Her husband, who she met in India through an arranged marriage, always insisted she accompany him in his work as a courier because he did not speak much English. Today he had become frustrated with her map reading and repeatedly punched her, banged her head onto the dashboard. Then he grabbed her purse and phone and kicked her out of the truck. It was another episode in a lonely marriage characterised by brutality. As Meera sat, dazed, by the river, her husband came after her and dragged her back towards the truck. Two tradesmen tried to intervene. "Don't worry, she's my wife", he told them as he hauled Meera away. Jasvinder Sidhu nods his head as Meera tells her story. He has heard many like it before. An accounting lecturer at RMIT, Sidhu first became aware of family violence in the Indian community in a previous teaching role, when his female students missed class or asked for an extension as they struggled to cope with their violent partners.

When Sidhu later joined the executive of Gurudwara Sahib Tarneit, the Sikh temple in Tarneit, in Melbourne's west, people asked him for help on the behalf of family violence victims. The Gurudwara Sahib Temple on Davis Road, Tarneit. Soon he was fielding calls from police officers, local politicians and council social workers, who wanted advice on the cultural complexities facing the Indian women and children in their care. "They thought I was an agency, I often had to duck out of class to take phone calls," says Sidhu. He was called upon following a number of high-profile family violence homicides involving Indian families between 2012 and 2014. Don't worry, she's my wife Family violence perpetrator

When 23-year-old Sargun Raji was killed in a murder-suicide by her estranged husband, Avjit Singh, in 2012, Sidhu was contacted by the Indian Consulate and was the first person to call Ms Raji's mother in Delhi. The Tarneit temple raised money to sponsor a family member to come to Australia. Similarly, Sidhu was involved after finance manager Nilesh Sharma, 36, murdered his wife, Preetika Sharma, 35, and their five-year-old son Divesh and three-year-old daughter Divya, in Glen Waverley, and then took his own life. And Sidhu met with the distraught parents of 32-year-old Shikha Godara Beniwal, who was found dead in a house in Deer Park in 2014 in an apparent murder suicide. Her estranged husband Sunil Beniwal died after his car drove into the path of a truck. Sidhu and other supporters have formed a volunteer forum called Jagriti – which means "a social awakening" in Hindi – to developing a community-led response to family violence. It also funnels donations from the Tarneit temple to women and children who need help, and provides short-term rent assistance, and food and baby items.

Sidhu says traditional gender roles still run deep in some parts of the Indian community in Australia. Practices like arranged marriage and dowry systems continue, and exacerbate the objectification of women. Distrust of the police compounds the problem he says: "In India calling the police is a big taboo, they are seen as untrustworthy and corrupt." Psychiatrist Dr Manjula O'Conner, Credit:Paul Jeffers Dr Manjula O'Connor is a psychiatrist and see a large number of South Asian family violence victims. She also sometimes sees perpetrators, some who genuinely want to change their behaviour change and others keen to appear "reformed" for upcoming court appearances. The idealised image of an Indian man is a provider and the head of the household, a "hyper masculine" role that has deep roots in gender stereotypes, says Dr O'Conner.

India has a very complex marriage culture, with many expectations around relationships and an entrenched system of arranged marriage and dowry which continue, even though dowry has been illegal in India since 1961. There has been considerable awareness raising about dowry in Australia, and most Indian (and some Middle Eastern and African communities) men no longer ask for dowry, says Dr O'Connor. But some still find ways to circumvent changing social norms; one female client Dr O'Conner saw recently said her parents offered to spend the dowry amount for her arranged marriage on payment for a "lavish" wedding instead. Her husband is abusive, but the young woman was unaware she could take the matter to the police, a common problem. When Dr O'Connor suggested it, she replied "I cannot break my marriage". Meera says her husband expected her to play a very traditional role in the home. If she didn't prepare a meal on time she was reprimanded in front of his male friends. But a fellow Indian classmate she confided in told her men get "easily angry" and she should try to be a good wife.

Her husband even called her parents in India and complained that she was not doing her job or listening to him: "For him I was a commodity". At the time Meera was on a student visa that didn't give her rights to Medicare or access to a family violence refuge. When she thought he might kill her and tried to find crisis accommodation she was told she was ineligible. Professor Supriya Singh from RMIT, whose research focuses on the sociology of money and migration, suggests migrants should be given information about contemporary gender norms when they first arrive in Australia. "They may have no sense that money is shared between husband and wife, that the salary of women does not automatically go to remittance for the man's family back home." One day Meera's husband hit her with his safety boots, their metal soles leaving her bleeding and bruised. Usually when he left the house, he took her mobile phone and the landline with him so she had no contact with the outside world.

This time he forgot the landline and she called a family member who contacted the police. But most of her family told her she should not have complained. "They says it's a 'family matter'," says Meera. "The whole focus is on the women and her actions." Her husband was found guilty of assault and told to do a men's behavioural change program. But the couple were also told to organise and pay for it themselves, which became Meera's responsibility (the cost gave him another reason to berate her) Sometimes help came from unexpected quarters. One of the tradesmen who saw Meera's husband dragging her away from the banks of the river must have called the courier company. Back at the depot the office administrator, discreetly took her aside and asked her if everything was okay.

"Thank God someone asked," says Meera, tears on her cheeks. "And actually I was glad she wasn't Indian, because she didn't know anyone I knew. She was just listening to me with empathy and compassion. She kept calling me every week for months, asking if I was okay." Victoria has only one specialist family violence agency that provides help to culturally and linguistically-diverse communities, the inTouch Multicultural Centre Against Family Violence. The centre's workers speak 25 different languages and many have been migrants or refugees, says executive officer Maya Avdibegovic. The centre also runs men's behavioural change programs in Vietnamese and (soon) Arabic. Avdibegovic says migrant communities can play a powerful role in preventing family violence through encouraging discussion of respectful relationships and gender roles. But she cautions against communities trying to respond directly to victims in crisis, saying this delicate work is best handled by trained family violence workers: "Even when they have the best of intentions, people who are not skilled can inadvertently put victims at greater risk".

Women from migrant communities are particularly vulnerable to the effects of violence and face barriers when seeking help. They may have little English, no family or friends nearby, be unaware of laws prohibiting family violence in Australia or worry reporting violence will compromise their right to future residency. Some also come from societies where there are strong cultural prohibitions against separation and divorce. After another conviction for assault, Meera's husband undertook a court-ordered (and paid) behavioural change and anger management course. He has not been physically violent towards her again, and they still live together. He has never acknowledged his violent behaviour, or apologised. Meera suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder and depression. Despite finishing her studies, she has not worked for the past year because she knows most of her income will be sent back to her husband's family in India.

And she is a social outcast in the Indian community here because she took action against her husband, Meera says. When her husband's friends see her out shopping, they ring her husband and report on her movements. "How can someone live with the person who does all these things to them? I don't have the answer," says Meera. "Some days I feel like I will move out. But some days things are better." In her role as executive director of the Australasian Centre for Human Rights and Health, Dr O'Connor has designed a "forum" theatre project, which will see people from Australia's South Asian community bring stories of family violence from their everyday life to be turned into a drama script. The play will then be performed for the community in Melbourne and Sydney. Sidhu says Jagriti has plans for an awareness-raising campaign through amateur cricket clubs, which have a large and growing fan base in Melbourne.

Miki Perkins is Social Affairs Reporter *Meera is an assumed name. inTouch: 1800 755 988 Safe Steps: 1800 015 188