Battered Woman Syndrome

''The enemy doesn't stand a chance when the victim decides to survive''. One of the emerging and accepted concepts over the last decade which has gained legitimacy in legal and psychological spheres in countries like Australia, New Zealand, United States, United Kingdom is the doctrine of Battered Woman Syndrome. The doctrine is applied to defend those woman survivors of domestic violence who are guilty of killing their oppressors under the law. Over the years there have been several legal reforms which have been directed to assist the survivors. 'The Protection Of Woman Against Domestic Violence' enacted in 2005 which provides civil remedies to the survivors besides criminalising domestic violence is one such law. The Battered Woman Syndrome doctrine has not been thoroughly applied by the courts of India as yet however, recently the Delhi High Court in its landmark verdict applied the said doctrine and held a male accused guilty of abetting suicide of his wife. The verdict indicates the first step of acceptance, recognition and applicability of this doctrine in the Indian context.

Battered Woman Syndrome is a mental disorder that develops in victims of domestic violence as a result of serious and long term abuse. It has been identified as a subcategory of post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Although not all battered woman meets all the criteria of PTSD, a sufficient number do. It is understood that domestic violence is a part of gender violence and that many more women than men are the victims of physical, psychological and sexual abuse. Even when women strike back its usually the woman who hurt themselves physically and emotionally. In fact, until battered woman takes back some control of their lives, they may not truly be considered survivors. 

Battered Woman Syndrome begins as an abusive cycle of 3 stages. The first being where the abuser engages in behaviours that create relationship tension. In the second stage, the tension explodes and the abuser commits some form of abuse; physical, emotional, sexual, psychological or otherwise.In the third, the abuser tries to fix his wrongdoing and apologises. The third stage is often termed as the 'honeymoon stage' as the abuser makes amends for his wrongdoings whereby he is forgiven and the cycle starts all over again. Gradually as the cycle continues the victim starts to believe that its her own fault. When the victim takes responsibility of her abuse it is termed as 'learned helplessness'. The victim hereby is convinced of her own helplessness and that the abuse cannot be escaped. Thus, Battered Woman Syndrome develops.

Characteristics which battered Woman exhibit are the follows: 1) they fear for their safety 2) they irrationally believe that the abuser is powerul and will hurt her grievously if she contacts authority 3) they take full responsibility of the abuse 4) suffer from depression 5) seek addiction of drugs and alcohol.

A woman who has been continuously abused over a prolonged period may suffer from a psychological condition which is more severe than usual depression or post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Instead of looking for more options to escape she is lured into staying in such violent and abusive relationship. At the face of such violence the woman is eventually compelled to eliminate such an abuser in order to protect herself or her children when such an abuser is vulnerable and is in no position to fight back when attacked. The action taken by such a woman is not out of a sudden, grave or an immediate provocation.

DOCTRINE AS A LEGAL DEFENSE

The courts in  Australia, New Zealand, United States and United Kingdom have accepted the growing body of research  showing that battered partners can use force to defend themselves and sometimes kill their abusers because of the abusive and life threatening situations in which they find themselves acting in a firm belief that there is no other way of self- preservation. It was introduced in law to explain the reasonableness of a woman actions in self defense against her abuser. The critiques of this doctrine argued that the use of such a defense in the court would strengthen the stereotype that woman are irrational and emotional . Also ' learned helplessness' suggested that woman who survived horrendous abuse were powerless and helpless. Another critical argument was that law would not encourage woman to kill their husbands inorder to escape abuse. Feminist scholars believe that woman should take rationalised actions instead.

Contradicting the above arguments few scholors argued that the doctrine is a 'defense necessity' based on the idea that woman are placed in a difficult situation, her context and location should be taken into account while adjudicating. The law further uses the principle of reasonable standards. The inclusion of psychological defense would therefore imply that the law chooses to consider psychological mindset of the person and the conditions in which a reasonable person may react in similar circumstances. Thus the pschological doctrine upholds.

R v. Ahluwalia was the first matter where the defense of battered woman syndrome was pushed and the immediacy requirement of provocation was done away with. In this case Kiranjit Ahluwalia killed her violent and abusive husband.She claimed provocation and the judge directed the jury to consider whether she did lose her self-control, a reasonable person being a well educated Asian married woman living in England would have lost her self-control given her husband's provocation. On appeal it was argued that the judge should have directed the jury to consider a reasonable person suffering from Battered Woman Syndrome. Upon considering fresh medical evidence the court of appeal ordered a retrial as new evidence showed diminished responsibility of English law.

Similarly in R v. Thornton, Sara Thornton was facing an abusive and violent situation where her partner told her he will murder her while she sleeps. Due to this she was psychologically paralysed that her partner may kill her anytime. Owing to the threat and fear she stabbed her partner. She was convicted of murder. The court rejected her plea that she committed the murder inorder to psychologically protect herself. Upon fresh medical evidence that she had a personality disorder the court of appeal ordered a retrial. The victim does not have to be in a position to carry out threats immediately.

In India Battered Woman does not have a legal status, areper se, because there is no specific law dealing with her. None of the exceptions to murder as laid down in Section 3isapplicable to a battered woman who has committed murder. Most of the cases  are settled in home surroundings as they rarely reach the police station and courts. Also unfortunately the Indian criminal justice system is based on victorian ideology and gender stereotypes. This scenario makes us question if we are really advancing and if our laws are protecting and safeguarding the interests of women in India?

The social,cultural,religious and structural factors all train a woman to tolerate the cruelty subjected by their spouse silently. Instead of resorting to aggression women here voice their concerns within immediate martial family or involve kinship to pressurize the husbands to stop the act of violence, on the continuance of the same they eventually end up committing suicide.

In Aneesh Kumar v  State Of Bihar the Supreme court held that the fact that Section 498-A of the Indian Penal Code is a cognizable and non-bailable offence has lent it a dubious place of pride amongst the provisions that are used as weapons rather than shield by disgruntled wives. The simplest way to harass is to get the husband and the relatives arrested under this provision. In quite a number of cases bed ridden grandmothers, grandfathers and relatives living abroad have been arrested. The courts did not stop here.  Rather it issued a guidelines 'to prevent unnecessary arrest and mechanical detention'. Inspite of such baseless and irrational claims women activists have been successful in enacting Protection Of Women Against Domestic Violence Act 2005. The manner in which domestic violence cases are dealt with is worrisome. The law does not take into account a woman's pain, emotional and social situation which she is subjected to. However it is noteworthy to mention that inspite of so many structural and judicial flaws  the Delhi High Court in the matter of State v Hari Prashad has held the accused guilty under section 306 of IPC for abetting suicide of the victim while acquitting him under Section 304B. In this case the accused wife, Pushpa poured kerosene oil over herself and set herself ablaze for the reason that she was harassed by the accused. The accused who was unhappy with the dowry received would mentally and physically torture his wife. Upon complaining to Crime against women cell, the accused apologised and promised to mend his ways. The night when Pushpa committed suicide she was furiously beaten by the accused. The court stated that Pushpa took all the steps to salvage her marriage and the accused failed in his duty to provide her a peaceful and happy matrimonial environment. A prudent man could reasonably foresee that Pushpa was sending out distress signals and was bound to take such extreme step which she did for no fault of hers.

Cases like the above are like tip of the iceberg for drawing attention of the administrative agencies and woman social activists that we have to still go far to protect the woman in society as woman are still not in a position to save themselves or to escape from such intolerable environment. Thus social structural changes along with eliminating traces of patriarchy may help create violent free homes.