With none to lend an ear to their demands of amending what they see as the “gender biased” laws in the country, the National Coalition of Men (NCM), a city based men’s rights organisation has decided to campaign and appeal to citizens across the country not to vote for any political party and use NOTA option during the polls.

“We tried to approach all political parties with our demand that laws in the country should be made gender neutral instead of gender-biased. We also demanded that there should be a Ministry of Men’s Welfare but no party paid heed to our demands,” Amit Gupta, general secretary of NCM told The Hindu on Friday.

“No men’s right, no votes is the outcry this election,” a statement issued by the representatives of the coalition of NGOs working in 25 States and 50 cities of the country said.

“Since political parties have been non-committal on men’s issues and men’s right. The men in India have been left with choice but to exercise their right to reject,” he added.

Claiming that laws like Section 498 A of the Indian Penal Code (husband or relative of husband subjecting woman to cruelty) and the Domestic Violence Act are being widely misused, the representatives of NCM provide statistics alleging that majority of cases registered under the laws are either dismissed or withdrawn.

“There were over a lakh cases filed under Section 498 A in 2012. Conviction happened only in 6,916 cases. The largest number of such cases were either dismissed or withdrawn,” Mr Gupta said referring to the figures released by the National Crime Records Bureau.

No men’s right, no votes is the outcry this election: NCM

Demand laws in the country to be made gender neutral