Voice of Gender News From Pakistan
TOBA TEK SINGH – A woman was murdered here in Chak 376/JB Basi on Tuesday. As per detail, according to the police, deceased Gulzar Bibi was a widow.
Her relatives including Shaukat Ali along with his accomplices attacked and tortured her badly. Her body was shifted to DHQ Hospital for autopsy. The police have started raids for the arrest the accused.
Violence against women and children has become an insidious problem of alarming proportions and a recent study has revealed that many have fallen victim to incest, which some experts say has a more damaging psychological effect than rape.
These observations were made at the launch of three books titled With an End in Sight Incest in Pakistan: A Legal & Socio-cultural Analysis, The Criminal Justice System and Rape: An Attitudinal Study of the Public Sector’s Response to Rape in Karachi and Sexual Violence and The Law in Pakistan.
Studies that were quoted on the occasion were conducted by War against Rape (WAR) in collaboration with the Collective fir Social Science Research, an independent think tank based in Karachi.
Apart from gang-rape, rape and assault, there are other, lesser recognised forms of sexual violence such as forced marriages, forced abortions and forced prostitution as well as trafficking for commercial sex trade.
Citing the Violence Against Women (VAW) report by the Aurat Foundation, the study said there were a total 1,002 sexual assault and rape/gang rape cases against women reported across Pakistan in 2010.
A 2011 report by the same agency claims that eight women were raped in Pakistan everyday and half of them were minors.
“A report by Pakistani NGO Sahil says that 2,252 cases of child abuse were reported all over the country in 2011, while there were 138 cases of incest. Of these, 24 cases were those where the perpetrator was an immediate relation of the survivor (including the father or brother), whereas 114 were those where committed by relatives (cousins, uncles and others.)
“A large portion of these unreported cases comprise inter and intra-familial sexual abuse, perpetrated most commonly against very young children, particularly minor girls i.e. under the age of 16, and by someone who holds a position of authority and is trusted by the child. These kinds of cases are called incestuous sexual abuse, incestuous rape or simply incest, the study said.
Citing Dr Asha Bedar, a psychologist the study said girls who have suffered incest over a long period of time often develop borderline personality disorders and display other symptoms including low self-esteem, low self-respect and difficulty in trusting people, which later lead to relationship issues, particularly where intimacy is involved.
Dr Bedar notes that a survivor of incest could recover from the trauma if they were given support and have other positive experiences — such as some form of achievement — in their lives. On the other hand, survivors who belong to low-income families, who are not educated and do not possess any vocational skills were most likely to not recover from the trauma, Dr Bedar said.
Senior researcher at the Collective for Social Science Research Ayesha Khan said “marital rape is a reality in Pakistan.”
AMRITSAR: Women soldiers of India and Pakistan will soon perform the ceremonial beating retreat held every evening at the Attari-Wagah border.
Border security forces of the neighbours –India’s Border Security Force (BSF) and Pakistan Rangers – agreed to have women platoon commanders for the daily flag-lowering ceremony held simultaneously by the two forces at the Attari-Wagah border. BSF Inspector-General (Frontier) Aditya Mishra told Times of India that Pakistan has also agreed to women platoon commanders for the beating retreat ceremony.
The platoon commander seeks the permission of the company commander to conduct the parade and then shakes hands with their Pakistani counterpart at the zero line.Initially, Indian women platoon commanders would conduct the drill and Pakistan Rangers will follow.
Though both the sides have decided to have female platoon commanders, they were likely to begin conducting the parade after they develop perfect coordination.Three years ago, for the first time, the BSF posted women at the India-Pakistan border. They guard the border outposts and were also posted along the barbed wire fencing at the international border.
HYDERABAD: Vice-Chancellor of Liaquat University of Medical and Health Sciences Prof Mashoor Alam Shah laid the foundation stone of a girls’ hostel at the Jamshoro campus on Tuesday.
The facility would accommodate 360 undergraduate and postgraduate students with 120 rooms on three floors, he said.
He said the number of girl students was increasing every year.
KARACHI: Speakers at a meeting on Tuesday stressed that awareness campaigns be carried out about sexual violence against women so that the female discriminatory societal mindset be changed and victims felt safe in approaching the criminal judicial system to get justice.
Speaking at the meeting organised to launch three sexual violence-related studies by the War Against Rape, they demanded that special trainings be given to the police, prosecutors and junior judicial officials to sensitise them to victims, most of whom avoided approaching the system, fearing embarrassment and agony involved in the process.
Presenting the recommendations of the study titled ‘Sexual violence and law in Pakistan’, Maliha Lari said currently there were legal provisions that specifically addressed and prescribed punishment for object rape, incest, digital rape, necrophilia or marital rape.
She said the report was an attempt to initiate a thought process in people registering cases, prosecutors working to provide legal counsel or aid, and judges trying cases on how to prudently apply the existing laws. She said the average age of rape survivors in Karachi had fallen from 18 years to 13 years from 2008 to mid-2011.
The report also carries data regarding the medico-legal examinations conducted and the number of FIRs registered, which showed a big gap between 2004 and 2011. The MLEs conducted in 2004 were 425 and the number of FIRs registered stood at 389, while the next year these numbers were 357 and 160; in 2006 these were 362 and 173; in 2007 they were 275 and 85, while in 2008 the figures were 335 and 90. A year later these were 229 and 68; in 2010 the figures stood at 266 and 80 while in 2011 the figures were 283 and 103, respectively.
In her presentation on ‘The criminal justice system and rape – an attitudinal study of the public sector’s response to rape in Karachi’, Ayesha Khan, who conducted the study, said DNA tests must be done at state expense to confirm rape allegations and improve the conviction rate; and out of court settlements for rape be made punishable both for the lawyers and judges brokering such settlements.
Other recommendations were: a witness protection system; ethical guidelines for the questioning of witnesses and survivors and in-camera court proceedings to protect the identity and safety of survivors; bail of the accused be conditional and in case of extending threats to survivors, the bail be revoked; MLOs should always conduct complete examination to improve evidence.
Special measures be taken in case of incest to ensure that the survivor was not forced to go back to live with the accused (in case of fathers, brothers etc) in the event that he is given the benefit of the doubt and acquitted.
In her presentation on ‘With an end in sight – incest in Pakistan: a legal and socio-cultural analysis’, Sanaa Rasheed recommended that communities be strengthened to talk about and play an active role in identifying, reporting on behalf of and providing support to incest victims.
She said bails be granted with utmost caution and not without restraining orders for the accused or taking the victim into protective custody. She said incest trial should be concluded at the earliest, without compromising due process. Shelters be set up where victims could be settled temporary.
Sarah Zaman, Zia Awan, Faisal Siddiqui, Zahid Farooq and others also spoke at the meeting conducted by Fareeda Memon.
Sindh youth affairs minister Faisal Subzwari also attended the meeting briefly, but left it without making a speech.