"Among the more serious of problems that confront India today is the rapidly increasing incidence of crime against women. From 9.518 rape cases reported in 1990 for example, the figure in 1994 reached 12,351. torture of women increased from 13,450 cases in 1990 to 25,946 cases in 1994. The figure for total reported crime against women has increased from 68,317 in 1990 to 98,948 in 1994. With illiteracy, pronounced patriarchy, lack of awareness and near complete financial subordination among a vast majority of women, these cases of reported crime are only a fraction of the actual crime committed. The magnitude of the problem can be gauged from the fact that almost a third of reported rape cases were of girls aged less than 16 years. The organised sector employed only 15.36 percent women in 1995. In 1996, of the 2947 Indian police service personnel, there were only 64 women. The 1991 census shows that while the all India literacy level for males was 64.13 per cent, for women it was just 39,29 per cent. Such circumstances provide the ‘ideal’ climate for gross violation of human rights. The scene that emerges is even more disheartening when we see that social norms have derived from tenets mainly of Hinduism and Islam, the two major religions in India, mediums and rules to subordinate women. This volume is a selection of papers contributed on these themes to the National seminars organised by the Women’s Studies Research Centre, Kurukshetra University, Kurukshetra in 1994 and 1995."
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