The “Criminalization of Marital Rape” is one of the most trending national issues in the country for last few months. Now, the report of the National Family Health Survey-5 (2019-21) has revealed that 82 per cent of women in India can refuse to engage in sex with their husbands.
The National Family Health Survey-5 which was conducted between (2019-21), revealed that 80% women and 66% men believe that it is okay for the wife to refuse sex. The reasons for refusing sex might include the partner having a sexually transmissible disease, him having another partner, or simply because she doesn’t want to or is tired.
Though around 8% of women and 10% of men still believe that a wife cannot refuse sex.
The questions were asked in the section on women empowerment in the NFHS survey, titled ‘attitudes towards negotiating safer sexual relations with husband’, about the crucial factor of consent in a relationship for enabling gender equality.
The participants in the survey belonged to the age category of 15-49 years. The per cent of adults who agree that women have a right to refuse sex to their husbands for all three specified reasons has increased by 12 per cent for women and only 3 per cent for men from the NFHS-4 (2015-16).
During the survey, men were asked some additional questions to assess gender attitudes. These pertained to a situation when a woman refuses to have sex with her husband when he wants her to. Men were asked whether they believe they have the right to four kinds of behaviour: Get angry and reprimand her, refuse to give her money or other means of financial support, use force and have sex with her even if she doesn’t want to, and go and have sex with another woman.
The Survey states “Only 6 per cent of men age 15-49 agree that men have the right to display all four of these behaviours if a wife refuses him sex, and 72 per cent do not agree with any of the four behaviours. However, 19 per cent of men do agree that a husband has the right to get angry and reprimand a woman if she refuses to have sex with her husband.”
Sadly, 45% of women and 44% of men believe that a husband is justified in beating his wife in at least one of seven specified circumstances — if she goes out without telling him; neglects the house or the children; argues with him; refuses to have sex with him; doesn’t cook food properly; suspects her of being unfaithful; or shows disrespect to her in-laws. While women justifying wife beating declined by seven percentage points from 52%, in case of men it is up by two percentage points from 42%.
While a significantly high 19% of men agree that a husband has the right to get angry and reprimand a woman if she refuses to have sex with her husband when he wants her to, the survey also shows that more than four in five women (82%) can say no to their husband if they do not want to have sexual intercourse.
