Sexual Abuse Of Women And Children: A Critical Study With Special Reference To Indian Laws On Rape

Sexual Abuse Of Women And Children: A Critical Study With Special Reference To Indian Laws On Rape Victims

Arundhathi. K.S., School of Law, Christ (Deemed to be University)

INTRODUCTION

Sexual violence is one of the most extreme and effective forms of control in a male dominated society, which simultaneously damages and constraints women's lives and prompts individual and collective resistance among women thereby maintaining the status-quo of gender inequality, subjugation of women and their control.1 Sexual violence describes the deliberate use of sex as a weapon to demonstrate power over and to inflict pain and humiliation upon, another human being.2 Sexual violence may be defined as any violence, physical or psychological, carried out through sexual means or by targeting sexuality.3 Sexual violence covers both physical and psychological attacks directed at a person's sexual characteristics. Sexual violence does not necessarily include direct physical contact between perpetrator and victim, threats, humiliation and intimidation may all be considered as sexually violent. The word rape is derived from a Latino word implying 'to seize'. Rape is a crime that "involves sexual assault usually involving sexual intercourse which is initiated by one or more persons against another person without that person's consent.4"