When we picture a victim of domestic violence in India, the image that often surfaces is that of a woman, reflecting the well-documented reality that women disproportionately experience such violence. Sadly, it’s thus an accurate picture. However, this should not obscure the fact that men, too, can be victims of domestic abuse, with often little recognition, language, or access to support. As the world marks 15 May – a day meant to reflect on the family as a space of care, dignity, and support – it is worth confronting the uncomfortable reality that also for many men, home is where violence remains most hidden.
This is not to diminish the very real and widespread violence faced by women. Rather, it is to recognize that while the law appropriately gives greater weight to women in proportion to the scale and severity of violence they face, suffering itself is not confined strictly along gender lines. Men can experience domestic abuse as well.
Consider the case of a 34-year-old professional from Delhi who spent three years in what he describes as an emotionally and psychologically abusive marriage. He recounts repeated threats, humiliation, and manipulation, including warnings that any attempt to seek legal help would be met with counter-allegations. Despite experiencing abuse, he did not pursue legal recourse, in part because the existing legal framework does not explicitly recognize domestic violence against men in the same way. For instance, Section 498A of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) is designed specifically to protect women from cruelty within marriage, leaving a gap in protection for male victims.
The experience of this Delhi professional is not necessarily anomalous; rather, it remains largely undocumented and under-recognized. With this article, we hope to draw more attention to the issue.
Data on male survivors/victims of domestic violence in India remains limited, and broad claims should thus be treated with caution. A 2019 survey conducted in rural Haryana surveyed 1,000 married men aged 21-49 and found that 51.5% reported experiencing some form of intimate partner violence at least once in their lifetime, while 10.5% reported such experiences in the past 12 months. The most commonly reported category was emotional abuse, while physical violence was reported by 6% of respondents.
These figures, however, require careful interpretation. Emotional abuse can encompass a wide spectrum of experiences – from verbal humiliation and controlling behaviour to more severe forms of psychological coercion—and is therefore not directly comparable to physical violence. The study also reflects one specific rural sample rather than the male population at large, and should certainly not be read as evidence that half of all Indian men experience domestic abuse. Still, it points to an issue that remains largely absent from public discourse.
Other studies also suggest that male victimhood in intimate relationships is not negligible, though prevalence estimates vary widely depending on definitions and methods. A 2020 systematic review on domestic violence against men found that studies reported prevalence rates of 3.4% to 20.3% for domestic physical violence against men. One caveat perhaps: most of the affected men had been violent toward their partners themselves. The review also noted that factors such as childhood maltreatment, alcohol abuse, jealousy, mental illness, physical impairment, and shorter relationship duration were associated with a higher risk of victimisation.
At the same time, studies focusing on psychological abuse often report significantly higher numbers. A recent systematic review and meta-analysis covering 14 studies and 36,245 men found the pooled prevalence of psychological intimate partner violence against men to be 44% across all recall periods, while physical intimate partner violence was estimated at 20% and sexual violence at 7%. Again with the same caveats on the spectrum of emotional abuse as mentioned above.
Regardless of the exact percentages, the broader reality is difficult to ignore: male survivors/victims of domestic abuse exist, and many remain invisible. Again, the issue is not whether men experience abuse at the same scale or severity as women – evidence consistently shows women remain disproportionately affected by serious and repeated domestic violence – but whether male victimhood is acknowledged at all.
India’s legal framework compounds this invisibility. As already mentioned above, Section 498A of the Indian Penal Code, designed to protect women from cruelty by husbands and their families, does not extend any equivalent protection to men. A male victim of spousal abuse has no dedicated legal provision to turn to. When men do approach law enforcement, the response is often dismissal – or worse, the fear of a counter-complaint.
There’s also a cultural dimension to the story. Indian masculinity, as culturally constructed, often values stoicism and emotional restraint, but the silence of male survivors is equally shaped by concerns around and fear of social judgment. Admitting victimhood, particularly at the hands of a woman, carries a stigma so acute that many men choose not to disclose their experiences. Many remain silent, relying on informal coping mechanisms rather than seeking institutional support, further deepening the cycle of invisibility.
Dire consequences
The consequences of this silence accumulate. Unaddressed abuse correlates with chronic anxiety, depression, substance misuse, and increased suicide risk. Without shelters, dedicated helplines, or mental health programs that acknowledge male survivors, men navigate their trauma largely alone, and are invisible to the systems that might help them.
India’s suicide data reveals a stark gender disparity: approximately 70% of recorded suicides in the country are men, according to the National Crime Records Bureau. While suicide is undeniably multi-causal—linked to economic distress, unemployment, mental illness, and social pressures—marital conflict, domestic violence, and social isolation are documented contributors. When men face sustained emotional or physical abuse within domestic settings but lack both legal recognition and social permission to seek help, the burden intensifies. The pathway from prolonged abuse to hopelessness is gradual but well-established in clinical literature, and in the absence of accessible support systems, that trajectory can culminate in self-harm.
Many who do eventually leave abusive relationships find the exit routes riddled with additional pressures: the financial toll of prolonged litigation, vulnerability to false legal counter-complaints, and a judicial ecosystem that, even with the best intentions, was not designed with male victims in mind.
Some important caveats
Before outlining what needs to change, it is worth confronting a criticism this conversation routinely attracts. Discussions around male victimhood are sometimes weaponized. In certain public and digital spaces, “men are victims too” is invoked in bad faith to dilute or undermine protections for women. That concern is real. However, acknowledging male survivors does not require weakening legal safeguards for women. These are not competing claims but parallel realities. In other words, expanding protection to include male victims strengthens the credibility and fairness of the system rather than diminishing it.
In addition, as pointed out above, many of the men identified as victims of domestic violence in the 2020 systematic review had also been violent toward their partners themselves. This suggests that a significant proportion of these cases may reflect mutually destructive relationships with bidirectional violence, rather than one-sided abuse. It raises the question of how many men are primarily being abused by their wives, versus how many are in relationships where both partners use violence against each other (with given the power dynamics involved, men often with “stronger cards”?). Throughout this article, however, our focus has been on men for whom domestic violence significantly affects their safety, wellbeing, and autonomy—ànd where the abuse they experience outweighs or dominates the violence within the relationship.
Finally, another deeply under-acknowledged dimension is LGBTQ+ intimate partner violence. Survivors of intimate partner violence in same-sex or gender-diverse relationships face compounded invisibility—legal ambiguity, social stigma, and limited institutional sensitivity. In India, where same-sex relationships have only recently been decriminalized, structured support systems for LGBTQ+ survivors of intimate partner violence remain underdeveloped. Any meaningful reform must be inclusive of these realities.
Moving forward on several fronts
Addressing domestic violence against men requires movement on several fronts simultaneously.
The legal framework should move toward greater gender neutrality, ensuring that protection from intimate partner abuse is not contingent solely on the sex of the victim. At the same time, the current structure of the law reflects the empirical reality that women face a disproportionate burden of such violence, which justifies stronger, targeted protections. Any reform must therefore be carefully calibrated. There are legitimate concerns that expanding provisions without adequate checks could enable misuse or retaliatory complaints, including the risk of harassment through false allegations. Legislators, therefore, must balance two objectives: closing the gap in protection for male victims while embedding safeguards—such as rigorous evidentiary standards, penalties for proven false complaints, and impartial, gender-sensitive investigative procedures—to ensure that the law is not itself misused or turned into an instrument of coercion.
Support infrastructure must be built. Dedicated helplines, crisis counselling, and safe spaces for male survivors are nearly non-existent in India. NGOs and state governments could begin filling this gap relatively quickly if the political will existed.
In the interim, existing mental health helplines such as iCall and the Vandrevala Foundation are accessible to men, even though they are not male-specific services. Greater awareness of these platforms could provide immediate, practical avenues of support for those hesitant to approach formal legal channels.
Law enforcement and healthcare professionals also need sensitisation training. Many male victims who do come forward encounter responses ranging from indifference to ridicule. First responders who understand the dynamics of intimate partner violence, regardless of the genders involved, are essential to breaking the cycle of underreporting.
At the individual level, the role of friends, family, and colleagues is underestimated. Recognising that a man may be experiencing abuse, taking his disclosures seriously, resisting the impulse to minimise or joke, can be the first crack in the wall of isolation. Cultural change rarely begins with legislation; it begins with how we respond to the people we know.
And perhaps most fundamentally, the cultural conversation needs to expand. Domestic violence against men is not a joke, not a contradiction in terms, and not a threat to feminist progress. It is a public health issue that our collective silence is actively worsening.
Again, none of this erases the structural realities that make women disproportionately vulnerable to domestic violence globally. Those realities are real and demand continued attention. But a society serious about ending gender-based violence cannot afford to maintain blind spots, not when the cost of those blind spots is measured in human suffering.
The question is not who suffers more. The question is whether we are willing to see everyone who suffers.