Gender-Neutral Protection Against Domestic Violence: Examining the Constitutional Validity of Excluding Men under the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act, 2005

Abstract The Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act, 2005 (“PWDVA”) stands as India’s most comprehensive civil remedy against domestic abuse, yet it defines “aggrieved person” exclusively as a woman, leaving men who experience comparable abuse without a corresponding statutory remedy. This paper examines whether that exclusion can withstand scrutiny under Articles 14, 15 and 21 of the Constitution of India. Using a doctrinal method, it traces the statutory architecture of the PWDVA, situates it within the constitutional guarantees of equality, non-discrimination and dignity, and examines the principal judicial pronouncements that have tested its gendered design — from the Delhi High Court’s rejection of a direct Article 14 challenge in Aruna Parmod Shah v. Union of India (2008) to the Supreme Court’s gender-neutralisation of the “respondent” category in Hiral P. Harsora v. Kusum Narottamdas Harsora (2016) and its articulation of the limits of protective discrimination in Joseph Shine v. Union of India (2018). Drawing on comparative developments such as the United Kingdom’s Domestic Abuse Act 2021, the paper argues that while the PWDVA’s gender-specificity remains defensible as protective discrimination under Article 15(3), its categorical and unreviewable exclusion of men sits uneasily with the dignitarian reading of Article 21 and merits legislative reconsideration through a supplementary, need-based framework rather than either repeal or unexamined retention.