Rights of Sexual and Reproductive Independence of Women with Disabilities 

Anagha Nair and Niranjana J Anil
VIT School of Law, VIT Chennai, India.

Volume III, Issue V, 2020

Sexual and reproductive rights are certainly one of the most basic pedestals of human rights. They encompass the essential rights that every being deserves, such as the right to have the autonomy, independence, and complete authority over one’s body and the consequent actions as well. These rights must also include the rights to make independent and erudite choices on matters revolving around sexual health, preferences, and rights over reproduction. Most of all these rights must be endowed with the protection and immunity from the stereotypes and stigmas, that the society has been continuously throwing upon those subjected to conflicts in these matters. Amongst the vast array of sections of the human race, who are concerned with the same, through our paper, we hope to bring the women with disabilities under the spotlight of our research. We have chosen the aforementioned section, as we believe that they are even more suppressed than the others due to their physical inequality in general as well from the dimensions of reproductive perspective, parenthood, financial, and economic and legal background. We would be therein, discussing key factors of relevance such as the sufferings that women face for being born a woman, moreover a woman with a disability, in the light of their rights to sexual and reproductive independence, being oppressed. We will also be examining the shift in the cycle of accountability concerning this issue from the perspectives of answerability, liability, and responsibility and the reasonableness and practicability of enforcement.  And they say of the ‘Convention on the Rights of Person with Disability (CRPD)’ on the same with highlight to the optional protocol which in its current status quo has ordered, there be an investigation only in the event of the grave and systematic violations of its norms.