cases, the problem arises in implementation of the court's order and they have to approach the court again for execution of the decision.
She urged the court to take note of the lack of implementation of orders and ensure their compliance for providing relief to women in distress.
