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Third Millennium Development Goal aims to empower women. Despite serious efforts, process of women empowerment has been lagging behind the target rate. Responsibility of marital status cannot be denied for such outcome because it has an important role in Indian women's life. Marriage in India is considered as an important social event and is supposed to transmit traditional values across generations. Hence, in orthodox society, lone women (unmarried/widow/ divorcee/ separated) are subject to disrespect in anticipation that they are rebelling against patriarchy. Again in this type of society, majority of Indian women are discouraged to opt job, therefore, marriage becomes the only option for their future settlement and security. Hence, life of Indian women is supposed to spin around their marital status, which possibly has some influence on their level of empowerment. Present study evaluate the influence of marital status on women empowerment, explores the possible reasons of difference in empowerment, if any, and suggest some way-out to eliminate this difference. Except married women, all lone women is found to have miserably low empowerment and are not allowed to take part in the familial decisions though they have the right to keep money for their own use and enjoy some mobility freedom.

Violence against women (VAW) is a common phenomenon in orthodox Indian society. Women are here trained to tolerate violence since their childhood. Although it is an age-old problem, it has come into the spotlight after the Beijing world conference. Since then, the Indian government and NGOs have started to take numerous steps to eradicate this crime, but it not only continues to persist in the society but is also increasing over time.Based on the project data of West Bengal State in India, chi square test and logistic regression are carried out to locate the factors associated with VAW in West Bengal. In addition, women are asked to specify the reasons of violence against them to unveil the important factors. Addressing the factors detected from the study and the factors from the perception of women may help the policymakers to take right and effective measures to tackle this social crime. This study confirms that most of the Bengali women face some sort of violence in their married life; sometimes, they experience multiple types of violence. They also experience neglect, isolation or restriction in their married life and among several factors; dowry is emerging as an important factor in West Bengal.<br />Key messages<br /><ol><li>Almost all Indian women experience some sort of violence in their married life.</li><br /><li>The majority of women face neglect, isolation and control.</li><br /><li>Severe physical violence is relatively less against Indian women.</li></ol>

Objective of the study: The present study tries to explore the variation in criminal cases of crimes against children in West Bengal vis-à-vis India during the period 2006 to 2017. Methodology: This is mainly a descriptive study, which uses secondary information collected from the official records of the National Crime Records Bureau from 2006-2017 of India and West Bengal. The present study considers only the crimes against children that are punishable under IPC. Linear regression is carried out to explore the crime against children which is increasing over the years. Findings: The data shows that all sorts of crime against children are increasing over time and that more than 90 percent of crimes against children are committed by known people. Implications: There should be awareness programmes by the Government of India and the respective State Governments to teach the parents and the teachers of schools about how to prepare the children against any move committed against them and how to treat the children if such mis-happenings are already committed. The NGOs and mass medias also have their specific roles in order to stem violence against children. Limitations: Firstly, the study was based on secondary data. Hence, sometimes it was not specific to researcher’s needs. Secondly, National Crime Records Bureau provides history of crime upto 2017 and afterwards no further records regarding crimes were updated. So, the present situation of overall crime against children in India was not known. Key wordsKidnapping, Murder, Rape, Trafficking of girls

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