Need of Gender Neutral prenuptial agreement

 The suicide of Bangaluru engineer Atul Subhash has triggered a nationwide debate about the anti-man marriage laws. His thirty pages suicide note and eight minutes long video blaming his estranged wife and her family of harassment, extortion, blackmailing and subsequent suicide has pulled the attention of the nation and triggered a big debate on how sick is our legal and social system in disputes of disturbed and abusive relationships.

The suicide of Atul  Subhash has enforced the idea that men are much more in need of legal, social and emotional support than women, though the activists, feminists and other rights groups are still hooked to propagate otherwise. It manifests how 'dowry' lingers as a perilous weapon in society to harass men for more than almost seven decades since it was decreed as a cognizable offence. In cities and the educated class, the dowry system is nearly eradicated. But, this anti-dowry act is used by all against the husband and his family to settle the score and extort a huge amount as a divorce package.

This case has again affirmed that whenever there is a dispute between husband and wife, 'all men' are victims of this high-handedness. All women use this as a tool to harass the husband's side. Atul's wounding description of the legal system is the story of all men. Section 498A of the formerly IPC (Section 85 of the BNS) is an unkind section for men. Even the highest court of the land The Supreme Court (while quashing many such cases) has articulated unease over the mounting trend "to abuse the provisions of the section," to "let loose personal grudge" and "making unfair demands."

The other scenario should be out of deliberation now. There was a time, when married women suffered mental, physical and financial harassment for decades, without any legal support. This forced the lawmakers to bring the 498A section. However, among the Muslims, married women in a majority of cases, still have to swallow the mental and physical abuses for life, without any legal remedy.

Whenever there is a tragedy, precious life is lost and many others and families are ruined in legal mesh, people cry for gender-neutral laws and legal reforms. One-sided strict laws are not the remedy because the more stringent the laws, the more they will be abused. There is much more in the pledge that can be specified. The legal system is not always guided by the material and the evidence. It depends upon many other things. Deciding about an alimony is a persecution to the husband. There is no law to address the pain and agony of the husband and his family. They have to face untold miseries and humiliation right from filing the case. There is no consideration of their mental trauma and social embarrassment.

Long-drawn-out divorces and legal battles are also other torturous issues. Atul also blamed the endless dates and court visits, partisan and corrupt judges, court staff and other authorities for his mental and financial agony.  However, it was just another cruise for the wife and her family to grab a fat divorce and settlement package by misusing the law and the system. The top court has commented," Laws For Women's Welfare Not Tools To "Extort" Their Husbands: Top Court."

Irrespective of the conclusion of the investigations, one thing is clear with the suicide of Atul Subhash the society, system and legal web are up the fault line. Now, the malaise is rather deep. It needs drastic reform to fix the trust. This is big irony that one has to pay alimony and maintenance foe entire life according to his status to a woman with whom the man has no relationship anymore.  Who will look after his parents in case he dies or became a pauper? These are serous flows in the law.

There should be a legal provision of a prenuptial agreement, in a written contract form enforced before marriage or a civil union that facilitates them to choose and manage all the legal rights upon marrying, or marriage ends by divorce or death. This law should be gender neutral and supersede all the martial laws in the event of divorce, division of property, retirement benefits, savings, alimony, children's expenses, care of old and sick family members etc.    

Some countries, including the United States, Belgium, Netherlands etc have prenuptial agreements that cover all the events of divorce, death, property and even bankruptcy. Many countries, including France, Germany, Italy and Canada have matrimonial regimes instead of prenuptial agreements. Goa is the only state in India where a prenuptial agreement is legally enforceable, as it still follows the civil code of Portuguese, of 1987.

The law should be amended to address men's harassment. It is very easy to malign women than to do real work to support and protect men. Far left-wing feminists would be assembled to oppose men's rights activists, the anti-Section 498 and anti-man fantasists etc. It requires a lot of work and courage to reform the Marriage and Divorce Acts.