In patriarchal India, a high proportion of acid attacks are carried out by men against women who have rejected a marriage proposal or sexual advances
NEW DELHI (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – A new helpline for women in distress received 56 reports of acid attacks in New Delhi in three months, the Times of India said on Wednesday.
"Acid attacks on girls are not uncommon,” said Khadijah Faruqui, an activist-lawyer who is monitoring the helpline’s operations. “In most of these cases the girl had shown no interest or refused to develop a relationship with a man interested in her," she added.
"The men have used acid to threaten the girls and (in many cases) thrown it on them," she added. “As many as 56 cases (were) reported to the helpline” between February and April, she said.
Acid violence - where acid is intentionally thrown to maim, disfigure or blind - occurs in many countries but is most common in Cambodia, followed by Bangladesh, Pakistan, Afghanistan and India, all countries where society remains deeply patriarchal.
Around 1,500 acid attacks are reported globally each year, 80 percent of them on women, the London-based charity Acid Survivors Trust International says, though it adds that most victims are scared to speak out and the real figure is much higher.
There are no official statistics on acid attacks in India, but a study conducted by Cornell University in January 2011 said that 153 such attacks had been reported in the media from 1999 to 2010.
Many of these attacks were acts of revenge because a woman spurned sexual advances or rejected a marriage proposal, the study said.
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