Lawyer and activist, Flavia Agnes, is one who has strived to champion womenโs rights through legal reforms and was also a pioneer of the womenโs movement in India. Agnes forayed into the legal arena by completing her legal graduation and post-graduation from Mumbai University, and her MPhil from National Law School of India University (NLSIU), Bangalore. She has been practicing at the Bombay High Court since 1988, specializing in marriage and divorce laws, and property laws.
Her personal experience as a victim of domestic violence, served as the impetus for Agnes to co-found the Womenโs Centre in Bombay, where women could gather, and โshare their storiesโ. The centre also aimed at extending counselling and assistance to women in crisis. She also co-found Majlis, a legal and cultural resource centre for providing women and children with quality legal services.
Additionally, Agnes also dons the role of a writer, and has written extensively on a wide range of social issues, from domestic violence and sexual abuse to the Uniform Civil Code, and death penalty.
Agnes has been awarded the Bharatiya Manavata Vikas Puraskar for her work with marginalized women and children and Majlis, and her contributions to the development of feminist jurisprudence, womenโs rights, and human rights in India. In February 2024, the prestigious Dr. Asghar Ali Engineer Memorial Lifetime Achievement Award was bestowed on Agnes for her exceptional commitment towards championing womenโs rights and legal reforms.
In her own words, โI want to be remembered as somebody who, through her experience, has addressed questions of community, of secularism, and of law reform, who has struggled, travelled this journey, lived a certain kind of life, and shared that life as an inspiration for them so that they can change their own situation. This is how I want to be rememberedโ.
Major Contributions of Flavia Agnes:
Agnes has contributed significaฬฅฬฅntly in the domains of Gender Rights, Marriage and Divorce Laws, Property Laws, Personal Laws, and Anti-Domestic Violence Activism.
Scholarly Works of Flavia Agnes:
BOOKS
- The Nation, the State, and Indian Identity (2001):
- Law and Gender Inequality: The Politics of Womenโs Rights in India (2001):
https://books.google.co.in/books/about/Law_and_Gender_Inequality.html?id=B6YLAAAACAAJ&redir_esc=y
- Judgment Call: An Insight Into Muslim Womenโs Right to Maintenance (2001)
- Of Lofty Claims and Muffled Voices: A Perspective of the Gujarat Carnage (2002)
- Family Law Vol. I: Family Laws and Constitutional Claims (2011):
https://books.google.co.in/books/about/Family_Law.html?id=1PQtDwAAQBAJ&redir_esc=y
- Family Law Vol. II: Marriage, Divorce, and Matrimonial Litigation (2011):
https://books.google.co.in/books/about/Family_Law.html?id=5vQtDwAAQBAJ&redir_esc=y
- Negotiating Spaces: Legal Domains, Gender Concerns, and Community Constructs (2012):
https://books.google.co.in/books/about/Negotiating_Spaces.html?id=udonLgEACAAJ&redir_esc=y
- Women and Law in India (2016):
https://books.google.co.in/books/about/Women_and_Law_in_India.html?id=fiyXDAEACAAJ&redir_esc=y
ARTICLES
- Hindu Men, Monogamy, and Uniform Civil Code (1995)
https://www.jstor.org/stable/4403569
- The concubine and notions of constitutional justice (2011)
https://www.jstor.org/stable/23018240
- Protection of women from domestic violence (2015)
https://www.jstor.org/stable/44002806
- Has the Codified Hindu Law Changed Gender Relationships? (2016)
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0049085716666635
- Protecting Women against Violence? Review of a Decade of Legislation, 1980-89 (1992)
https://www.jstor.org/stable/4397795
- Redefining the agenda of the women’s movement within a secular framework (1994)
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/00856409408723216
- Economic rights of women in Islamic law (1996)
https://www.jstor.org/stable/4404686
- No shortcuts on rape: Make the legal system work (2013)
https://www.jstor.org/stable/23391173
- The Supreme Court, the Media, and the Uniform Civil Code Debate (2007)
- Controversy over age of consent (2013)
https://www.jstor.org/stable/23528498
- Women’s movement within a secular framework: redefining the agenda (1994)
https://www.jstor.org/stable/4401166
- Law, ideology and female sexuality: Gender neutrality in rape law (2002)
https://www.jstor.org/stable/4411809
- Minority Identity and Gender Concerns (2001)
https://www.jstor.org/stable/4411251
- To whom do experts testify? Ideological challenges of feminist jurisprudence (2005)
https://www.jstor.org/stable/4416570
- Section 498A, marital rape and adverse propaganda (2015)
https://www.jstor.org/stable/24482280
- The bar dancer and the trafficked migrant: globalisation and subaltern existence (2013)
- Hypocritical morality (2005)
https://www.manushi.in/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/pdfs_issues/PDF%20Files%20149/Flavia%20Agnes.pdf
- Transgressing boundaries of gender and identity (2002)
https://www.jstor.org/stable/4412567
- Women’s rights and legislative reforms: an overview (2008)
- Conjugality, property, morality and maintenance (2009)
https://www.jstor.org/stable/25663734
- Triple Talaq-Gender Concerns and Minority Safeguards within a Communalised Polity: Can Conditional Nikahnama Offer a Solution? (2017)
https://heinonline.org/HOL/LandingPage?handle=hein.journals/nujslr10&div=21&id=&page=
- Law and women of age: A short note (1999)
https://www.jstor.org/stable/4408565
- Hindu Conjugality: Transition from Sacrament to Contractual Obligations (2020)
- Maintenance for Women Rhetoric of Equality (1992)
- The making of a high profile rape trial (2014)
https://www.jstor.org/stable/24479775
- His and hers (2012)
https://www.jstor.org/stable/23214814
- Two riots and after: A fact-finding report on Bandra (East) (1993)
https://www.jstor.org/stable/4399391
- What Survivors of Domestic Violence Need from Their New Government (2019)
https://www.epw.in/sites/default/files/engage_pdf/2019/05/02/154289.pdf
- Liberating Hindu Women (2015)
https://www.jstor.org/stable/24481448
- Nation Building through the Enactment of Hindu Code Bill โ The Nehruvian Agenda (2007)
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/223080750700100106?journalCode=hsaa
- Church, state and secular spaces (2000)
https://www.jstor.org/stable/4409612
- From Shah Bano to Kausar Bano: Contextualizing the Muslim Woman within a Communalized Polity (2012)
- Making laws work for women: The potential of existing laws against Domestic Violence (2006)
https://www.manushi.in/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/pdfs_issues/PDF%20Files%20156/pg%2025-31.pdf
- Diverse personal laws, gender justice and controversy over the uniform civil code (2017)
- State, gender and the rhetoric of law reform (1995)
https://lawcat.berkeley.edu/record/491849?ln=en
- Reforms As If Women Mattered (2015)
- Violence in the family: Wife Beating (1984)
- How ‘Consent’, ‘Agency’ and ‘Age’ Play out across the Complex Terrain of Family Laws in India (2019)
http://intersections.anu.edu.au/issue43/agnes.pdf
- Marriage, divorce, and matrimonial litigation (2011)
https://cir.nii.ac.jp/crid/1130000797503409664
- Violence against women: Review of recent enactments (1998)
http://www.womenstudies.in/elib/crime_ag_women/ca_violence_against.pdf
- Sexual Violence: Interface Between the Public and the Private (2015)
- Supreme Court’s Judgment Ignores Lived Reality of Married Women (2017)
https://www.jstor.org/stable/26697549
- Murder of Former Temple Priest at Ayodhya: Report of Fact-Finding Team (1994)
https://www.jstor.org/stable/4400751
- Gendered Notions Of Citizenship-Mapping The Margins
https://tiss.edu/uploads/files/Citizenship_of_Women_In_India-Uniform_Civil_Code.pdf#page=13
- Patriarchy, Sexuality, and Property: The Impact of Colonial State Policies on Gender Relations in India (2009)
- Protective Legislations: Myth of Misuse (1995)
https://www.epw.in/journal/1995/16/commentary/protective-legislations-myth-misuse.html
- Rescuing Mumbai’s’ child sex workers’ (1996)
https://www.epw.in/journal/1996/14/commentary/rescuing-mumbai-s-child-sex-workers.html
SPEECHES
- How to fix Indiaโs Broken Rape Laws:
- A United Fight Against Domestic Violence:
- A Code with Exemptions cannot be Uniform: Flavia Agnes on UCC:
- Flavia Agnes: From Victim to Trailblazer:
- Providing Socio-Legal Support to Survivors of Sexual Abuse:
- Indian Constitution and Multiculturalism:
- Need to Bring Gender Justice in Laws:
- Womenโs Rights & Legislative Reforms:
- Codified Hindu Law Changed Gender Relationships:
- Flavia Agnes on POCSO Act and Mediaโs Reportage of Sexual Abuse:
- Feminist Jurisprudence and Gender Bias within Family Laws:
- Womenโs Human Rights โ A Feminist Discourse:
- Flavia Agnes on Muslim Womenโs Rights and Media Projection:
- Gender and Sexuality in the Supreme Court:
- Gender Justice & the Law:
- Why is a Womanโs โMoral Characterโ used against her in Court?
- Combating Violence Against Women:
- Eradicating Rape Culture and providing Socio-Legal Support to Survivors of Sexual Abuse:
- Uniform Civil Code โ A Majoritarian Agenda or a much-needed Reform?
- The Controversy surrounding Triple Talaq and Uniform Civil Code:
- Gender Concerns and Minority Safeguards within a Communalized Polity โ the Triple Talaq Controversy :