Domestic Violence & Digital Coercive Control

Control inside a marriage now runs through devices. Tracking apps installed on a wife's phone in the name of safety. Her salary account operated by someone else. Her UPI blocked so she cannot leave the house with money. Her passwords, her cloud photographs, her Aadhaar and her passport held by the family. Recordings taken during an argument and kept for leverage. None of this leaves a mark, and women therefore assume none of it counts. Section 3 of the Domestic Violence Act says otherwise: economic abuse and emotional abuse are domestic violence in law, and the Act has never required a woman to prove a physical injury before she is entitled to protection.

The Act is a civil remedy that moves faster than most people expect, and it does not require a woman to file for divorce or to leave the shared household. We seek what the situation needs, not a standard bundle: a protection order restraining contact and interference, a residence order securing her right to remain in the shared household under Section 17, a monetary order covering maintenance and the expenses already incurred, and where relevant a direction to return documents, devices and account access. Where stalkerware is suspected, we advise on evidence capture before removal — uninstalling the application first destroys the proof that it was ever there. The Protection Officer and the service providers under the Act are used properly, because a domestic incident report prepared early is worth a great deal later.

Interim orders are frequently obtained at the first or second hearing, and breach of a protection order is a cognisable offence — which is precisely the point of obtaining one. Women who feared that raising the matter meant losing the house most often find that the residence order does the opposite: it secures the roof while everything else is worked out.