Reporting Domestic Violence and such Incidences
One of the readers of this blog asked us(via suggest a story feature) to post on how to go about reporting abuse of maids at home, violence against children and incidences of such kind. This being an important issue, I would like to invite our readers to suggest ways of helping the victim or reporting it to the concerned authorities on spotting such incidences. To give you an idea of what I am referring to, here is a quote from the reader:
“The man was BEATING his maid – a teenage girl – with his leather belt. She was crying so much. We were trying to understand the reason for all this from what he was shouting. It was something about the maid servant having scolded one of the man’s sons and the son must have complained to his father, who in turn beats the maid IN FULL VIEW of his sons and wife.”
An easy way I know of to help is to call Makkala Sahayavani at 1098, a helpline for children which may take the issue further. Another obvious ways to handle this is to report to police, but this may involve you to go through lot of procedures and documentation work.
Are there any other useful ways that you know of to report such incidents and help the victims?
Abuse of maids by men in Indian households is one of the darkest blots on our society. It really calls into question the level of civility in our homes and societies. We who lecture the world about morality and dharma are incapable of showing tolerance and acceptance of people “lower” than us in wealth and power. It is a shame that the women leaders in our society rise up against this brutality and begin to push for enforcement of laws, protecting maidservants, especially female maidservants.
Even I know only of the Makkala Sahayavani. But honestly there should be some NGO that takes care of this work. There are some associations that prevent cruelty to women on a generic scale. Maybe we can ask them to give us a lead or to take up the initiative.