Father's Day

Deserted fathers speak for kids’ rights
Spend time with those at Mother Teresa Home

 Chandigarh, June 19
Child Rights Initiative for Share Parenting (CRISP) in association with the Save Indian Family Foundation (SIFF), whose members happens to be deserted fathers and elderly citizens got together and shared their love and affection with the mentally challenged children at Mother Teresa Home, Sector 23, on the occasion of Father’s Day, here, today.

Though, the members offered to adopt children, but the authorities refused to oblize them. However, they were allowed to spend some time with the children. The members of the organisation are now in favour single parenting. Here in our country the system and society at large is still based on a patriarchal mindset which considers fathers incapable of nurturing children which is incorrect. Men are as capable as women to be caregivers and bring up children in a normal way. Even if the woman (mother) assumes that the man is not a good husband, it is out of place to say he is not also a good father for the children until there is strong evidence against him, said Arun Kumar, a deserted father, who till now have not seen his son, who is one-and-a-half-year old.

There is no law requiring a normal father to keep away from his child, during divorce proceedings. The child has the unquestionable right to acquire love and care from both father and the mother, said Vikas Kapur, coordinator of the organisation.

It is an NGO and was formed in 2008 at Bangalore. It speaks up for the rights of the children to remain connected with and enjoy the love of both natural parents being divorced or separated. At first, it takes almost a year or two to get the rights to visit, which is again just a formality. The father is given an hour or two to spend with his child, which ultimately is of no use, said Tejinder Singh, a member from Rajpura, who came to seek some love at Mother Teresa Home.

Ramandeep of Chandigarh narrates the same story. I have been granted permission to meet my daughter every third Sunday of month and I have not been allowed to her to my home for the past several years, he said.

Kids from broken families are: 14 times more likely to commit rape 5 times more likely to commit suicide 20 times more likely to end up in prison 10 times more likely to take drugs 32 times more likely to run away from home 20 times more likely to have behavioral disorders 9 times more likely to drop out of school 9 times more likely to end up in a state operated institution

Divorced fathers crave for shared parenting

Mon, 21 June 2010

This Father’s Day, divorced men are seeking their due. An NGO with more than 2,500 members across the country has taken up their cause, saying shared parenting and joint custody of children should be implemented as a rule in divorce or separation cases. Bangalore-based Children’s Rights Initiative for Shared Parenting (Crisp) points out that children have a right to remain connected to both parents after a divorce.
“On Father’s Day, we demand the basic rights of children to access both biological parents. For this, there is a need for implementing shared parenting and joint custody as a rule in separation and divorce cases,” Crisp founder President Kumar V Jahgirdar, who was visiting Shimla, said.
“Our laws are wife-centric — from the custody of children for divorced couples to allegations of domestic violence to dowry harassment. We are demanding the setting up of special guardian courts in major cities,” he said.
Crisp with its regional chapters in Chandigarh, Chennai, Hyderabad, Mumbai, Delhi and Lucknow has been fighting to constitute a separate ministry for the welfare of children who face problems after the divorce of their parents.
“Since 40 per cent of the country’s population is children, our demand to bifurcate the union women and child development ministry is genuine,” said Jahgirdar, who is fighting for shared parenting of his daughter with his ex-wife. Shiva Kumar, a divorced software engineer, said: “Despite a court’s order, my wife is not allowing me to meet my 11-year-old son. For more than five years, I have not seen him.”
He blamed the centuries-old laws that are exploited by married women and their families. “We want laws that stop the creation of a fatherless society,” he said.
S P Sidhu, a leading lawyer based in Chandigarh, said: “As per law, a child below the age of five always remains in the custody of the mother and the father doesn’t have the right to bring him or her up.
“Even if the child is more than five years old, the court generally favours the mother for custody. However, only in exceptional cases the court gives custody to a father, that too after he convinces the court that the mother is not taking care of the child well,” he said. “We have even come across cases where the mother discourages the child to meet the father even after he has won the right to meet the child,” Sidhu added.
Nitin Gupta, Secretary of the Chandigarh Crisp chapter, said parental alienation often occurs when one parent gets children estranged from the other parent for personal vendetta.
“We have seen that the child is brainwashed by the dominant parent against the non-custodial parent, usually the father. This brings a lot of mental distress and trauma not only to the child and but also to the alienated parent,” Gupta said.
Jahgirdar said the Indian legal system and society at large is still based on a patriarchal mindset which considers fathers incapable of nurturing children. “This is totally incorrect. Men are as capable as women to be caregivers and bring up children in a normal way,” he said.
“We are trying to impress upon the government to allow shared parenting like allowing the children to stay with their father on vacations or weekends,” he said.
According to the data available with Crisp, over 15,000 divorce cases are pending in Bangalore alone. The figure was collected from family courts.

Divorced fathers crave for shared parenting (June 20 is Father's Day)

http://in.news.yahoo.com/43/20100620/836/tbs-divorced-fathers-crave-for-shared-pa_1.html

Sun, Jun 20 12:04 PM

Shimla, June 20 (IANS) This Father’s Day, divorced men are seeking their due. An NGO with more than 2,500 members across the country has taken up their cause, saying shared parenting and joint custody of children should be implemented as a rule in divorce or separation cases.

Bangalore-based Children’s Rights Initiative for Shared Parenting (CRISP) points out that children have a right to remain connected to both parents after a divorce.

‘On Father’s Day, we demand the basic rights of children to access both biological parents. For this, there is a need for implementing shared parenting and joint custody as a rule in separation and divorce cases,’ CRISP founder president Kumar V. Jahgirdar, who was visiting Shimla, told IANS.

‘Our laws are wife-centric – from the custody of children for divorced couples to allegations of domestic violence to dowry harassment. We are demanding the setting up of special guardian courts in major cities,’ he said.

CRISP with its regional chapters in Chandigarh, Chennai, Hyderabad, Mumbai, Delhi and Lucknow has been fighting to constitute a separate ministry for the welfare of children who face problems after the divorce of their parents.

‘Since 40 percent of the country’s population is children, our demand to bifurcate the union women and child development ministry is genuine,’ said Jahgirdar, who is fighting for shared parenting of his daughter with his ex-wife.

Shiva Kumar, a divorced software engineer, said: ‘Despite a court’s order, my wife is not allowing me to meet my 11-year-old son. For more than five years, I have not seen him.’

He blamed the centuries-old laws that are exploited by married women and their families. ‘We want laws that stop the creation of a fatherless society,’ he said.

S.P. Sidhu, a leading lawyer based in Chandigarh, said: ‘As per law, a child below the age of five always remains in the custody of the mother and the father doesn’t have the right bring him or her up.

‘Even if the child is more than five years old, the court generally favours the mother for custody. However, only in exceptional cases the court gives custody to a father, that too after he convinces the court that the mother is not taking care of the child well,’ he said.

‘We have even come across cases where the mother discourages the child to meet the father even after he has won the right to meet the child,’ Sidhu added.

Nitin Gupta, secretary of the Chandigarh CRISP chapter, said parental alienation often occurs when one parent gets children estranged from the other parent for personal vendetta.

‘We have seen that the child is brainwashed by the dominant parent against the non-custodial parent, usually the father. This brings a lot of mental distress and trauma not only to the child and but also to the alienated parent,’ Gupta said.

Jahgirdar said the Indian legal system and society at large is still based on a patriarchal mindset which considers fathers incapable of nurturing children.

‘This is totally incorrect. Men are as capable as women to be caregivers and bring up children in a normal way,’ he said.

‘We are trying to impress upon the government to allow shared parenting like allowing the children to stay with their father on vacations or weekends,’ he said.

According to the data available with CRISP, over 15,000 divorce cases are pending in Bangalore alone. The figure was collected from family courts.

Her wild side

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/life/relationships/man-woman/Her-wild-side/articleshow/5851818.cms

Her wild side

Boys don’t cry, especially when they grow up into men who are hit by their women. As stories of battered men come out of the closet, it’s clear that more and more women are losing control and giving in to their wild side.

Tales of rudeness, shouting and violent outbursts are more in the news. Recently, two Iranian women in Bangalore beat up a traffic cop; almost a week later, a drunk woman in Bangalore hit an auto-rickshaw driver.

Take this: Men are getting punched, boxed, kicked with pointed stilettos, and even having hot coffee thrown on their faces. As women initiate assault in an intimate relationship, men become the silent victims. Says Swaroop Sarkar, co-founder of the Battered Men helpline in Delhi, “I was a victim and on the brink of committing suicide. There were days that I wouldn’t get out of bed. I almost lost my job.” But Sarkar didn’t give up. He started a helpline in Delhi, “We get 20 troubled men who come to us for help every week in Delhi itself. They just need our gentleness,” adds Sarkar, who is a textile engineer.

The stories are stark but real. There’s Ravi in Bangalore, all of 31, who studied at IIT, Delhi, and he narrates how he was traumatised by his wife after she discovered he had one kidney. “She threw me out of my own house. Men in our country don’t cry and certainly never get beaten,” says the engineer, who works for an MNC in Bangalore.

These are educated, well-settled and independent men. Says Kiran Bedi, former police commissioner, “These cases are not any different from what causes violence in men against women. For an aggressive woman, it’s determined by the environment she grows up in. She is an equal now. In the beginning, it may be a gradual slip. Or one she feels powerless to resist.”

Every Sunday in Bangalore, Mithun Kumar, another man “abused” by his wife physically and verbally, counsels battered men. “We get five to six men every week coming to us for help. Men are petrified someone will ask, ‘Did you provoke your wife by doing something wrong?’” says Kumar, an IT professional.

Adds Sarkar, “Men don’t hit back because they’re scared. Most are afraid the woman will call the police and the law will side with her.”
Is it the Bobbitisation of Indian society? We all remember the story of Lorena Bobbitt, who became known as the woman who cut off her husband’s penis with a carving knife. Says Uma Challa, president of All India Men’s Welfare Association in Hyderabad, “In our research, married men commit more suicides in India. We found that 65.35 per cent men end their lives, while only 34.65 per cent married women commit suicide.”

Tejinder Luthra, additional commissioner of police says, “We get allegations where the woman is the aggressor. The men are ashamed to talk about it.”

But what makes women the perpetrators of domestic violence? Today’s woman is fighting on so many fronts — at office, she has to be a know-it-all and as good as the guys if not better and fight twice as hard to prove it; while socialising, she has to be modern and with it and then with in-laws and family she has to meet the role of traditional bahu and homemaker. So, the pressure cooker is bound to burst… and it does!

Some nagging wives have problems in other relationships as well. Adds Kumar, “The children of these women don’t want to be with them as they live in dread of physical assault. But some women are only on a short fuse with their husbands.”

It’s a challenge to preconceived ideas of gender roles where it was virtually impossible for a woman to physically abuse a man. Says Suman Nalwa, ACP, Special Police Unit for Women: “The men who report abuse are few. When we get men who are booked under the Dowry Act, they plead that they’re being harassed by their wives.”

Men are confused. It’s put their identity in a crisis. Says Pinky Anand, lawyer: “As women grow financially, they want to control men. Recently, a wife slapped her husband at a party in a posh hotel in front of his friends.”

The stories told by battered men are no less horrifying than those told by women. According to psychiatrist Dr Avdesh Sharma, “The tipping point comes when the women can’t be in control. Alcohol is making women aggressive. Some women remain tomboys.”
It’s time men come out of the closet and get help. Simply say goodbye to shame and guilt!

Balm for men

http://www.tribuneindia.com/2010/20100523/spectrum/main4.htm

Several laws have been passed in the name of women’s empowerment.
 The All India Men’s Welfare Association aims to protect men from domestic
violence and other forms of abuse, reports Nivedita Choudhuri

ASK someone about the problems of women, and a list would emerge that would never seem to end. Ask about men’s problems, and you see only blank faces. Does that mean that men do not have any problem? Or is it that there is no awareness amongst the general public? Or is it just that men are simply taken for granted? If Uma Challa had her way, she would strive to bring in changes.

The All-India Men’s Welfare Association wants laws to be enacted to protect men from harassment

The president of the newly-formed All-India Men’s Welfare Association (AIMWA) says the welfare of men and boys has been seriously neglected in India over the last few decades. While championing the cause of women’s rights and empowerment, the government and society tacitly approve of the propagation of anti-male sentiments, condone the resultant diminution in value of men’s lives and support the blatant violation of men’s rights through discriminatory laws and policies.

Challa says several laws have been passed since Independence in the name of women’s empowerment. However, there are no laws to protect men from any form of abuse or harassment within and outside the home, and a man is always thought of as an aggressor, and a woman as victim. Challa focusses on the “legal terrorism” in India unleashed through laws such as Section 498-A, IPC, and the Protection of Women Against Domestic Violence Act (PWDVA).

Section 498-A, for example, deals with matrimonial cruelty and allows for immediate arrest of a woman’s husband and in-laws on the basis of her complaint. Challa says this law is being grossly misused by women for their selfish ends. AIMWA was launched in October, 2009, which was observed as domestic violence awareness month. Four organisations — Save Indian Family Foundation, All-India Forgotten Women, Rishtey and Children’s Rights Initiative for Shared Parenting — launched a month-long campaign in Hyderabad on October 2, International Day of Non-Violence.

Challa says the campaign aims at educating Indians about how the problem of domestic violence has been misrepresented, and how laws claiming to prevent domestic violence are actually promoting human rights abuses against men, women and children. An association member cites the example of 58-year-old Aneek, who claims to have invested all his money in his wife’s name. He is now on the verge of retirement, and his wife is showing him the door. She has filed a case under the Domestic Violence Act against him, and her lawyer has threatened him with a view to extort money.

Aneek also claims to be a victim of domestic violence himself, and says his wife has slapped and punched him on many occasions. Or, take the case of Gaurav, who has been booked under Section 498-A along with his parents and mentally-challenged sister. His disabled sister and mother, a kidney patient for over two decades, managed to secure bail. However, his father lost his secure government job after he was arrested and spent more than 48 hours in the police lock-up. The family is now in dire financial straits as there is no earning member. Gaurav has started studying law in a bid to understand his rights better.

He is worried about the loan his father had taken out to fund his estranged daughter-in-law’s studies. Gaurav has no idea how he will repay it. The founders of AIMWA say the helplines that were set up for male victims have not stopped ringing since October. More than 40 calls are received each day from distressed husbands. The association also conducts counselling sessions for men who develop suicidal tendencies due to the mental anguish they face. The pain and agony that men go through when subjected to domestic violence is much like what women face when ill-treated, adds another member. However, while people sympathise with women, men find no listeners.

While society is applauding more and more women getting educated, entering the job market and challenging their traditional roles within the family and society, men are still being shackled to their traditional roles of protecting and providing for women, children and the aged. AIMWA
members claim the growing disregard against males in India is forcing more than 50,000 men to end their lives every year.

Challa says domestic and social harmony will prevail only when women and men are ensured their rightful place within and outside the home.

Fathers' day Women abusing system, laws should be gender-neutral'

http://epaper.expressbuzz.com/NE/NE/2010/06/21/ArticleHtmls/21_06_2010_004_056.shtml?Mode=1

AS women clamour for equality, some men are also gearing up to fight for their rights. And what they too want , is equality.
“There are 24 laws that are women-centric in our system,” says Frances Anthony, convenor of the Tamil Nadu Chapter of the All India Men’s Welfare Association (AIMWA).

“Women misuse the law and use their children to threaten the father. The laws are making ours a fatherless society,” he adds.

Just a week ahead of Father’s Day, this group of men proclaimed a national boycott of the Family Courts and submitted a memorandum and a petition to the Principal Judge of the Family Court, with an appeal to make the law genderneutral.
Leading the group on Friday was Kalaiselvan, who has not seen his son for the last 12 years. “I got married in 1997 and filed for divorce in 2002.

Our son was born in 1999.

Though I have been given rights to visit and see my son by the court, I’ve not set eyes on my son since he was born

it’s been 12 years now,” he says. Kalaiselvan alleged that he lost his job as a civil engineer in Kuwait because his wife complained about him to the company . “She misused the judicial system, filed a dowry harassment case against me and I spent 25 days in jail without bail. Even now, she refuses to obey the courts. I have appealed to the court many times saying she must be booked for contempt for not allowing me to see my son, but the courts remain silent. The dowry harassment case is still on and I have no job and no hope of seeing my boy anytime soon,” he grieves. The men in this organisation say they were not against women or trying to deprive the fairer sex of their rights. “Women are not victims in all cases. In the 21st century, women are equal in their families. They have an equal voice.
But they’re misusing these laws and turning their husband into ATMsto withdraw money when they feel like it,” says Frances.

S Hariharan, an employee of a telecom firm, agrees and says, “I have not been given visitation and customary rights of my two children by the courts. It has been three
years since I last saw them.”
The solution, he says, is to play it carefully. “When we gave him the petition, the principal judge of the Family Court, Ramalingam, told us that the society needs to change. He agreed that laws are misused by women in many cases. He suggested that couples should go in for judicial separation until the child turns 18 after which they can file for divorce.
Judicial separation allows visitation rights for the father as well. Fathers too feel the pain when they’re separated from their children,” Hariharan says.

On Father’s Day, in search of a new fatherland

http://www.deccanherald.com/content/76538/on-fathers-day-search-fatherland.html

On every summer visit to my Calcutta house I see in the front garden the mango tree that my daughter would gleefully prance around along with mother, waiting to pluck the ripe fruits…

I even see the first-floor balcony father would stand watching my daughter playing. On Father’s Day, my eyes cried a little, but there’s not much cry left in them anymore, only the desire to feel the richness of the sorrow I once knew. It’s been close to two years I have not seen my daughter who is now 11. It’s been over a year-and-half that father passed away. Father’s Day? I may not have done a good enough job, when my daughter was still there, to deserve that honour which, years back, I would dismiss as western clatter. But the phone call from Calcutta, where she now lives, did come through Sunday, and that was it: a 10-minute conversation in which she asked me if I had had breakfast and I wanted to know how she was doing in school. The last few seconds were taken away by the anguished I-love-yous and the I-miss-yous, but I could sense she wanted to talk more, anything. Speaking on Father’s Day two years back, Barack Obama famously said that “any fool can have a child. That doesn’t make you a father. It’s the courage to raise a child that makes you a father”. True. But I have often times wondered what is it that fathers lack that reflects the doubts and obvious ambivalence so many women — and the Indian judiciary — show about male involvement and parenting. The boorish, bullying, brow-beating judges — specifically the ones seated in Calcutta — thought otherwise when the inevitable petitioned-battle for access to my daughter in the larger custody war was adjudicated by them. In their competitive frenzy to win and turn around difficult cases, the leech-like lawyers had their own spin on the laws and the probable outcomes. Certain concepts like ‘paramount interest’ and “the best interests of the child” have come to dominate judicial pronouncements and decisions without there being a challenge to the dominance of such vague, but worthy sounding, notions and platitudes. The uncaring and partisan orders and judgements that the vain men in black robes deliver, sometimes by imposing their morally reprehensible and legally untenable notions of reconciliation on divorced couples, smack not just of condescension but also hold fathers guilty, as if they have committed some abominable crime just by being fathers. I know of one Calcutta judge who, when petitioned to adjudicate a simple issue of wider and comprehensive access of a father to a child, first sought to reconcile the divorced couple and then arrogantly declared in open court that he did not recognise the foreign court order that had decreed the separation and given the child’s custody to the father. Leave alone parents’ rights, it did not occur to ‘the learned’ judge that there is also something called the rights of the child — that the girl or the boy would like to share exclusive moments of mischief and joy, make demands, piggy-back, or go out for a sandwich or share an apple pie with vanilla ice cream with the father. Implicit in Indian court orders arising out of matrimonial/divorce issues is ‘father knows least’ and that the child of divorced parents can grow up best in the mother’s care. It is my sense — and contention — that judges are not just biased in favour of mothers but, on most occasions, play to the gallery, as though women as a category are a constituency that must be appeased and pampered so they could win their promotional laurels in the judicial hierarchy and society at large. Justice is sacrificed on the altar of gender rights and politics. Friends ask, “So… can’t you see your daughter?” And all I am left saying, looking the other way, is “it’s complicated”, hating to go over and over again the story of a messy divorce and the messier details of a so-called ‘reasoned’ court order delivered by one among a tribe of small men with big egos. Joint custody “At a time when family courts are being flooded with petitions by divorced fathers and mothers clamouring to be part of their children’s lives, the courts must view the matter more humanely. One way to settle bitter custody cases is joint custody. But above all, judges must be sensitive to the rights of the child,” says S Susheela, a Karnataka high court advocate specialising in matrimonial cases, including child custody. According to Susheela, “the judges must feel that fathers have been robbed of the years when their children should have played piggy-back with them. Parental alienation is a potentially dangerous social phenomenon that the courts must recognise and use their wisdom to put an end to”. A Bangalore-based NGO, Children’s Rights Initiative for Shared Parenting (CRISP), has been trying to unite ‘unfortunate fathers’ to promote a culture that would make shared parenting acceptable and easier. Among CRISP’s members are single fathers and others who scoff at those who assert the inherent superiority of mothers. They say — and I agree — that the judiciary wastes a huge amount of energy and money making an end to a marriage more bitter, especially because it has a deplorable understanding of child welfare and outdated and half-baked notions of social concepts in which the father is relegated to a mere ‘visitor’. I am not bitter anymore about the divorce. My ex-wife is but virtually a stranger. Even the memories of the end to an unhappy last seven years of the marriage are receding. Time may have diminished the pain and the hurt, but I would wait for a Father’s Day when one of the nicest things anyone could say to me — by way of a gift — is that I have been a good dad too. I can’t teach my daughter all the frilly things of being a girl but that — and more — can always be done by “getting to the other side”.

Fathers’ Day becoming Fatherless Day

P R E S S    R E L E A S E

ON THE OCCASION OF FATHERS’ DAY – 20 JUNE

Subject: Fathers’ Day becoming Fatherless Day

 

About National Family Harmony Society®: “National Family Harmony Society®” NFHS is a Non Governmental Organization (NGO) promoting the cause of “family harmony” and “gender equality”. It is registered under “The Karnataka Societies Registration Act, 1960” and is based in Bangalore. We have branches in more than 16 states and in abroad too. We have approximately 14500 members all over India. To know more about us please visit http://www.family-harmony.org / http://www.498a.org.in.

Fathers’ Day is celebrated on the third Sunday of June every year, but for many children 20th June will be a Fatherless Day this year.

Every year more and more children are becoming fatherless thanks to the Family Courts which grant sole and total custody of children to mothers, with total disregard to the love and affection that fathers and children have towards each other.

Fathers are denied custody as a rule rather than an exception. If at all visitation is ordered to fathers, it is limited to 30 minutes or 1 hour in a month contrary to the requirement of the UN resolution that no child should be denied access to either parent.

Indian Family Courts appear to have declared a war against fathers and are adopting every possible means to create a “fatherless society” and to reduce men to mere ATM machines and sperm donors.

Cases filed in Family Courts linger on indefinitely while wives enjoy full custody of children, interim maintenance and child support at the expense of husbands.

The attitude of the Family Courts in the matters of ordering child custody/visitation, maintenance and alimony is completely biased against husbands. Even in the few cases where fathers manage to obtain visitation rights, no action is taken against mothers who disobey the orders. On the other hand, fathers who try to visit their children are accused of trying to kidnap their own children.

While there is much emphasis on a wife’s rights on husbands and children, no order is passed on the responsibilities of a wife towards herself and her matrimonial family. Husbands, on the other hand, are heaped with disproportionate responsibilities with no rights over their wives or children.

The brazenly anti-male mindset of Indian Family Courts is making it a crime to be born male in India. The continued onslaught on men and manhood is gradually destroying the faith of men on the system of marriage and societal values as a whole. As a result many men are being forced to commit suicide or shun marriage altogether paving the way for a fatherless society full of single mothers in the future.

We strongly denounce the attitude of the Family Courts which consider children as the exclusive property of the mother and totally deny access to the father and his family. We strongly condemn the belief of the Family Courts that the husband alone is bound to earn and maintain his wife and children, even though the wife is either earning or sufficiently qualified to earn.

Family Courts should ensure that fathers are given equal custody and unhindered access to children that mothers enjoy. The practice of showing children for 30 minutes or 1 hour like a TV show to a father without providing him an opportunity to demonstrate his fatherly care and affection should be done away with.

The practice of passing orders for monetary compensation should be done away with and instead, both parents should be directed to share the responsibilities like buying medical insurance, paying the school fee, purchasing clothes, books etc., for children based on their respective and combined financial capacities.

NFHS has recently joined Nationwide Boycott of Family Courts on 18th June 2010, in association with All India Men Welfare Association (AIMWA) and many other NGOs to highlight the above issues. This protest was organized across Bangalore, Hyderabad, Chennai, Delhi, Lucknow, Mumbai, Calcutta, Nagpur and many other cities all over India.

NFHS also participated and supported the “NATIONAL FATHERS DAY RALLY” on 19th June 2010, to stop the creation of a fatherless society organized by CHILDREN’S RIGHTS INITIATIVE FOR SHARED PARENTING (CRISP) in Bangalore.

NFHS also submitted a memorandum to Honorable Chief Justice of High Court of Karnataka Shri PD Dinakaran on 18^th June 2010 regarding various child issues related to matrimonial disputes in Family Court in Bangalore.

All these protests and events have received wide media publicity in print and electronic media. Please see the link for some of the coverage. Please check link below.

http://498amisuse.wordpress.com/category/ngo-related/press_coverage/

http://498amisuse.wordpress.com/category/ngo-related/protest-news/

Helpline operated by NFHS in Bangalore

• 9880141531, P Suresh, President, Family Harmony Society
• 9731569970, M Mahesh, General Secretary, Family Harmony Society

For more information please contact

P Suresh, President,                                                            M Mahesh, General Secretary,

9880141531                                                                      9731569970

You are also requested to visit

www.498a.org.in / www.family-harmony.org

A Real Father Is Better For Childen Then As Simple ATM Machines!

http://newsblaze.com/story/20100619164253zzzz.nb/topstory.html

Published: June 19, 2010 Send to a friend
A Real Father Is Better For Childen Then As Simple ATM Machines!

CHILD RIGHTS INITIATIVE FOR SHARE PARENTING (CRISP) in association with SAVE INDIAN FAMILY FOUNDATION (SIFF), whose members are deserted Fathers and elderly citizens in India, got together and shared their love and affection with the mentally retarded children at the Mother Teresa Home, Sector 23, Chandigarh, on Father’s Day.

Though, the members offered to adopt children residing at the Mother Teresa Home, the same was denied by the home. However, the members were allowed to spend time with the children.

These deserted fathers have lost faith in judiciary and have been deprived off meeting their own blood. The members of the organisation have been seriously effected by parental alienation of children due to single parenting in divorce/separation. They now favor single parenting. These deserted fathers are given limited hours of meeting their son/daughters by the Indian Judiciary after fighting for years for simple visitation rights.

Judicial & Governmental Apathy: CRISP

“The way justice is administered, the child is separated from the father (mostly) for years! One has to “apply” for “visitation” that takes years to “grant” and even then for a paltry time. Innocent children suffer because parents are separating and are fighting for their egos! Our judicial mechanism has a deplorable understanding of child welfare based on biased and outdated social concepts. The father is a relegated to a mere “visitor”, eliminating involvement in the child’s life and are treated just as “maintenance” paying ATM machines. It virtually condemns the child. This is neither in the child’s nor the family’s interest and destroys the foundation for the future generation”, said Mandeep Puri, the coordinator, SIFF, Chandigarh Chapter.

“The Indian legal system and society at large is still based on a patriarchal mindset which considers fathers incapable of nurturing children which is incorrect. Men are as capable as women to be caregivers and bring up children in a normal way. Even if the woman (mother) assumes that the man is not a good husband, it is out of place to say he is not also a good father for the children until there is strong evidence against the father”, said Arun Kumar, a deserted father, who till now, has not seen his son, who is a year and a half years old.

“The organisation terms the judiciary as Anti-Child, Anti-Father and Anti-Family. Divorce/ Separation is between spouses. Not child and parent. This is common sense. There is no law requiring a normal father to keep away from his child, in divorce/ separation proceedings. The child has the unquestionable right to acquire love and care from both the father and the mother”, says Vikas Kapur, coordinator, CRSIP.

CRISP is an NGO formed in 2008 in Bangalore who speaks up for the Rights of Children to remain connected with and enjoy the love of both the natural parents despite being divorced or separated. Our aims and objectives are based on research findings. Our members come from all walks of life, like software engineers, doctors, teachers, businessmen, social workers, etc. which includes women and senior citizens. All family roles like grandparents, fathers, mothers, etc., are being represented. CRISP has charted a Pro-Family agenda to promote family harmony in our society.

Parental Alienation: Psychological Effects on the Child

“Parental alienation occurs when one parent estranges the children from the other parent for a personal vendetta. Children are brainwashed (used as pawns in divorce/ separation) by the dominant parent against the non-custodial parent (usually fathers). This brings a lot of mental distress and trauma to the child and the alienated parent, and is particularly damaging to the child’s psychology and is truly Child Abuse”, added Mandeep.

“At first, it takes almost a year or two to get the Visitation rights, which is again just a formality. The father is given a hour or two to spend with his child, which ultimately is of no use. This is open violation of the law of land”, said Tejinder Singh, a member, who hailed from Rajpura to seek some love at the Mother Teresa Home.

Why is a Family institution needed in the first place? Family is the most fundamental building block of society. It builds healthy human beings and a healthy society. When the family system breaks, its leads to serious social consequences and surges in crime rates. A main contributor to teenage pregnancies is broken families. It’s well known that children from broken homes are more prone to crime.

“According to a HIGH COURT ruling, a custody case is to be decided within 90 days for the benefit of the child. But, I filed a permanent and interim custody case in November two years ago to get my 8 year old daughter, and still today, I don’t have any visitation rights. Is there any justice in this country? Can’t the judiciary see from their own eyes what’s happening in front of them? Why are they scared to give any relief to men and their parents”, said Amritpal Singh.

“I have been asked to pay maintenance for my child, but can’t see him. My application for the visitation rights for my kid has been pending since September, last year. A child is born in nine months, but you can’t get the visitation rights in nine months”, added Tejinder Saini, a father of a one year old child.

CRISP’s Demands:

Basic right of children to access both biological parents

Implementation of UN’s Child Rights Convention and Hague’s Convention on Parental child Abduction.

Implement SHARED PARENTING / JOINT CUSTODY as a rule in separation and divorce cases.

Setting up Special Guardian Courts in every major city

Speedy and quality justice (within 3 months)

Rational and Gender neutral Family Laws (including DV Act)

Create a separate Child Welfare Ministry at the National Level and separate from WCD Ministry

Laws against International Parental Child Abduction and Child Alienation

Enroll organizations like NIMHANS to carry out research on Child Psychology of separated children. Laws to be framed based on scientific studies.

Compulsory counseling to parent-litigants on Shared Parenting for child’s welfare.

Ban child interviews of tender age children, who have not had adequate access with the noncustodial parent.

Appoint psychologists/ child psychologists as mediators and to encourage shared parenting.

Ban lawyers as mediators! They are suited for arbitration not mediation!

Ban lawyers form Family Courts (implement the Family Court Act which discourages engaging lawyers).Encourage party in person after giving adequate counseling.

Grant visitation rights to grand parents who want to have access to the grandchildren.

Divorced fathers crave for shared parenting

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/life/relationships/parenting/Divorced-fathers-crave-for-shared-parenting/articleshow/6070496.cms

This Father’s Day, divorced men are seeking their due. An NGO with more than 2,500 members across the country has taken up their cause, saying shared parenting and joint custody of children should be implemented as a rule in divorce or separation cases.

Bangalore-based Children’s Rights Initiative for Shared Parenting (CRISP) points out that children have a right to remain connected to both parents after a divorce.

“On Father’s Day, we demand the basic rights of children to access both biological parents. For this, there is a need for implementing shared parenting and joint custody as a rule in separation and divorce cases,” CRISP founder president Kumar V. Jahgirdar, who was visiting Shimla, told IANS.

“Our laws are wife-centric – from the custody of children for divorced couples to allegations of domestic violence to dowry harassment. We are demanding the setting up of special guardian courts in major cities,” he said.

CRISP with its regional chapters in Chandigarh, Chennai, Hyderabad, Mumbai, Delhi and Lucknow has been fighting to constitute a separate ministry for the welfare of children who face problems after the divorce of their parents.

“Since 40 percent of the country’s population is children, our demand to bifurcate the union women and child development ministry is genuine,” said Jahgirdar, who is fighting for shared parenting of his daughter with his ex-wife.

Shiva Kumar, a divorced software engineer, said: “Despite a court’s order, my wife is not allowing me to meet my 11-year-old son. For more than five years, I have not seen him.”

He blamed the centuries-old laws that are exploited by married women and their families. “We want laws that stop the creation of a fatherless society,” he said.

S.P. Sidhu, a leading lawyer based in Chandigarh, said: “As per law, a child below the age of five always remains in the custody of the mother and the father doesn’t have the right bring him or her up.

“Even if the child is more than five years old, the court generally favours the mother for custody. However, only in exceptional cases the court gives custody to a father, that too after he convinces the court that the mother is not taking care of the child well,” he said.

“We have even come across cases where the mother discourages the child to meet the father even after he has won the right to meet the child,” Sidhu added.

Nitin Gupta, secretary of the Chandigarh CRISP chapter, said parental alienation often occurs when one parent gets children estranged from the other parent for personal vendetta.

“We have seen that the child is brainwashed by the dominant parent against the non-custodial parent, usually the father. This brings a lot of mental distress and trauma not only to the child and but also to the alienated parent,” Gupta said.

Jahgirdar said the Indian legal system and society at large is still based on a patriarchal mindset which considers fathers incapable of nurturing children.

“This is totally incorrect. Men are as capable as women to be caregivers and bring up children in a normal way,” he said.

“We are trying to impress upon the government to allow shared parenting like allowing the children to stay with their father on vacations or weekends,” he said.

According to the data available with CRISP, over 15,000 divorce cases are pending in Bangalore alone. The figure was collected from family courts.