Health consequences of violence within marriage: Need for strengthening the health sector response

and an accepted practice. The most recent estimates show that as many as 35 percent of married women aged 15–49 had experienced physical violence and 10 percent had experienced sexual violence perpetrated by their current or former husband over the course of their married life (IIPS and Macro International, 2007). Policies and programmes have increasingly focused on preventing violence against women and supporting women who experience such violence. For example, the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act 2005, passed in 2006, adopts a broad definition of domestic violence, and provides for immediate and long-term relief to women in situations of violence of any kind in the home.