The Supreme Court on Monday refused to entertain a PIL seeking framing of guidelines to deal with incidents of suicide committed by married men subjected to domestic violence and the constitution of a "National Commission for Men" to safeguard their interests.
A bench comprising Justices Surya Kant and Dipankar Datta expressed disinclination to consider the matter.
"You just want to portray a one-sided picture. Can you give us the data of young girls dying soon after marriage?... Nobody wants to commit suicide, it depends on the facts of an individual case," the bench observed.
The top court was hearing a plea filed by advocate Mahesh Kumar Tiwari, citing the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) data published in 2021 on accidental deaths in India, which said 1,64,033 people died by suicide across the country that year. Of them, 81,063 were married men, while 28,680 were married women, the petition said.
"Around 33.2 per cent men ended their lives because of family problems and 4.8 per cent due to marriage-related issues in the year 2021. In this year, total 1,18,979 men committed suicide, which are about 72 per cent, and total 45,026 women committed suicide, which are about 27 per cent," the plea said while referring to the NCRB data.
The petition had also sought directions to the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) to deal with the issue of suicide by married men and accept the complaints of men suffering domestic violence.