Over 20% of Indian women face spousal violence despite having jobs, access to internet: Survey

The survey also shows nationwide 64% of women have their own cell phones and over 30% of them was employed and received salary in the last 12 months.

New Delhi: More than a fifth of Indian women experience violence from their spouses despite the feminine gender’s upwardly mobile social progress as seen from their substantially increased use of the internet and cell phones as well as having a bank account and job, according to the sixth edition of the National Family Health Survey released on Friday.

The latest edition of India’s largest public health survey also reveals that 20 per cent women are married before they turn 18 and nearly a third of these married women between 18-49 years don’t have access to family planning. The NFHS-6 results are based on surveys carried out in 6.79 lakh households between 2023-24.

Sexual violence against married women by their spouses is still widely prevalent with 22.3 per cent of them experiencing it across the country, though there is dip compared to the previous survey as NFHS-5 (2019-21) pegged the percentage of such women at 29.2 per cent.

Karnataka has emerged as a success story as the percentage of women experiencing sexual violence dropped to 14.1 per cent in NFHS-6 as against 44.4 per cent recorded in the previous survey. The practice is three times more common in rural Karnataka compared to the cities.

Neighbouring Kerala too springs a surprise. In the literate and empowered Kerala where 87 per cent of girls have schooling up to 10th standard or more, the prevalence of sexual violence against married women by the spouse has almost doubled to 17.7 per cent in NFHS-6 as against 9.8 per cent in the previous survey. The occurrence is more in villages.

Among other three southern states, women face such abuse the most in Telangana (30.8 per cent) followed by Tamil Nadu (28.5) and Andhra Pradesh (22.7). The prevalence, however, has come down in all the three states when the figures are compared to NFHS-5.

On the positive side, internet use by women across the country has doubled from more than 33 per cent in 2019-21 to over 64 per cent in 2023-24.

In Kerala, 87.3 per cent of women actively use internet followed by Telangana (64.8), Andhra Pradesh (63.6), Tamil Nadu (59.5) and Karnataka (57.9). Five years back, the corresponding numbers were significantly low for all the southern states barring Kerala.

The survey also shows nationwide 64 per cent of women have their own cell phones and over 30 per cent of them was employed and received salary in the last 12 months.

Women having a bank or savings account that they themselves use increased from 78.6 per cent to 89.0 per cent, and women having a mobile phone that they themselves use rose from 53.9 per cent to 63.6 per cent.

Nevertheless, 20 per cent women between 20-24 years still get married before they turn 18. This figures are better in southern India – Andhra Pradesh is the worst with 25 per cent - as against northern states like West Bengal (36.4), Bihar (34.6) and Jharkhand (28.1).