Author
Dr KAVYA SALIM
Organisation/Institution
VIDYASHILP UNIVERSITY, BENGALURU
Country
INDIA
Panel
Criminal Law
Title
Sustaining Male Power Through Courts: Exposing Forensic Fetish, Judicial Apathy, and Epistemic Injustice in India’s Rape Cases
Abstract
Do society’s laws and courts judge women through ‘male eyes’? Unfortunately, the judicial discourse and the state of affairs in the rape trials in India validate the point. Grounded in critiques by feminist legal theorists such as MacKinnon, Conaghan, Andersson, and Wegerstad, as well as Gangoli, the paper aims to challenge the presumption of legal impartiality by examining how Indian courts adjudicate cases of sexual violence. While doing so, the paper seeks to expose the deeply entrenched patriarchal norms that frame women’s bodies through male-dominated perspectives. The analysis looks for the forensic fetishes, judicial apathy and epistemic injustice by dissecting critical judicial rulings by the Indian courts in rape cases to show - how courts: (a) prioritise anatomical scrutiny over survivors’ lived experiences, (b) are fixated to turn the female body as a forensic canvas or text; (c) reduce the value of trauma over technical debates due to patriarchal norms; (d) trivialises acts of sexual violence in rape trials; (e) shifts the blame on to the survivor and (f) continue to perpetuate systemic inequities. These results suggest that a legal institution like the Indian courts has become a medium for repeatedly sustaining ‘male power’. The paper advocates for a reimagined adjudication through survivor-centric frameworks not anchored in and concludes by outlining actionable steps to dismantle institutionalised misogyny and redefine legal processes as spaces of accountability and healing.
Biography
Dr Kavya Salim is an Assistant Professor of Law at the School of Legal Studies and Governance, Vidyashilp University, Bengaluru. She is an accomplished legal academic specialising in Human Rights Law and Public Health Law. She holds a Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) in Law from the Central University of Kerala, where her interdisciplinary research focused on “Public Health Interventions to Control Infectious Disease Outbreaks: Human Rights Dimensions.” She earned her Master of Laws (LL.M.) in Human Rights Law from the National Law Institute University, Bhopal, graduating first in her batch in the two-year program. She completed her B.A., LL.B. (Hons.) from the School of Indian Legal Thought, Mahatma Gandhi University, Kerala. Her academic training is deeply rooted in constitutional Law, human rights, and public health law, with strong foundations in both theory and applied legal research. Dr Salim’s foundational experience includes serving as a Research Associate on a major project under the Bureau of Police Research and Development (BPR&D), Ministry of Home Affairs. This project, conducted at the National Law Institute University, Bhopal, examined crimes against women in northern India, providing her with significant empirical and legal exposure to systemic gaps in law enforcement, the functioning of the criminal justice system, and the need for victim-sensitive approaches. She has delivered invited lectures and has authored research papers on mental healthcare, AI in healthcare, libertarian values, menstrual health and reproductive justice, sexual harassment law, vaccine mandates, and criminal investigation processes. She has consistently contributed as a resource person for interdisciplinary workshops and seminars on Law, public health, AI, and human rights. She is also an active academic consultant for national-level AI-legal hackathons.
