India’s shame: The women ‘treated worse than animals’

THE conditions are indescribable and so shocking even prisoners are housed more humanely.

But these women have committed no crime.

The women, many of whom have disabilities, are locked away, abused and kept in conditions so appalling that even this footage doesn’t begin to show the depth of horror they experience.

Crowded into tiny room to sleep on the floor, the women are left to just lie and wait in unsanitary conditions.

These women also are at risk of physical and sexual violence, and involuntary treatment, including electroshock therapy according to Human Rights Watch.

It sounds like the stuff of nightmares, but this is the reality of life for women who are sent to institutions across India.

A seclusion room in the Home for ‘Mentally Retarded’ Women, a government institution for people with intellectual disabilities in Bengaluru. Picture: Shantha Rau Barriga/Human Rights Watch. Source: Supplied

In a new report, Treated Worse than Animals’: Abuses against Women and Girls with Psychosocial or Intellectual Disabilities in Institutions in India, Human Rights Watch catalogued a wide range of abuses.

It found women who were forcibly admitted to government institutions and mental hospitals suffered extreme abuses.

The levels of abuse were so shocking it has called on the Indian Government to take action to shift from forced institutional care to voluntary community-based services and support for people with disabilities.

Human Rights Watch researcher Kriti Sharma said the women were dumped due to a government failure to properly ensure their care.

“Women and girls with disabilities are dumped in institutions by their family members or police in part because the government is failing to provide appropriate support and services,” she said.

“And once they’re locked up, their lives are often rife with isolation, fear, and abuse, with no hope of escape.”

The damning 106-page report provides a shocking insight into how women with disabilities are treated across the country.

The electroshock therapy room in Thane Mental Hospital. On the bed lies the headpiece through which an electric current passes to the patient’s brain in order to provoke a seizure. Picture: Shantha Rau Barriga/Human Rights Watch Source: Supplied

Among the key findings, the report found women faced involuntary admission and arbitrary detention in mental hospitals and residential care institutions while those with psychosocial or intellectual disabilities experienced overcrowding and lack of hygiene.

It also found women had inadequate access to general healthcare, forced treatment — including electroconvulsive therapy — as well as physical, verbal, and sexual violence.

In one case, a woman with both intellectual and psychosocial disabilities was sexually assaulted by a male staff member in a mental hospital in Kolkata, according to HRW.

The report analysed the cases of women and girls with disabilities in six cities across India, with research conducted from December 2012 through November 2014 in New Delhi, Kolkata, Mumbai, Pune, Bengaluru, and Mysore.

The report is based on more than 200 interviews with women and girls with psychosocial or intellectual disabilities, their families, caretakers, mental health professionals, service providers, government officials, and the police.

Human Rights Watch said the report was even more concerning as women already faced increased discrimination across the country.

Residents sleep in a cramped room in the women’s section of Pune Mental Hospital, one of the biggest state-run mental hospitals in Asia with a capacity of over 2500 beds. Picture: Shantha Rau Barriga/Human

It said women and girls with psychosocial or intellectual disabilities in particular faced multiple layers of discrimination are among the most marginalised and vulnerable to abuse and violence.

“Without appropriate community support and a lack of awareness, people with psychosocial disabilities are ridiculed, feared, and stigmatised in India,” Ms Sharma said.

They were also often shunned by families unable to take care of them with many end up forcibly institutionalised.

“The process for institutionalising women and men in India is the same,” HRW said.

“But women and girls with disabilities face unique challenges — including sexual violence and denial of access to reproductive health — that men do not.”

A toilet in Pune Mental Hospital. With only 25 working toilets for 1850 patients, open defecation is the norm. Picture: Shantha Rau Barriga/Human Rights Watch 

Families, legal guardians, and child welfare committees can admit women and girls with psychosocial or intellectual disabilities to institutions without their consent.

If they are found wandering in the streets, they could also be picked up by the police and admitted to these institutions through court orders.

To make matters worse, if no family comes to take them home, they can be left for decades.

Overcrowding and inadequate sanitation was among the norm.

HRW found close to 900 people live in Asha Kiran, a government institution in Delhi, which was nearly three times the hospital’s capacity.

In Pune Mental Hospital, the superintendent, Dr Vilas Bhailume told Human Rights Watch: “We only have 100 toilets for more than 1,850 patients — out of which only 25 are functional; the others keep getting blocked. Open defecation is the norm.”

HRW also documented cases of 20 women and 11 girls who are currently or were recently given electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) without their consent in four different mental hospitals.

One 45-year-old woman, known was Vidya was institutionalised by her husband and underwent ECT for months.

Her story is shocking as it is revealing.

“ECT was like a death tunnel,” she told HRW. “I would get a headache for days ... When my medication was reduced, I started asking questions. Until then I was like a vegetable. It was only many months later that I found out that I was being given ECT.”

HRW said India had a right to honour its obligations under the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) which it ratified in 2007 which states governments must respect and protect the right to legal capacity of people with disabilities and their right to live in the community on an equal basis as others.

The organisation said the Indian government should immediately order inspections and regular monitoring of all residential facilities — private and government-run — for women and girls with psychosocial or intellectual disabilities.

Women sleep on the floor in the women’s ward of Thane Mental Hospital, a 1857-bed facility in the suburbs of Mumbai. The close sleeping arrangements contribute to many women in the facility having lice. Picture: Shantha Rau Barriga/Human Rights Watch.