When a 19-year-old young woman was beaten for denying sex with her husband in the bathroom at the house, we couldn’t contain our anger and frustration about the rotting DNA of our society.
Many unfortunate women in India constantly live in the fear of domestic abuse and marital rape.
They suffer in silence because either they don’t have the courage to move out of abusive marriage or they stick around for the sake of their parents.
They either start believing that the person will change one day or they start blaming themselves for the abuse, which leads to acceptance of the abuse and the abuser.
But there are some who are brave.
This 19-year-old is one such woman. She showed that she is a woman of today and she is not going to sacrifice her life to domestic abuse or marital rape.
On Monday, a 19-year- old brave woman filed a complaint with the police in Ahmedabad. She has alleged that she was beaten on several occasions by her husband for refusing to have sex with him in the bathroom at their house.
Just married four months ago, this girl hardly knew how her beautiful dream of being happily married will turn into a nightmare.
As per TOI, recalling her trauma the courageous girl shared in her complaint:
“Many times, my in-laws badly thrashed me at midnight after waking me up from sleep. They used to ask me to bring dowry from my parents,”Â
She also shared how she was brutalized by her husband during sex:
“Very often, he used to forcibly take me inside bathroom to have sex with me,”Â
Also Read: Tina Datta Opens Up About Her 5-Year Abusive Relationship
She alleged that her husband thrashed her badly for denying sex in the bathroom.
“Whenever I insisted on not having sex in the bathroom, my husband would beat me, overpower me and have sex with me forcibly,”Â
She added,
“My husband’s elder brother also molested me quite often whenever he found me alone in the house.”
Sadly, it wasn’t only her in-laws but also a woman neighbor of her husband, who instigated them to beat her up.
Also Read: Tortured By In-Laws, This Brave Mom Is Building Her Life To Set An Example For Her Daughter
Tormented, heartbroken and saddened by the inhumane treatment of her husband and in-laws, she gathered the courage to move out of that abusive family and return back to her father’s place, where she approached the police.
Though the police have registered a case against her husband, four members of in-laws’ family and a neighbor, we wonder how many women struggle with the domestic abuse and marital rape on a daily basis.
Marital rape has been widely debated in India.
India unlike other developed nations has yet to criminalize marital rape. Activists endorse the opinion that India’s patriarchal society makes it necessary and imperative that marital rape should be criminalized.
On the other hand, a more orthodox view remains that marital rape cannot be criminalized because of the sacred nature of marriage and how criminalizing it would destabilize the institution of marriage.
Being in the 21st century, we couldn’t resist but wonder how a brutal act of rape of a wife by a husband is still seen as acceptable by our society.Â
While many women accept abuse as their fate and suffer infinitely in silence, a very few have the courage to stand against society to raise their bold voices.Â
And, it is high time our society need to celebrate the voices of such young girls and moms rather than shame them for being bold.
At I FOR HER, we believe that it’s time that the ugly circle of harassing or abusing daughters-in-law needs to be broken.
If you are a therapist or relationship coach or an NGO who can support our community members in coping up with the stress of marriage, then please connect with us and help bring the change.