Legal rape of Husbands: India’s fastest growing crime

“Just like a man misusing his physical strength on a woman is called a rapist , a female misusing her legal strength on a man must be also called as a rapist. “

— A Gender rights activist

What is Rape ?

The word rape itself originates from the Latin verb rapere: to seize or take by force. According to the feminists Rape is about power, not sex. A rapist uses actual force or violence — or the threat of it — to take control over another human being. Rape is categorized as a crime against humanity.

How can a rapist exercise power on a victim?

A rapist can exercise power on a victim either physically or legally. When it comes to physical rapes since men are physically more powerful than women and this results in a significantly larger percentage of physical rape victims being women .

There are also a lot of instances when a wife wants to illegally exercise her power on her husband and use actual force or the threat of it to take control of her husband. In these instances the wife legally rapes the husband using government backed laws and misusing the state machinery.

What is a legal rape ?

A legal rape is a situation when a person used the legal system to unleash trauma and violence on the victim in order to exercise power on the victim and to control the victim.

How Indian husband are legally raped?

In order to exercise her control and power over her husband ore in some instances punish him for not towing her line Indian wives frequently resort to using her legal power to unleash trauma and suffering on the husband many times over his entire family . Primary among the tools of legal rape are section 498a , DV act of 2005 , Maintenance and Child custody laws.

The symptoms leading to the legal rape have an uncanny similarity to the physical rape of women.

a) The legal rapist is always close acquaintance of the victim in the from of wife , daughter in law or sister-in-law.

b) The victim refuses to abide by the whims of the rapist.

c) The rapist develops deep rooted hatred for the victim and has a desire to control the life of the victim and exercise power over the victim.

d) The rapist uses her legal force to rape the victim.

e) Many times the wife legally rapes the husband impulsively as opportunity presently itself and might later regret the act.

f) Very often the legal rapists say that the trigger for the legal rape was when a husband made them angry, usually by rebuffing a wife’s whims and fancies or toeing her line.

The effects of Legal Rape ?

Just like the symptoms the aftermath if a legal rape is also similar to a physical rape.

Victims of legal rape can be severely traumatized by the assault and may have difficulty functioning as well as they had been used to prior to the assault, with disruption of concentration, sleeping patterns and eating habits, for example. They may feel jumpy or be on edge. After being legally raped, it is common for the victim to experience acute stress disorder, including symptoms similar to those of posttraumatic stress disorder, such as intense, sometimes unpredictable, emotions, and they may find it hard to deal with their memories of the event. In the months immediately following the legal rape , these problems may be severe and very upsetting and may prevent the victim from revealing their ordeal to friends or family, or seeking police or medical assistance. Additional symptoms of Acute Stress Disorder include:

* Depersonalization or dissociation (feeling numb and detached, like being in a daze or a dream, or feeling that the world is strange and unreal)

* Difficulty remembering important parts of the assault

* reliving the assault through repeated thoughts, memories, or nightmares

* Avoidance of things, places, thoughts, and/or feelings that remind the victim of the assault

* Anxiety or increased alertness (difficulty sleeping, concentrating, etc.)

* Avoidance of social life

For one-third to one-half of the victims, these symptoms continue beyond the first few months and meet the conditions for the diagnosis of posttraumatic stress disorder

The facts of legal rape in India

• The incidence of legal rapes of husbands is thousands of percentages higher than that the physical rapes of women. The legal rape has become a profitable industry for the Lawyers and the Legal rapist wives.

• The legal rape system is backed by the government even though there is little difference between raping a woman by physical force and raping man using legal force .

• Physical rape affects one woman , while legal rape affects the family of the man including men , women and children

• In Legal rape the victim of the rape is asked to compensate the female rapist. No legal rapist has ever been [punished in India for committing such a heinous crime .

• The Indian government has no welfare schemes to rehabilitate the victims of legal rape. Instead finds are allocated to encourage females to legally rape husbands and protect them from prosecution for the legal rape.