Sohaila Abdulali joins fellow author Ashwini Desphpande with straight-forward and urgent measure governments can put in place to curb domestic abuse and sexual violence during the global lockdown.

– There is a shadow pandemic on the rise and it is following the trail of the spread of COVID19 from China to Europe and the USA – rising cases of domestic abuse against women.

– In India the National Commission of Women has seen a spike in reported cases of domestic abuse during the lockdown. This is worrying particularly because there is massive underreporting of domestic abuse in India.

– Underreporting occurs because women are scared, lack resources and/or self-confidence, don’t know about hotlines, are culturally conditioned to believe abuse is acceptable. Data from the National Family Health Survey revealed that 52% of women think it is okay for their husbands to beat them up. In contrast, 42% of the men think beating their wives is par for the course.

Read their article in full here.