Spent: Fighting Economic Abuse in India is based on the first-hand accounts of five women, following interviews with 50 Hindu and Muslim women across a range of occupations, class and caste demographics. It aims to shine a light on the resilience of the women and their spirit in the face of adversity and economic abuse.
The film, which premieres at Sheffield Hallam University this week, explores themes of domestic violence, with viewer discretion advised.
The project was funded by the Global Challenges Research Fund (GCRF) and Sheffield Hallam University, and is part of the Impact of Covid 19 on Women’s Employment project in Bihar, India.
It comes as the UK’s Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) published its International Women and Girls Strategy earlier this year, which aims to ‘stand up and speak out for women’s and girls’ rights and freedoms on the global stage’.
The FCDO strategy fails to specifically address economic abuse, despite committing to end gender-based violence.
Economic abuse involves behaviours that interfere with an individual’s ability to acquire, use and maintain economic resources such as money, transportation and utilities. The abuse can be controlling or coercive. It can make an individual economically dependent on an abuser, limiting their ability to escape and access safety, and is intended to intimidate and isolate the victim.
Dr Punita Chowbey, project lead and senior research fellow at Sheffield Hallam University, said: “We need to take urgent action to put women’s economic security at the forefront of our wider recovery plan following the pandemic. The consequences of not taking immediate actions are too great for women, children and society as a whole to waste any time.”
The project reports three categories of economic abuse, including:
- Sabotage: preventing women acquiring money and other economic resources
“He continued impersonating me [on WhatsApp and email to my seniors] and I told him not to say anything to anybody. And he just said that he was my husband and he will do anything,” Lakshmi, 29, professional
- Exploitation: exploitation of resources for abusers’ benefit, such as stealing
“He will take out a loan for no reason, and it comes to me to pay the loan. We get into arguments, and he is such that, irrespective of whether money is there or not, he will buy nice shoes and wear nice clothes,” Vandana, no formal education, self-employer
- Restriction: limiting access to and use of economic resources, such as bank accounts
“He never gave me any money, in fact he would ask me if I had money or ask me to give him money as he needed to buy this or that. Once he wanted to throw a party and asked me for money, but he did not give me a penny. All the money was with him,” Nitya, 29, postgraduate, homemaker
It also confirmed that the pandemic was a catalyst for more avenues of exploitation, restriction, sabotage, extortion and exclusion. Many women in the study lost all their secret savings, assets and gold jewellery. The enhanced digitalisation of finance and work has made economic abuse possible in new ways, such as impersonation to sabotage employment.
