Legal Safeguards for Victimized Women in Bangladesh:

An Empirical Study

Abstract

In Bangladesh, the ratio of the number of women is much higher than the number of men. The Government has enacted various laws which are especially for women and the penalties which have been incorporated under the laws are also severe. But the rate of victimization is increasing day by day due to lack of proper application of laws and adequate monitoring of the concerned authorities. It is a matter of great concern that most of the occurrences of victimization of women begin at home by their family members or intimate partners and extends to the society afterwards. Women are victimized by different crimes especially sexual abuse, physical assault, mental harassment, persecution, violation of conjugal rights and violation of personal rights i.e. non-payment of dowry, maintenance etc. These are here considered as social crime because of anti-social nature and place of occurrence. The offences are also punishable under different social legislations. As the offences are criminal in nature, and sometimes these are considered also as civil wrongs, both the penalty and compensation could be inflicted by ensuring legal safeguard. In this study, various cases have been analyzed as enlisted in Victim Support Center (VSC) guided by Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP). Each of the cases was analyzed in social crime perspective for identifying the causes of victimization with proper recommendations. Finally, it has been observed that there are a lot of laws for protecting the rights of the victimized women, but the outcome level is not satisfactory. This paper identifies and analyses the causes for the victimization with a way of solution in reducing the rate of victimization by ensuring legal safeguards in the context of social crime in Bangladesh. It reveals that the number of victimized women from rural area is greater than urban region. It explores that the primary reasons of victimization are dowry, illiteracy, lack of economic independence and income, child marriage and lack of security for women. It also maintains that the consequences of victimization are significantly higher than the other crimes as it causes physical disability, psychological disorder, financial insolvency, emotional disorder and social condemnation that make a negative impact on rest of the life of the victims and their family members simultaneously.