Curator's Note - Backlash: The law’s betrayal of feminist gains

THE grammar of backlash is precise. It speaks in the language of rights even as it erases them, mobilizes the rule of law to subvert justice, and hides behind neutrality while advancing patriarchy. The jurisprudence of backlash is, thus, not merely an inertial response to feminist legal gains; it is an active counter-revolution against the idea of justice itself. Every hard-won feminist victory is met with an equally forceful attempt to wrest it away, often through the same institutions that had once conceded to feminist demands. The courts, the legislature, and the executive all conspire—sometimes in tandem, sometimes through omissions—to undercut rights that feminist jurisprudence has carved out through tireless struggle. The law, thus, becomes both the site of feminist resistance and the terrain of its obliteration.Feminist legal interventions have long been met with resistance. However, what we witness today is not just resistance, but an orchestrated backlash that seeks to erase the very legitimacy of feminist legal discourse. This backlash operates through multiple registers: judicial reversals, legislative rollbacks, and the discursive weaponization of "victimhood" by dominant groups. What is critical to understand is that backlash is not about justice—it is about the restoration of power to those who have historically wielded it.This is not an accident of jurisprudence. It is an active project.Each feminist legal victory, whether in the courtroom or through legislative reform, is met with immediate counter-mobilization. The system, so often resistant to acknowledging the existence of gendered violence, suddenly transforms into an efficient machine when it comes to rolling back women’s rights. It does so through procedural delays, evidentiary skepticism, and moral panic. .Indians want women to have equal rights as men, but still want men to get the jobs.The judiciary, often considered the final bastion of constitutional morality, is increasingly betraying its own principles. We see a disturbing pattern where courts, instead of expanding the horizon of rights, engage in interpretive gymnastics to shrink them. Consider the shift in judicial discourse from a rights-based framework to one of "morality" and "tradition." Take, for instance, the judicial retreat on marital rape exemptions or the disinclination of courts to recognize caste-based sexual violence under the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act. These are not mere doctrinal choices. Rather, they are deliberate acts of erasure, reinforcing the patriarchal compact between state and society. Legislative backlash, too, is a well-worn tactic in dismantling feminist legal gains. The dilution of the Pre-Conception and Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques (PC-PNDT) Act, for example, has been justified under the garb of "ease of doing business" for medical practitioners, as though the fight against female foeticide is merely a bureaucratic hurdle. Similarly, the Forest Rights Act has been weaponized to erase the land rights of Adivasi women, reinforcing patriarchal and caste-based control over natural resources.One of the most insidious recent legislative moves has been the attempt to frame child marriage as a matter of "community autonomy" rather than a blatant violation of human rights. The backlash against raising the legal age of marriage for women reveals the deep entrenchment of patriarchal interests that view women’s bodies as sites of control rather than as autonomous entities deserving of rights and dignity..What we witness today is not just resistance, but an orchestrated backlash that seeks to erase the very legitimacy of feminist legal discourse..A particularly dangerous strand of backlash has emerged from the co-opting of rights language by dominant groups to claim victimhood. The myth of the "misused" rape law, the moral panic over "false" dowry harassment cases, and the concerted legal harassment and social vilification of feminist academics and activists, all stem from a carefully orchestrated campaign to reframe men as the real victims. These narratives do not seek justice; they seek retribution against the feminist project itself.The backlash against sexual harassment laws in India, particularly after the #MeToo movement illustrates this well. The Hema Committee report, commissioned to examine complaints of sexual harassment, shed light on institutional anxiety rather than self-reflection in the cine industry. When powerful men are held accountable, there is widespread outcry against due process, again reflecting a deep-seated belief that the structures of privilege must remain untouched..A particularly dangerous strand of backlash has emerged from the co-opting of rights language by dominant groups to claim victimhood..Backlash thrives on erasure—of histories of struggle, of feminist jurisprudence, of the very language of justice. It seeks to exhaust feminists into submission, to drown out radical demands for structural change with the tedious bureaucratic grind of legal reversals and discursive attacks. Yet, history reminds us that backlash is a testament to feminist success; it is the final gasp of a crumbling order desperately clinging to power.And then there is the matter of criminalization—backlash often operates through carceral feminism, weaponizing punitive legal measures while sidelining transformative justice. Nowhere is the global nature of backlash more evident than in the debates on reproductive rights. The overturning of Roe v. Wade in the United States has emboldened anti-abortion rhetoric worldwide, including in India, where access to abortion remains retrogressively fraught with medical paternalism and bureaucratic gatekeeping. In the name of protecting fetal rights, women’s autonomy is steadily undermined, often with the complicity of the state and judiciary. The right to abortion may exist on paper, but access remains conditional on the whims of legal and medical authorities..Not just liberty, Roe v. Wade legitimised extinguishing the American woman’s right to life.Resistance, then, must not merely be a defense against backlash but an unrelenting assertion of justice. It requires us to fight the dilution of laws as fiercely as we fought for their enactment. It demands that we challenge the judiciary’s retreat into patriarchal interpretations as vigorously as we once demanded progressive jurisprudence. It insists that we refuse to cede discursive ground to those who claim that gender justice has "gone too far."The feminist legal project is, by necessity, a project of vigilance. Gains are never secure, and victories are never final. The backlash against gender justice does not rely on overt resistance alone—it embeds itself within institutions, cloaks itself in the language of objectivity, and infiltrates legal reasoning. It does not need to repeal laws to render them ineffective; it simply needs to delay, dilute, and discredit.Yet, backlash is also a testament to feminist success. The resistance to gender justice is proportional to the extent of change it threatens. If feminist legal victories were inconsequential, they would not provoke such organized opposition. Backlash, then, is also an indicator of progress—proof that the foundations of patriarchy are being shaken, that feminist jurisprudence is not an abstraction but a force that compels a reaction.What, then, is the way forward?.The feminist legal project is, by necessity, a project of vigilance. Gains are never secure, and victories are never final..It is to refuse complacency. To document, challenge, and anticipate backlash at every turn. To name it for what it is—not an unfortunate consequence of legal reform, but a deliberate, strategic, and organized project to preserve structural inequality. It is to recognize that every feminist gain is not a destination but a battleground.And above all, it is to persist.Because if the law can betray, it can also be reclaimed..Jhuma Sen and Asmita Basu are the curators of this special issue.

Curator's Note - Backlash: The law’s betrayal of feminist gains

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