• Despite the adoption of the Women’s Charter, the amendment to the Penal Code (1995) and the Prevention of Domestic Violence Act (2005), about 60 per cent women in Sri Lanka continue to experience violence, according to Gender Based Violence Forum
• Recent police statistics show between 8,000 and 10,000 cases of violence against women per month
• A survey at the outpatient department of the North Colombo Teaching Hospital in Ragama, a semi-urban area in the suburbs of Colombo, found that 40.7 per cent of women had been abused by their partners.
• Most women reacted in a submissive manner: 79 per cent of those abused have stayed in their marriages for more than 10 years (2005), see http://bjp.rcpsych.org/cgi/content/full/187/6/587-a
• According to the same survey, children of 31 per cent of the victims had witnessed the abuse. It has been demonstrated by many studies that emotional abuse in childhood has a major impact on adult mental health
• Fifty six per cent of women who had suffered abuse were in poor mental health

LAUNCH