ERADICATING GENDER-BASED VIOLENCE IN VIJAYAWADA CITY: MAHILA MITRA
INTRODUCTION Women in India continue to witness a growth in violence against them, both domestically and in the streets (Verma et al., 2017). In 2014 alone, there were 337,922 reported cases of violence against women, and many more unreported, a 28,000 case rise compared to 2013 (ibid.). Genderbased violence (GBV) is considered a global health problem; women who have encountered physical or sexual abuse are 16% more likely to bear underweight babies, twice as likely to suffer an abortion and to have depression (WHO, 2013). Yet, the issue is not a lack of information on these survivors of violence, but rather the perdurance of silence towards the ‘patriarchal conservative society’ that allows this abuse (ibid.). In spite of women’s rights in India being protected under the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the Indian Constitution, the Dowry Prohibition Act (1961), the Equal Remuneration Act (1976), and Medical termination of Pregnancy Act (1971), among others, women still face in