Association of Domestic Violence From Husband and Women Empowerment in Slum Community,Mumbai

Abstract

Prevalence of violence by husband against wife is an indicator of women’s status at household level. The objective of the study is to understand the relationship between domestic violence and women’s empowerment in a slum community in Mumbai, India. Data were collected from a sample of 1,136 married women aged 18 to 39 years having at least one child and reporting of unmet need for family planning. Domestic violence by husband against wife was measured in terms of either physical, sexual, or emotional violence. Three logit regression analyses were carried out using decision-making power, freedom of movement, and justified wife beating as dependent variables separately and socio-demographic and economic variables as independent variables. Furthermore, the relationship between domestic violence and women’s decision-making power, freedom of movement, and justified wife-beating index has been explored. About 21% of women had ever experienced violence, and 38% of women had decision-making power with respect to own health care, household purchase, or visiting family and relatives. A little more than one fifth of the women reported freedom of movement to market, health facilities, or places outside the community. Women who justified wife beating were 2.29 (95% CI [1.59, 3.29]) times at risk of experiencing violence than women who disagreed with the wife-beating statements. Women not empowered in decision making were 1.15 (95% CI [0.91, 1.46]) times at risk of experiencing domestic violence than women who were empowered in decision making. Women who are empowered are less likely to be at risk of domestic violence. Programs aimed at empowering women must address socio-cultural norms relating to justification of violence in marriage.

Keywords

violence from husband empowerment index decision-making power freedom of movement justified wife beating

Introduction

Prevalence of violence by husband against wife is an indicator of women’s status at the household level (Kishor & Johnson, 2004). Studies have shown that in places where violence rates were high, women’s status was found to be low (Goetz & Gupta, 1996). Findings suggest that violence often impedes women’s freedom, thus disempowering them. A survey of 1,842 rural women aged 15 to 39 (Jejeebhoy & Cook, 1997) who were interviewed on their decision-making power; personal freedom of movement; wife–husband power relations, including wife beatings; and their attitudes revealed that wife beating was reported to be widely prevalent in all settings, and the reasons included disobedience to husband’s expectations. Another survey by Hindin and Adair (2002) found that male-dominated or female-dominated decision making was associated with more reports of physical violence, while joint decision making was protective. Gage (2005) in his study revealed that women who had the final say alone on household purchases were more likely to report emotional, physical, or sexual violence than women who reported that decisions were made jointly. The Demographic Health Survey (DHS) data analysis of multi-country carried out by Kishor and Johnson (2004) revealed that the relationship of controlling behaviors by husband and the risk of violence persists in all countries, and violence increases rapidly with increase in controlling behaviors of the husband. Studies also revealed that husband’s drinking habits and women’s work status were risk factors associated with domestic violence (Eswaran & Malhotra, 2011; Kimuna, Djamba, Ciciurkaite, & Cherukuri, 2013; Kishor & Johnson, 2004; Krishnan et al., 2010). Except for a few studies, most of these studies suggest the protective role of empowerment against experiences of violence by women. This needs further exploration to suggest directions of association. In this backdrop, this article attempts to understand the socio-economic variables influencing women’s status in a slum community and assess the relation between violence by husband and women’s empowerment in that community.

Material and Method

The baseline data used for the present study were derived from the main study, which aimed to enhance the contraceptive use among women having unmet need for family planning by a community-based intervention. The eligibility criteria included currently married women aged 18 to 39 years, staying with their husbands, having at least one child, and having unmet need for family planning.

Baseline survey was conducted during September 2012 to June 2013 in two slum communities, namely, Kajupada and Tunga village under the jurisdiction of the health posts of Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai (MCGM), Mumbai, covering a total population of approximately 20,806 women of reproductive age group. People come to Mumbai in search of livelihood, and hence, majority of the residents are migrants from other parts of Maharashtra and India. However, majority of the population has been staying in these communities for more than 5 years. The two slum communities have an equal proportion of Hindu and Muslim population. Most of the men are daily wage earners, and only a few women work indicating their low socio-demographic and economic status. Median income of the households is Rs. 5,000 or US$81 per month. To get a representative sample of women, each slum community was divided into four equal parts on the basis of number of households. From each part, equal numbers of eligible women were selected using systematic random sampling procedure. Information was collected by face-to-face interview. Survey questions included socio- demographic and economic variables, reproductive history, contraceptive use, fertility preference, domestic violence, work status, and husband–wife non-sexual relations. The objective of the study was explained to each woman, and they were assured privacy and confidentiality. All the interviews were conducted in their houses in privacy. All care was taken with regard to women living in joint families too. The participant woman alone was invited to sit in a room with the interviewer and the interview was conducted. The interviews were conducted during the day time when men were at work, and hence, none of the men were present during the interviews. Nevertheless, as this was an intervention project, women were asked to seek permission from their husband or mother-in-law if required to avoid any problems. To minimize literacy concerns, the participant information sheets were read aloud to the women, and a copy of the same was provided to them. Women were then requested to provide written informed consent. These forms were kept under lock and key at the institute. Safety guidelines delineated by World Health Organization (WHO) for research on domestic violence were adhered to. None of the women reported any inconvenience or discomfort following the administration of the interview schedule. All procedures and forms were approved by the National Institute for Research in Reproductive Health (NIRRH) Ethics Committee. As per the ethics committee guidelines, no compensation was provided to any participant. The detailed methodology of the study is published (Begum, Donta, Nair, & Prakasam, 2015).

Measures of Domestic Violence From Husband

The instrument for measuring domestic violence was based on a greatly shortened and modified Conflict Tactics Scale (CTS). The CTS has been found to be effective in measuring domestic violence in National Family Health Surveys (NFHSs; equivalent of DHSs; IIPS [International Institute for Population Sciences] and Macro International, 2007). Information about experience of violence by husband was collected through a set of questions. Women could respond “yes” or “no” to each item. A “yes” response to one or more of the item(s) revealed evidence of physical, sexual, and emotional violence. Percentage of currently married women who had ever experienced various forms of violence by their husbands is presented in Table 1.

Table 1.

Percentage of Women Who Had Ever Experienced Various Forms of Violence by Their Husband.

Type of Violence	Percentage of Women Ever Experienced Violence (n = 1,136)
Physical violence
Any form of physical violence	16.8
Slapped her	16.7
Twisted her arm or pulled her	8.0
Pushed her, shook her, or threw something at her	6.1
Punched her with his fist or hurt with something	5.7
Kicked her, dragged her, or beat her up	5.5
Tried to choke her or burn her on purpose	1.5
Threatened or attacked her with knife or weapon	0.7
Emotional violence
Any form of emotional violence	12.4
Said or did something to humiliate her in front of others	11.3
Threatened to hurt or harm her or someone close to her	6.4
Insulted her or made her feel bad about herself	8.8
Sexual violence
Any form of sexual violence	4.8
Physically forced her to have sexual intercourse with him even when she did not want to	4.7
Forced her to perform any sexual acts she did not want to	1.9
Any form of physical or sexual violence or emotional violence	21.2

Measures of Women Empowerment

Measuring women’s empowerment at the household level is a complex phenomenon, and it has multi-dimensional effects. Researchers identify women empowerment in different forms such as status of women, women’s autonomy, gender stratification, gender systems, gender equity, and so on (Agarwala & Lynch, 2006; Barrett, 2007; Jejeebhoy, 2000; Kishor & Johnson, 2004). In the present study, women’s empowerment was measured focusing on three dimensions:

Women’s decision-making power, which includes three issues such as decision making about health care, daily household purchases, and visiting family and relatives. The index has been computed based on the data about women’s participation in decision making of the above mentioned three household tasks. If women participated in decision making exclusively by “self” or “jointly with husband” in all the three issues, then they were categorized into one group and scored as “1” and, if not, assigned a score of “0.” The sum score of 3 was considered as women empowered with decision making power.

Women’s freedom of movement includes three issues such as freedom to go to the market, to visit a health facility, and to visit places outside the community. The index has been computed based on the information on whether women were allowed to go to the three places on their own, with someone, or not. All those women who were allowed to go to three places on their own were grouped into one category and assigned a score of “1,” and if not, a score of “0” was given. The sum score of 3 was considered as women empowered with freedom of movement.

Women’s justification of domestic violence from husband includes seven issues such as justification for husband beating wife if she goes out without telling him, neglects the house, argues, refuses to have sex with husband, does not cook food, is being unfaithful, and is disrespectful toward in-laws. The index has been computed based on women’s agreement to the above-mentioned statements of wife beating, and scored as “1” if she does not agree and “0” if she agrees with the reasons given. The sum of scores varies from 0 to 7. The sum scores 5 and above were considered as women “not empowered.”

Explanatory Variables

Researchers in the past (Barrett, 2007; Basu, 1992; Jejeebhoy, 1991) showed that socio-economic variables influence women’s empowerment. Considering the past research studies, socio-economic variables have been identified as age of the women, religion, caste, duration of marriage, husbands’ age, number of living children, and wife and husband habits related to tobacco and alcohol use. The caste system in India denotes the historical social stratification of people and is hierarchical in nature. This resulted in certain sections of the society being relatively more disadvantaged than others. Government of India has identified these as scheduled castes (SCs), scheduled tribes (ST), and other backward classes (OBC; Jangir, 2013).

Univariate and Bivariate analysis is carried out. Socio-demographic and economic factors influencing women’s empowerment have been analyzed by applying logit regression. Women’s empowerment index for each dimension has been cross tabulated with domestic violence, and odds ratio and 95% of confidence interval are calculated.

Results

About 21% of women had ever experienced domestic violence (Table 1). Most common acts of violence observed was physical (16.8%) followed by emotional (12.4%) and sexual violence (4.8%).

Women Empowerment

Data presented in Table 2 shows that approximately 39% of the women had participated in decision making either by themselves or jointly with their husband for their own health care, household purchase, and visiting family or relatives. Only 36.8% women had power of decision making for all the three categories. When examining the women’s empowerment indicator for “freedom of movement,” 71.2% women were allowed to go to the market alone, and 57.9% to health facilities. In case of going to places outside the community alone, only 22.8% of women were allowed. The percentage of women who were allowed to go to these three places with full freedom was 22.4%.

Table 2.

Percentage of Women According to Empowerment Indicators.

Empowerment Indicators	Percentage
Women’s participation in decision making
Own health care	39.4
Daily household purchases	38.8
Visiting family or relatives	39.0
Decision making with respect to all three issues	36.8
Women’s freedom of movement
Allowed to go to market	71.2
Allowed to go to health facilities	57.9
Allowed to go to places outside the community	22.8
Freedom of movement with respect to the three places	22.4
Husband is justified in beating wife if she:	Disagree
Goes out without telling husband	94.7
Neglects the house or children	93.2
Argues with husband	93.4
Refuses to have sex	95.4
Does not cook food	97.4
Is unfaithful	94.5
Disrespects her in-laws	93.1
Overall disagreement to the above-mentioned justifications of wife beating	85.8

Disagreement to the reasons of wife beating explains that women were empowered. Analysis in Table 2 reveals that 93% to 97% of women disagreed to the statements of wife beating by husband.

Multivariate Analysis

Participation in decision making

Results from Table 3 reveal that, controlling for other socio-economic variables, women belonging to younger age group (<25 years), Hindu religion, scheduled caste (SC), scheduled tribe (ST), and other backward class (OBC) group; and reporting husband’s age less than 35 years and husband’s use of alcohol were significantly at greater risk in decision making regarding their health care, household purchases, and visiting family or relatives, compared with their counterpart.

Table 3.

Results of Logit Regression Analysis on Indicators of Women’s Empowerment and Socio-Economic Variables in Slum Community, Mumbai.

Socio-Economic Variables	Decision Making	Freedom of Movement	Justified Wife Beating
Socio-Economic Variables	Odds Ratio [95% CI]	Odds Ratio [95% CI]	Odds Ratio [95% CI]
Age (years)
<25	2.35 [1.19, 3.48]	2.51 [1.38, 4.57]	1.26 [0.60, 2.64]
25-29	1.37 [0.88, 2.11]	1.67 [1.05, 2.65]	1.28 [0.71, 2.33]
30-39	1.00	1.00	1.00
Religion
Hindu	1.36 [1.02, 1.83]	1.08 [0.77, 1.52]	1.04 [0.70, 1.53]
Non Hindu	1.00	1.00	1.00
Caste group
SC/ST	0.67 [0.48, 0.95]	0.83 [0.56, 1.23]	0.58 [0.37, 0.92]
OBC	0.72 [0.53, 0.97]	0.68[0.48, 0.96]	0.62 [0.41, 0.93]
Other	1.00	1.00	1.00
Duration of marriage (years)
≤5	1.09 [0.67,1.77]	0.83 [0.48, 1.42]	1.41 [0.74, 2.69]
6-10	0.93 [0.63, 1.38]	0.85 [0.55, 1.32]	1.19 [0.72, 1.99]
11 and above	1.00	1.00	1.00
Husbands age (years)
≤30	2.63 [1.59, 4.35]	1.87 [1.08, 3.25]	1.27 [0.65, 2.48]
31-35	2.08 [1.36, 3.18]	1.07 [0.68, 1.67]	1.66 [0.95, 2.91]
36+	1.00	1.00	1.00
Number of living children
1	0.64 [0.37, 1.12]	0.40 [0.20, 0.78]	0.75 [0.34, 1.62]
2-3	0.66 [0.41, 1.08]	0.52 [0.28, 0.94]	0.59 [0.30, 1.16]
4+	1.00	1.00	1.00
Use of tobacco products
Yes	1.27 [0.81, 1.99]	1.19 [0.72, 2.01]	0.81 [0.47, 1.39]
No	1.00	1.00	1.00
Husband’s use of any tobacco products
Yes	1.11 [0.84, 1.48]	1.11 [0.80, 1.53]	0.88 [0.61, 1.29]
No	1.00	1.00	1.00
Husband’s use of alcohol
Yes	0.64 [0.46, 0.89]	0.74 [0.51, 1.06]	0.85 [0.56, 1.31]
No	1.00	1.00	1.00

Note. CI = confidence interval; SC = scheduled caste; ST = scheduled tribe; OBC = other backward class.

Freedom of movement

Women less than 25 years were significantly 2.5 (95% CI [1.38, 4.57]) times more at risk than older women in exercising freedom of movement (Table 3). Similarly, women whose husbands were less than 30 years of age were at more risk than their counterparts. Women with higher number of children and those belonging to OBC had more freedom of movement than their counterparts.

Justified wife beating by husband

Table 3 clearly shows that except for caste group, other socio-economic variables were not statistically significant in relation with justification of wife beating.

Relation between domestic violence and women empowerment with respect to decision making, freedom of movement, and justified wife beating

To understand the relation between domestic violence by husband and women’s empowerment index, relative risk has been calculated, and the results are presented in Table 4. “Not empowered” women in decision making were 1.15 (95% CI [0.91, 1.46]) times higher at risk of experiencing domestic violence than women who were empowered in decision making. Women who were not empowered as justifying wife beating were 2.29 (95% CI [1.59, 3.29]) times at risk of experiencing domestic violence than women who were empowered in disagreeing with wife-beating statements.

Table 4.

Odds Ratio of Women Empowerment Index and Domestic Violence in Slum Community in Mumbai.

Empowerment Index	Ever Experienced Domestic Violence		Odds Ratio [95% CI]
Empowerment Index	Never (N = 896)	Ever (N = 240)	Odds Ratio [95% CI]
Decision making
Empowered	337 (37.8)	80 (33.3)	1.00
Not empowered	559 (62.4)	160 (66.7)	1.15 [0.91, 1.46]
Freedom of movement
Empowered	195 (21.8)	60 (25.0)	1.00
Not empowered	701 (78.2)	180 (75.0)	1.07 [0.67, 1.13]
Justified wife beating
Empowered	105 (11.7)	56 (23.3)	1.00
Not empowered	791 (88.3)	184 (76.7)	2.29 [1.59, 3.29]

Note. CI = confidence interval.

Discussion and Conclusion

Understanding the relation between domestic violence and women’s status is a complex phenomenon. The prevalence of violence against women more so by husband affects women’s status in the family. Analysis of National Family Health Survey (NFHS-3) data by Kishor and Gupta (2009) brought out that violence against women affects women’s status in the family. Analysis of multi-country data by Kishor and Johnson (2004) explained that direction of causality. Nevertheless, the relation between domestic violence by husband and women empowerment are likely to be unclear. Furthermore, the study stated that causality may run not from empowerment to violence but from violence to disempowerment. This was likely to be partially true in a society where women cannot or may not leave violent marriages. The present study showed that women in the slum community had restricted movements and were indirectly controlled by their husband. Younger women (<25 years) were restricted in decision making and had less freedom of movement in the community. Women who agreed to wife-beating statements were more likely to face domestic violence than women who disagreed with the wife-beating statements.

The present study extracted data from a survey collected in slum community in Mumbai to identify the prevalence of domestic violence by husband and its influence on women’s empowerment. Three different sets of indicators of women’s status have been considered: decision-making power, freedom of movement, and justified wife beating. Violence by husband has been measured by women who had ever experienced physical, sexual, or emotional violence by husband. It may be concluded that,

Nearly one third of the women had participated in decision making related to their health care and daily purchase. Only 22.8% of the women were allowed to go out to places outside their community. This clearly indicates that women in the slum community were restricted in movements and indirectly controlled by their husband.

Women in the age group less than 25 years did not have freedom of decision making and had less freedom of movement in the slum community.

Non-empowered women were more likely to face husband violence than empowered women in all three women empowerment indicators. This establishes a relation between violence by husband and women’s status in the slum community.

Overall, these findings reveal that determinants of women’s status were different in different settings. Hence, couples living in the slum area should be given proper orientation regarding family life and husband–wife communication. Also, it is necessary to educate the male partner to understand the role of women in the family. Women should be educated to know their rights. Occasional training programs should be imparted to women in the slum community to empower them, which may indirectly reduce domestic violence in the family.

Footnotes

Acknowledgements

The authors acknowledge the extent of help provided by the staff of Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai (MCGM), Mumbai, to conduct this study.

Authors’ Note

The article uses the baseline data collected for the main study titled “Intervention to Enhance Acceptance of Contraceptive Use Among Couples by Reducing Domestic Violence From Husband” funded by Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), New Delhi, India.

Author Contributions

Balaiah Donta has contributed to the conceptualization and interpretation, and the “Discussion and Conclusion” section of the article. He also reviewed the manuscript drafts and added critical comments.

Saritha Nair has contributed to the “Introduction” and reviewed the manuscript drafts and added critical comments.

Shahina Begum has contributed to the analysis and interpretation, and the “Discussion and Conclusion” sections.

C. P. Prakasam has contributed to the conceptualization and analysis, and the “Discussion and Conclusion” sections.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Author Biographies

Balaiah Donta, PhD, is a scientist G and HOD in the Department of Biostatistics at the National Institute for Research in Reproductive Health (ICMR), Mumbai, India. His research focuses on gender-based violence, gender equity, HIV, and family planning with a particular emphasis on male involvement in reproductive health.

Saritha Nair, PhD, is a scientist C in the Department of Biostatistics at the National Institute for Research in Reproductive Health (ICMR), Mumbai, India. Her research focuses on gender equity, HIV, and intimate partner violence with a particular emphasis on use of smokeless tobacco among women.

Shahina Begum, PhD, is a scientist C in the Department of Biostatistics at the National Institute for Research in Reproductive Health (ICMR), Mumbai, India. Her research focuses on violence and contraceptive use.

C. P. Prakasam, PhD, is a consultant in the Department of Biostatistics at the National Institute for Research in Reproductive Health (ICMR), Mumbai, India. He has a vast experience in conducting large survey and handling large data. His main focus is on maternal and child health.

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