Opinion Express View on BJP MP’s comments on live-in relationships: Her choice
Demand for law to regulate such relationships reflects patriarchal anxieties over women claiming agency, failure to understand their aspirations
Last year, for instance, in the aftermath of a gruesome murder of a young woman by her live-in partner, Union Minister of State, Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs, Kaushal Kishore, had suggested that educated women are complicit in violence against them when they opt for non-traditional relationships over marriages. 
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BJP MP from Haryana Dharambir Singh’s assertion that live-in relationships are a dangerous disease that requires eradication is of a piece with similar claims voiced by elective representatives across party lines from time to time. While Singh has urged for a law to protect Indian culture from the so-called evils of the West — in this case the freedom to choose who to love and how to consummate it — he was only echoing what many before him have said.
Last year, for instance, in the aftermath of a gruesome murder of a young woman by her live-in partner, Union Minister of State, Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs, Kaushal Kishore, had suggested that educated women are complicit in violence against them when they opt for non-traditional relationships over marriages.
This tendency to police choices — be it with regard to partner or education, career or attire — reflects a pervasive and growing patriarchal anxiety over women claiming agency over their own lives. It is not incidental that it comes at a time when women have emerged as an irreversible force in India’s public life, heading institutions such as the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research, helming projects such as Chandrayaan-2.
From the historic Nari Shakti Vandan Adhiniyam ensuring greater representation of women in legislatures to the permanent commission of women in the armed forces, from initiatives such as Beti Bachao Beti Padhao, and the Ujjwala scheme to the institution of Mahila Shakti Kendras in rural areas, the Centre, too, has repeatedly spoken of its commitment to women-led development. At such a time, the insistence on tradition as an arbiter of choice speaks of a failure to understand the aspirations of a large section of the nation’s population, or comes as a backlash to its irrefutable expression.
Recently released data by the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) show an increase of 4 per cent in crimes against women in 2022 over the previous year. Of these, the largest number was perpetrated by intimate partners, family members or relatives. Just as India’s low divorce rate is not any indication of the success of marriages, parental consent in the choice of a partner seems to offer little guarantee of a successful conjugal life. What will make a difference, though, is an unshackling of the mind from outdated ideas of sexism that cannot accommodate the idea of tradition moving, and changing, with the times.
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