Women are innocent and impotent!

Two news reports (URLs of both at the end) in yesterday's Times of India (Delhi edition) drew my attention and I wondered the society we are giving ourselves and planning to frame in the future.

The first one is a report where a Delhi woman killed her 4 year old son, injured her 15 year old daughter and killed a woman from her neighbourhood. The reason was that this murderous woman had illicit relation with the husband of the victim woman from the neighbourhood for few years. The dead woman had got suspicious of her husband and the murderous woman. It is reported that the husband ultimately reconciled with his wife and distanced himself with the murderous woman.

But this sent the murderous woman in a fit of rage so self-occupied that she even decided to eliminate her own children just for the sake of carnal pleasures. Yes, it was mere carnal pleasure as I deeply reject that a person (man or woman) can find 'true love' at age of 40 after three children. The murderous woman was 40 and had three children (her second daughter aged 12 escaped the mad wrath of her own mother since the poor child was at school).

Now before we look at the second report, let's just see how can this woman be punished by Indian legal system. With my limited knowledge of the Indian legal system, I guess she can be booked under attempt to murder (her own daughter, who is currently in hospital) and murder of her own 4 year old son and murder of her neighbouring woman. I do not think that she can be booked under having illicit relations with a person outside her matrimony. Why?

Two reasons. One, section 497 of IPC unambiguously and shamelessly excuses the woman of the charge of adultery. It says “...the wife shall not be punishable as an abettor”

The Indian legal system just does not punish a woman if she is found to be maintaining illicit relations outside her matrimony but has listed down the criteria for punishment for a man if he is found to be maintaining illicit relations with a woman outside matrimony. This also leads us to the second reason, which is that Indian legal system and the legislature is assinine.

Thus, the laws in India for protection of women are made with an assumption that all women are innocent. They just cannot do anyone any harm especially mental harm. Be it laws around domestic violence, 498a, or adultery it is the man who is at fault. Always.

Now, coming to the second report of the day, which as per me is somewhat hilarious. As per this report the National Commission of Women (NCW) is drafting a Bill of Rights. Before we look at the content it is to be noted that it does not specify whose rights. Since it does not specify whose rights, one can be led to believe that it is talking of Rights of all Indian citizens and if that be the case then why is NCW drafting it? Who is contributing in the draft on men's behalf, on behalf of kids, elderlies, handicapped and many other Indian citizens?

My half an hour search on the webiste of NCW did not throw up a single document that was called Bill of Rights but it had few other proposed bills and changes to existing bills. But going by the report, the next funny part is that there is a demand to make refusal of sex within marriage not a valid ground for seeking divorce. Now this is clearly an outcome of more than few judgements where wife's refusal for sex with the husband has facilitated the husband to seek divorce. The reasons I consider it funny is that while it is giving the wife a right to refuse sex, it is not talking of husband's right to refuse sex. This leads me to wonder if people who are drafting this think that the sex hormones exit only in men and women are impotent. It's only women who have “something” which they can refuse and husband shall be required to beg for it. It just reminds me of a quote on twitter by a woman which went something like this (addressed to womanfolk) “If your tears do not get you what you want depend on sex”. I took it as a joke then but I guess that lady was followed by some member(s) of NCW

At the same time I also find it pathetic and feel pity that such a draft is in a sense giving an impression that women indeed is a sex object. She has something which a man around her is after and she has a right to refuse it. Disgusting line of thinking this NCW carries with it, in fact.

My only suggestion to NCW will be on terms of reality. If they are indeed proposing such a stupid one sided right-of-refusal then also propose legality of prostitution else potential of sexual crimes could only see an increase.

Click HERE to see first report on the murderous wife; and

Click HERE to see the second report on NCW's nincompoop proposals

Economics is the Name of the Game

There is no second opinion that the world runs on money and therefore it is generally said to understand the behaviour of humans, one needs to understand the subject of economics and how humans behave and make choices under influence of money.

The best seller “Freakonomics” actually puts economics in each of mundace acts of humans where one would not have thought of applying economics but concludes that even such mundane acts are guided by money.

But then divorce is not mundane! How can it be then free of economics and money? If one were to analyse the various laws that have been framed for settling marital discords (fondly called “Women empowerment” - which is nothing but a joke).

Below is my understanding of framing of various laws that “empowered” women and how the laws have transformed from being somewhat neutral to being flawed and biased with advancement in society, technology and communication. While I have focused on main and most common of the laws, in all probability I might have missed some laws/amendments, please highlight the same.

The first law to be framed with special attention to women was Hindu Marriage Act in the year 1955. Similar acts for Christians is the Indian Christian Marriage Act framed in 1872, for Muslims is the Personnel Laws of Divorce and Dissolution of Marriage Act of 1939 and The Muslim Women (Protection of Rights on Divorce) Act of 1986 while the Parsis have the Parsi Marriage and Divorce Act 1936. There is also a secular act Special Marriage Act of 1954 that generally deals with marital matters where the man and women practice different faiths or religions.

A cursory reading of these acts shows that these governed the rules under which a man and a woman can start a new life as husband and wife or decide to end their marital relation in the unfortunate circumstances where going together becomes impossible. These acts, though not impartial to both man and woman, still had taken a middle path for instance in section 27 of the Hindu Marriage Act the reference to property is the one which is jointly owned by the husband and the wife.

The Dowry Prohibition Act of 1961 was one that had right intent to weed out dowry system from India and continued to be fair in design and application by making both giving and taking dowry a crime.

However, 1973 saw the section 125 of Code of Criminal Procedure. It carried with it a new wave of a mindset and I firmly believe that this mindset was inherently primitive and backward looking. The section unambiguously assumes that in a house only the man/husband/son is capable to earn. The section is for maintenance of wives, children and parents and is worded to corner the man. The definition of wife includes the divorced wife who is not yet married – the man cannot think to be relieved even after formally and legally separating. Notwithstanding the fact that this enactment was probably the firs step back towards a fair society, this act had taken care to refuse maintenance to women who refuses to stay with the husband without adequate grounds or is involved in adultery.

But if looked at deeply (from Freakonomics perspective) this S.125 CRPC enactment was monetization of marriage. It was economics at play in the name of women empowerment!

1983 was the year which saw the most abused and misused law in the matters of matrimonial disputes. This year section 498a was inserted into the Indian Penal Code. This section/law has certain fundamental problems:

• The act is based on the basic premise that husband and his relatives are at fault
• The section states unambiguously that husband and his relatives shall be imprisoned and fined
• It assumes that act of cruelty is uni-directional and is from husband to wife. The wife can never be cruel to husband and his family members

This act has assumed draconian proportions not just with it's misuse but also with the threats of using it and the fear in the minds of husband and his family of getting arrested thereby losing jobs and respect. This impact has made sure that this act is the most economically beneficial for the women. It helps the women extract money in the name of settlement (actually an assurance of not filing 498a).

In 1984, we had the Family Courts Act. Now this could be said to be a law that ensured that family matters are kept separate from other matters and are resolved at the earliest. But this act had one problem. It sowed the seeds of mistrust against the man by including a provision to prefer women when appointing judges for the family court.

Thus as time has progressed we have actually brought in more and more of economic despondency among women and helped them extract money from men they called their husbands. These laws are in fact making women shun their careers, give up hard work, not use their intelligence, shy from contribution to the economic development of the country by ensuring them that they can go scot-free even if they are caught in an act of adultery and would still be rightful in demanding a maintenance from the man.

But hold on. Did I just say women shying away from contribution to the economic development of the country. Well that may not be true as these women are just not shying away from making money move – from the hands of the man to their own hands and as students of economic understand movement of money is the name of the game.

What about the toddling criminals, Mr Shinde?

Our Home Minister, Mr Shinde has advised the law administrators to take all steps that they can to ensure that no innocent Muslim should be detained and put behind bars.

That definitely is a noble thought, Sir but I just wonder why has it not been brought to you notice that along with such innocent Muslim there are toddlers, in fact infants as young as a few months old who are being put behind bars at a mere complain under the notorious section 498A of the Indian Penal Code.

But then I also wonder why should you wait for someone to bring this to your notice when the same has been documented in the Report No. 243 on S.498A of the Indian Penal Code by the Indian Law Commission released just about an year back in August 2012. The report is not just available in public forums it is ought to be in your office since you are India's Home Minister (and not just a father of a woman who has had a bad marriage).

If you read the report in full and provided in full fairness, you would realize that there is a significant number of men – Muslims, Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, Christians etc – who are being detained, put behind bars for either no fault or without proper investigation. At just a mere complain by a woman not just her husband but his entire family is thrown in the jail. And this family has often included kids, children and even infants – not to talk of elderly men and women who are in regular need ot medical help! I draw your attention to section 2.2 of the said report (just in case your office – or maybe you – missed it by chance or by design; a link to the report is provided at the end)

Isn't this report from the judiciary who actually gets to see the use and misuse of law enough for the legislature to sit up and introspect what went wrong when framing the law? Or is it that you are seeking personal benefits out from it? But what makes you sure that this will not bite you back? Will you amend it then? But in that case, the Indians are actually living at the mercy of politicians – the gods of the time! Unless they feel the heat, the commoners cannot expect any wind of relief.

So, Mr Home Minister will you now take a minute and see that besides innocent Muslims, innocent infants and kids are not put behind bars. Or do you too believe that a 4 month old baby is a grave threat to an abla naari who has all designs and plans or the support to misuse laws. By not taking corrective action on this asinine law, the legislature is putting the country on the path that slowly but surely leads to a criminal record for over 50% of the population across age!

This does not leave me with a wonder, but a clarity that law world over is an ass but Indian legislature is unique in being a asshole!

The report.