In India, domestic violence has been a criminal offence under the Indian Penal Code since 1983, but this section does not give a wide definition to domestic violence. The efforts to draft a new civil law on Domestic Violence started sometime in 1999. A draft legislation was prepared by Lawyers Collective with nationwide consultations with women's groups from all over the country and this Bill aims to provide combined civil and criminal law remedies for a co-ordinated approach to the problem of domestic violence. Some of the salient features of this draft legislation, which has borrowed heavily from the South African law, and the UN Model law are:
1. a broad definition of domestic violence to include not only physical and mental abuse but also verbal, sexual and economic violence, 2. the woman's right to reside in the shared household. In the Indian scenario, this is most crucial, since women do not have property rights under other personal laws. 3. granting of interim and ex-parte protection orders, 4. training programmes for police officers, protection officers, judges, etc. Presently however, the Indian government has taken this draft legislation and presented a new version of it which is currently introduced in the Parliament and may be passed very soon. For all those who are interested, I can email copies of the draft legislation, Jayna Kothari (Lawyers Collective) ***End-violence is sponsored by UNIFEM and receives generous support from ICAP*** To post a message, send it to: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To subscribe or unsubscribe, send a message to: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>. In the 1st line of the message type: subscribe end-violence OR type: unsubscribe end-violence Archives of previous End-violence messages can be found at: http://www.edc.org/GLG/end-violence/hypermail/
