Domestic Violence: A Community based cross sectional study among rural married females in North West India

ABSTRACT

Violence against women a social evil in the society despite a lot of talk of women empowerment. Assessmentof burden in terms of prevalence will go a long way in planning the services for those affected bydomestic violence. To find the prevalence of domestic violence and associated risk factors among marriedfemales in a rural area of Jammu. This community based cross-sectional study was conducted amongrural married females using a structured and pretested questionnaire. Data was analysed using simpleproportions, chi-square test and logistic regression. 171/301(56.6%) of the respondents reported someform of the domestic violence. Psychological, physical and sexual violence rates were found to be32.16%, 9.9% and 2.33% respectively. A statistically significant association was found with variables likeliteracy, type of family, family income, sex of children etc. Relatively high levels of domestic violence inthis rural setting calls for a multidisciplinary approach involving improvement of literacy levels amongfemales, creating awareness about legal aid and screening the victims at primary health centres to mitigatethis problem.