The Supreme Court of India refused to entertain a PIL seeking the formation of the ‘National Commission for Men’ to look into suicides among married men.
According to the apex court, there is no reason why a commission should be formed after it observed the petitioner had painted a one-sided story.
“No question of misplaced sympathy for anyone. You just want to portray a one-sided picture. Can you give us data of young girls dying soon after marriage?” the court queried.
“Nobody wants to commit suicide, it depends on facts of individual case. Criminal law takes care, not remediless,” the court added.
The petitioner provided the National Crime Record Bureau (NCRB) numbers of suicide cases among married men as proof to submit their side.
The plea filed by advocate Mahesh Kumar Tiwari cited the NCRB data published in 2021 on accidental deaths in India which said 1,64,033 people died by suicide across the country that year. Out of these, 81,063 were married men, while 28,680 were married women, the petition said.
“Around 33.2 percent of men ended their lives because of family problems and 4.8 percent due to marriage-related issues in the year 2021. In this year a total of 1,18,979 men died by suicide which is about (72 percent) and a total of 45,026 women died which is about 27 percent,” the plea said while referring to data provided by the NCRB.
In response, the court said that such cases come under criminal law and should be handled by the police.
