Coimbatore Men Participating In Women Harassment Meeting
A group of men from Tamil Nadu is setting off for Shimla to participate in a meeting on August 15 for “equal rights and freedom from harassment from women”. Keshava Vishwanathan, an IT professional who is going to attend the meeting organised by Save Indian Family Foundation, said he felt that in many in stances Indian law favoured wives. “Be it in the case of custody of children or allegations of domestic violence and dowry harassment, the law generally takes the side of women,” he said. Another participant, Manoj David said they were trying to “raise the issue of freedom and dignity of harassed husbands”.About 19 men from Chennai, Madurai and Coimbatore would be part of the day-long meeting in Shimla, in which more than 100 men were participating. “More than 100 men, representatives of 30,000 other harassed husbands from across the country, will meet to come up with strategies to take on their wives,” he said. Virag Dhulia, a member of Save Indian Family Foundation, said the latest report on the suicide rate of men across India was an indicator of the harassment of men. Around 1.2 lakh ‘harassed’ husbands have committed suicide in the last four years, he claimed, citing figures from the National Crime Records Bureau.
“ We’re meeting at Shimla, not to draw a gender-dividing line. We want to discuss and find solutions as India is seeing a large number of divorces,” he said. Issues they will discuss include a separate men’s welfare ministry on the lines of the women and child welfare ministry, equal taxation for men and women, change in inheritance laws, amendment to the domestic violence prevention law, and mandatory joint custody of children for divorced couples.
