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 Tarnishing
Realities ~ The
Awful Truth |
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Amjad Hussain Meo ~ LL.B II |
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The Pakistan Government never stops disappointing its
people. Never will hapless victims of corruption and cruelty
ever find justice. The judiciary of
Pakistan
has lost all its credibility, and what is worse is that none
of the leaders fret the least about what the common man is
going through. This country could have done so much better
with a better leader. Politicians everywhere are corrupt, but they
still
have
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national
interests. Unfortunately our leaders have always belonged
to the army or of a feudal
background. Either way, common man always suffers.
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Just
as the Government
has not bothered to bring in reforms for
improving the law and order situation in Pakistan,
it has not made any efforts to protect
the rights of the
people as human
beings. And
of course
women fall into this category. In
all regions of
the world,
women are respected. Greek
Mythology celebrates her as Gaia or Mother Earth. She
is also Aphrodite - the Goddess
of love and beauty. She
is Athena
- the Goddess
of Wisdom. She
can even be Lolita, the
child-like Hindu
Goddess who
takes delight
in all play
and pleasure, the universe
is a toy
to her, created
for her enjoyment.
She is a mother
- as in Islam, and has
heaven the
ultimate destiny of prophets, saints, and other
good doers, beneath her feet.
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But
unfortunately it is not easy being a woman in
Pakistan; here she is not even considered a human,
let alone a Goddess. In Pakistan, she is a subordinate
meant to follow men blinded by traditional values,
and mostly ruled by an army dictator with the
wisdom of an ignorant peasant. Subjugation of
women is to the extent that their human features
have been taken away and now they are no more
than a piece of land owned by the male members
of the society. However, this piece of land has
not been farmed properly. So now it stands as
a terra nullius, a land without an owner.
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No
women in Pakistan or any where else in the world
who is raped would drag herself through the kind
of public humiliation that we see today befalling
upon rape victims in the courts, the press, and
the eyes of the community. I do not know of a single
woman who chose to be raped, so that she could migrate
to Canada. But I do know of many thousand men and
women who chose to migrate to Canada because they
did not want to be raped and end up in a hopeless
and helpless situation in Pakistan.
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The
entire system is fervently supported by state institutions
that would ensure that the
FIR is
never recorded (Sonia
Naz), the rapists
are protected (Dr.
Shazia`s case), the medico-legal examination is
messed up (every case), the
rapists are
set scot-free
(LHC) and the justice
is eternally denied (Mukhtaran Mai`s case). We
are indeed a callous
society that such rapes occurs
everyday and none of us have done
anything to
pressurize the
government. Here
no one
wants to
do anything. The religious
leaders rant
and rave almost
all the time about various
non issues and hold protests off and on,
but how many clerics
have raised the issue
of rape
seriously, and
have actually
done something about it?
None, anyhow,
one cannot expect too much from religious
leaders as
theirs is a myopic point of view that revolves
only around tearing off billboards.
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About
4380
rape cases
that take
place in
the Islamic
Republic each
year (a
rape every
2 hours:
HRCP 2001
report.) More
conservative estimates
speak of
a rape every 6
hours and
a gang
rape every
4 days.
Eighty percent
of these
cases are simply
not reported.
Those reported
become a
source of
endless agony
and anguish for the
victims.
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Sonia
Naz is the latest victim of the system. Raped and
tortured by the putative custodian of her honor
and her country - the police, a woman is put on
the stand yet again to fight for her right to co-exist
in this patriarchal society. Sonia Naz was arrested
when she intruded the respectable parliament in
session as her last resort to find out about the
otherwise inexplicable absence of her husband. After
a detention of five or six days, Ms. Naz reports
that Faisalabad investigation police SP Khalid Abdullah
came there and tortured her. She alleged that the
SP tore her clothes and tried to rape her. On failure,
he urinated in her mouth. The SP then ordered two
of his men to rape her.
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Before
her was Dr. Shazia Khalid and before Dr.
Shazia Khalid was Mukhtaran Mai. These are
the strong women who stood up and spoke
out against the crime that was committed
against them. But who knows how many more
have been raped and were made silent by
their families in the name of honor.
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Dr
Farida Akhtar, president of the
JUP`s women wing in Karachi and
a Member of the National Assembly representing the MMA
noted "Girls who are raped are also imprisoned
in our jails
under the
zina laws. Then
there are
the prostitutes - but some
`dalal` or other always gets them out. And fifth, there
are those girls who are forced into this profession, I
have met such girls in jail myself, who say they were
forced, and arrested during a police raid."
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So
shouldn't these
laws be
repealed,
considering
that they have
led to
thousands of women being unjustly accused
of adultery, and then imprisoned? But all these
thousands of
women have
only been
imprisoned. None
of them
have been
punished under the
Hudood laws
so far,
because of
the condition
requiring four
witnesses. That is
what has
saved them.
Certainly,
the strict condition for four adult Muslim males
who are truthful and abstain from major sins to
bear witness against anyone accused of Zina, has
led to most such cases being acquitted --
eventually, anyway -- 95 per cent, according to a
statement by former Chief Justice of the Federal
Shariat Court M. Afzal-ullah. But conversely, this
condition has also been inverted so that a woman
who has been raped is also required under this
law, to provide these four `tazkiat-uz-shahood` --
or else risk being accused of adultery herself.
Lower courts have pronounced severe sentences
under the Hudood laws in several such cases. Blaming
the victim is gross misunderstanding. How
and where does a victim go about reporting her
tale of hurt and misery?
The
burden of proof rests with the victim. Failure to
prove the allegations in a sexual assault can have
potentially disastrous consequences. The victim
could easily be turned into a proven offender of
“Qazf” or slander, punishable with whipping
(100 lashes) or capital punishment depending upon
the circumstances of the case. Rape is not merely
a personal crime; it is the most terrible violence
that can be inflicted upon a woman, it is the
crime against a citizen, and therefore should be
prosecuted as a crime against the state.
It
is argued that probably the stiffer penalties for
sexual assaults are one of the reasons for the
courts to err on to the side of defendant. These
harsher capital punishments were brought to the
system by the Zina and Hudood Ordinances. In order
to justify a capital punishment the courts
invariably have to set higher evidentiary
standards. Inconsistencies, omissions, faulty or
tainted evidence are valid grounds for acquittal.
The
current Hudood laws are probably too idealistic.
There is a lack of alternative or lesser
punishment under Sub-section (4) of Section 10 of
the Offence of Zina (Enforcement of Hudood
Ordinance, 1979). Thus, if death cannot be awarded
due to inadequate evidence, the accused has to be
acquitted. Changing the Hudood Ordinance, ensuring
that the rapes are registered as criminal
offences, guaranteeing that criminals are caught
and punished, establishing a proper reporting
system, and making sure that the women who report
rapes and their families are safe from physical
danger and intimidation are the ways in which the
image of this country can be saved from these
tarnishing realties.
It is a matter of shame that the best we can offer a rape victim is a UK visa or
a picture with the Prime Minister. The only way to create awareness about the hideousness of this crime is
to bring it to light instead of brushing it under
the carpet.
<Go
to top>
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Copyright
© 2005-2006 by Govt. Sindh Law College Hyderabad, Pakistan,
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may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written
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