 Violence against women has become a social phenomenon that cuts across all social classes, cultures, religions and geo-political situations. Without any exception, the rule is confirmed every day. Globally, every minute women are abused, humiliated, assaulted, raped, beaten, exploited and killed, most often by men close to them. And the perpetrators go scot-free!
Over the centuries, the absolute control of women and appropriation of women’s bodies has manifested itself in different ways, ranging from outright horror to manipulation. The 20th century saw progress in women’s rights but no significant reduction in the violence against women. We know about “honour” crimes, dowry-related crimes against young women, and the passionate crimes: all practices that give men in the family life-and-death power over women In the West, despite broad recognition of women’s rights, violence and diverse forms of control persist: a woman is raped every 6 minutes in the United States, marital rape is still not recognized, expansion of sex trafficking; massacres of women like that of 1989 in Montréal. UN says a whopping total of more than 5,000 women are slain under honor-killing label while another 5,000 brides are burnt to death in retaliation for having insufficient dowries world wide each year.
The longstanding patriarchal-tribal traditions cast the male as the sole protector and possessor of the female in many eastern countries. Death punishment is meted out to females suspected of unsanctioned sexual behaviour bringing shame on the family in the Middle East, North Africa and South Asia.
This heinous practice has insipidly travelled to the West where such killings are often reported from within migrant communities. The United Kingdom is reported to have been grappling with 100 such cases. Germany, Sweden, Canada and the United States are added to the list where young Muslim women are becoming increasingly vulnerable.
Undoubtedly that’s a low estimate as reports from Turkey, Jordan, Pakistan, the Palestinian territories and Yemen are filtering in at an alarming rate. Women are buried in unmarked graves and all records of their existence are wiped out. Women accused of dishonouring families are rarely given the opportunity to prove their innocence. In the Middle East, often teenage brothers are selected to be the executioners, because their sentences are generally lighter than those handed down to adults.
Sometimes the bride price involves another woman. Men can exchange daughters, even unborn granddaughters, to obtain new wives for them in the subcontinent. The tradition puts an additional burden on women to abide by their father’s choices. In Pakistan, exchange marriages continue to take place under “Vani and Satta-Watta” label.
The witch-hunts are perpetuated by men and women alike. Women’s role has often been under-appreciated. “Women act as instigators and collaborators in these murders, unleashing a torrent of gossip that spurs the accusations,” globally anthropologists note. Even mothers often support killing of an “offending” female to preserve the honour of the family as men in such clans will refuse to marry the girl or girls of the “shamed” family.
UN reports say that in India a woman is reported killed over dowry every two hours and annual toll comes to around 5,000 for having insufficient dowries. However Rita Banerji, who fights female genocide in India, records with the Alumnae Quarterly that dowry-related murders stand at around 25,000 cases a year. The most common method of dispatching the bride is to douse her with kerosene. Hundreds of women in Bangladesh are permanently disfigured by acid burns inflicted by men who go unpunished every year; a report said adding reasons behind acid attacks are a “delayed meal and rejection of a marriage proposal”. A tiny percentage of these murderers are brought to justice!
Vibrant media in recent years have revealed that honor killing is widespread in all four provinces of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan where the concept of woman as an object or commodity is deeply rooted in tribal cultures. The loose term ‘Karo Kari’ (meaning unclean man and woman) applies to killing of both males and females.
On an average, every day at least three women—including victims of rape—are reported killed in the name of so-called family honour. Once declared “kari,” a woman, who survives attempts on her life, finds few safeguards under Pakistani law that enables her to seek shelter, legal aid and justice from constant threats and targeted violence. Many women are hunted down as Kari months, even years after they supposedly “shamed” their family.
A whopping total of more than 2,500 persons were reported slain under the label of honour killing between the year 1999 and March 2008, majority of them in strident, patriarchs -dominated southern Sindh. The year 2003 recorded 1,261 honour killings followed by 1,000 in 1999; and at least 636 females were slain in 2007 in the four federating units.
Apart from this, women in Pakistan face gross violence and abuse at the hands of their male family members and state agents. In 2008 as many as 1,885 cases of violence against women were reported: more than 279 women murdered and over 284 persons— including 80 males – were hacked to death under the label of ‘karo-kari.’ Another 45 persons escaped attempts on their lives during the period; Dawn newspaper reported recently. Slain persons chose to have relationships outside their family’s tribal affiliation and religious community.
Standards of honour and chastity are not equally applied to men and women though the honour code applies to both equally. While females are usually forced to accept martial decisions made by their elder males, men are free to take a second spouse according to their liking and lead a life in the public where they can find fulfillment.
In August 2008, armed tribesmen in Balochistan forced five women out of their village, shot and injured them, and buried them alive in the scrub. Three of the women were teenagers. The other two were their mothers. Reports said “wild animals had left the bodies half eaten.” They were killed because the girls had attempted to make their own choice in marriage, a right legally available in Pakistan to every adult, male or female.
A Baloch politician defended the act of burying hapless women alive because they wanted to choose their own husbands. On the floor of the house he vowed to defend the tribesmen adding “Only those who indulge in immoral acts should be afraid.”
Back in November last year, President Asif Ali Zardari, widower of UN Human Rights Award recipient and twice elected Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, elevated two politicians Zehri and Mir Hazar Khan Bijarani, known for their anti-women views, to the rank of cabinet ministers in the Pakistan People Party (PPP} led coalition rule amidst wide protests from rights activists and prominent scholars. The elevation of the two was decried as a “slap” in the face of “decency” by rights activists and some parliamentarians
The impact of anti-women traditions has led to the neglect of women. On December 8, 2004, Pakistan enacted a law that made honor killings punishable by a prison term of seven years or by the death penalty in the most extreme cases.
However, women’s rights groups are wary of this law as it stops short of outlawing the practice of allowing killers to buy their freedom by paying compensation to the victim’s relatives. They claim that in most cases it is the victim’s immediate relatives who are the killers, so inherently the new law is just eyewash. It did not alter the Islamic provisions of Qisas and Diyat whereby the accused could negotiate pardon with the victim’s family. The strident debate continues to bring in change. 
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