HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATIONS AGAINST WOMEN AND THE STRUGGLES OF INDIAN WOMEN’S MOVEMENT

Violence is anissue that has always given rise to moral controversies throughout humancivilisation. Neither legal ideology, nor political ideology, not even religiousideologies have succeeded in eliminating the cultural roots of the cry for retributivejustice.The National Crime Records Bureau reported in 1998 that the growth rate of crimes against women would be higher than the population growth rate by 2010.Earlier, many cases were not registered with the police due to the social stigma attached to rape and molestation cases. Official statistics show that there has been a dramatic increase in the number of reported crimes against women. It is widely accepted that the issue of violence against women has been thegreatest rallying point of the feminist movement in the second half of the 20thcentury, often referred to as the second phase of feminism.This paper cannot trace the entire history of the women, violence and law debate inIndia in its entirety. I am restricting it to the few issues discussed so far,because between them they cover the major controversies within the movementand between the movement and the State and the general public.