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Difficulty in dismantling the patriarchal structuring of the legal profession

Author Affiliations

  • 1University of Calcutta, West Bengal, India

Int. Res. J. Social Sci., Volume 6, Issue (3), Pages 15-26, March,14 (2017)

Abstract

The research studied 60 women lawyers from urban Kolkata. Most of the respondents interviewed were into solo practice in the High Court at Calcutta. The study finds how the discrepancy is embedded in the very system of the judicial practice. In spite of the laws existing in the country favouring the women, the women lawyers in this very profession are continuously in a struggle to prove themselves. So the amazing part of the profession is that the women lawyers themselves cannot protect themselves in various ways when the laws are to safeguard the rights of all the women across the country. The problems of over-assessment is a typical characteristic noted in the study where the women inspite of her potential is compelled to be under pressure to prove themselves repeatedly as generalized ideas regarding the marital obligations and child birth has been seen as negative attributes of the study. The rigidness amongst the male lawyers to incorporate the women lawyers in their similar networking platform is noteworthy in this context. The patriarchal bound is deeply percolated in the structuring of the legal profession often acting as a major hindrance to the growth of the women lawyers in their profession.

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