Rape in Pakistan

In 1979, Pakistan lawmakers enforced changes to the laws in which rape was considered to be a crime and those who committed it were punishable for the act.[7] This was the first in Pakistan in which acts such as rape and adultery were regarded as crimes.[8]The reinforcement of this new law was referred to as The Offence of Zina.[9] Before 1979, section 375 of the Pakistan Penal Code, stated that girls younger than the age of fourteen were prohibited from sex acts even if consent was acquired.[10] Despite this, the previous laws also claims that rape during marriage is not considered rape as long as if the wife is over the age of fourteen.[11] The changes in the law enforced in 1979, changed the ways of punishment from imprisonment and fines to punishments such as stoning to death.[12] Although this new law is stated to protect women, it reinforces that in order to do so there must be concrete evidence. The evidence was most commonly deemed to be a witness who could testify that the rape actually occurred. During 1979, the witness had to be a muslim male and had to be deemed as credible and honest by the Qazi.[13]

According to this 1979 Zina law, rape is defined as:

(a) the sex is occurring against the will of the person[14]

(b) the individual did not consent to partaking in sexual intercourse[15]

(c) the perpetrator obtains consent by the victim by threatening, hurting or causing fear to the victim.[16]

(d) the perpetrator and victim are not married[17]

Since 2000, various women and teenage girls have begun to speak out after being sexually assaulted. Going against the tradition that a woman should suffer in silence, they have lobbied news outlets and politicians.[18] A recent report from the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan estimated that in 2009, 46 percent of unlawful female killings in Pakistan were "honour killings".[19]

• In 2002, 30-year-old Mukhtaran Bibi (Mukhtār Mā'ī) was gang raped on the orders of the village council as an "honour rape" after allegations that her 12-year-old brother had had sexual relations with a woman from a higher caste.[20] Although custom would expect her to commit suicide after being raped,[21][22][23] Mukhtaran spoke up, and pursued the case, which was picked up by both domestic and international media. On 1 September 2002, an anti-terrorism court sentenced 6 men (including the 4 rapists) to death for rape. In 2005, the Lahore High Court cited "insufficient evidence" and acquitted 5 of the 6 convicted, and commuted the punishment for the sixth man to a life sentence. Mukhtaran and the government appealed this decision, and the Supreme Court suspended the acquittal and held appeal hearings.[24] In 2011, the Supreme Court too acquitted the accused. Mukhtār Mā'ī's story was the subject of a Showtime (TV network) documentary called Shame, directed by Mohammed Naqvi,[25] which won awards including a TV Academy Honor (Special Emmy) of the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences.[26]
• In 2005, a woman claimed to have been gang raped by four police officers for refusing to pay them a bribe so her husband would be released from prison. One officer was arrested and three have disappeared.
• A 23-year-old woman in Faisalabad made public accusations against the police, saying her husband had been arrested for creating forged documents; she alleges she was raped on the orders of the chief of police for her actions. The officer was suspended but not arrested.[27]
• Kainat Soomro was a 13-year-old schoolgirl when she was kidnapped and gang raped for four days. Her protest has led to the murder of her brother, a death sentence from the elders of her village, and threats from the rapists, who after four years still remain at large.[28]
• Shazia Khalid was raped in Balochistan in the ruling of Pervez Musharaf.
• In 2012, three members of the Border Police were remanded into custody for raping five women aged between fifteen and twenty-one. The women claim they were taken from a picnic area to the police station in Dera Ghazi Khan, where the police filmed themselves sexually assaulting the women.[29]
• In January 2014, a village council ordered gang-rape that was carried out in the same Muzaffargarh district where the Mukhtaran Bibi took place in 2002.[30]
• In the 2014 Layyah rape murder incident, on 19 June 2014, a 21-year-old woman was gang raped and murdered in Layyah district, Punjab province of Pakistan.[31]
• In September 2014, three sons of Mian Farooq, a ruling party parliamentarian from Faisalabad, were accused of abducting and gang raping of a teenage girl. The rapists were later released by the court.[32]
• In July 2017, a panchayat ordered rape of a 16-year-old girl in Multan as punishment for her brother's conduct.[33]
• In December 2017, a 25-year-old girl was gang-raped by four dacoits during a robbery at her house in Multan.[34]
• In December 2017, A girl who married against the wishes of her family was allegedly raped by influential members of a panchayat.[35]

The group War Against Rape (WAR) has documented the severity of the rape problem in Pakistan and of police indifference to it.[46] WAR is an NGO whose mission is to publicize the problem of rape in Pakistan; in a report released in 1992, of 60 reported cases of rape, 20% involved police officers. In 2008 the group claimed that several of its members were assaulted by a religious group as they tried to help a woman who had been gang raped identify her assailants.[47]

According to a study carried out by Human Rights Watch there is a rape once every two hours,[48] a gang rape every hour [49][50] and 70-90 percent women are suffering with some kind of domestic violence.[48]

According to Women's Studies professor Shahla Haeri, rape in Pakistan is "often institutionalized and has the tacit and at times the explicit approval of the state".[5] According to a study by Human Rights Watch, there is a rape once every two hours[48] and a gang rape every eight.[50] Asma Jahangir, a lawyer and co-founder of the women's rights group Women's Action Forum, reported in a 1988 study of female detainees in Punjab that around 72 percent of them stated they had been sexually abused while in custody.[51]

Marital Rape

In Pakistan, approximately 70-90% of women face some form of domestic abuse during their lifetime.[52] Marital rape is a common form of spousal abuse as it is not considered to be a crime under the Zina laws.[53] Many men and women in Pakistan are raised with the beliefs that "sex is a man's right in marriage".[54] Women are instilled with the concept that their purpose in society is to fulfill a man's desires as well as to bear children.[55] The topic of sex is a taboo subject in Pakistan, therefore women often refrain from reporting their experiences with rape.[56] Marital abuse in general is considered to be a family and private matter in Pakistan which is another reason of why women refrain from reporting in fear of social judgement.[57] Non consensual marital sex can lead to issues with reproductive health, unsafe sex, as well as pregnancies.[58] Studies show that martial rape continues through out the course of pregnancies, as well as can lead to the birth of numerous babies.[59] Studies show that marital rape commonly occurs in Pakistan because of the husband's desire to have more children and in particular, to have sons.[60]

This map illustrates how some countries deem marital rape to be a crime, whereas others do not. Red is where marital rape is criminalized, and yellow is non criminalized.

Honour killings, burnings, and rapes in Pakistan can be seen as indicating inadequate legal protection for women.[77] In 1979 Pakistan passed into law the Hudood Ordinance, which made all forms of extra-marital sex, including rape, a crime against the state.[78][79]

In 2006, the Women's Protection Bill was passed by parliament.

Rape is punishable by death or imprisonment. Gang rape is punished exclusively by death according to the Zinah Al-Jabr(rape) law of the Hudood ordinances.

Corporal punishment is an option for rapists sentenced to imprisonment.

Rape in Pakistan came to international attention after Mukhtaran Bibi charged her attackers with rape and spoke out about her experiences.[1][27] She was then denied the right to leave the country. The matter of her refused visit to the US was raised in an interview by the Washington Post with the then President of Pakistan, General Pervez Musharraf, who claimed to champion "Moderate Islam" that "respect the rights of women", and complained that his country is "unfairly portrayed as a place where rape and other violence against women are rampant and frequently condoned".[80] He said that he had relented over allowing her to leave the country, and remarked that being raped had "become a money-making concern", a way to get rich abroad. This statement provoked an uproar, and Musharraf later denied having made it.[80]

The statement was made in the light of the fact that another rape victim, Dr Shazia Khalid, had left Pakistan, was living in Canada, and had spoken out against official attitudes to rape in Pakistan. Musharraf said of her: "It is the easiest way of doing it. Every second person now wants to come up and get all the [pause] because there is so much of finances. Dr. Shazia, I don't know. But maybe she's a case of money (too), that she wants to make money. She is again talking all against Pakistan, against whatever we've done. But I know what the realities are."[81]

On 29 May 2013, the Council of Islamic Ideology, a constitutional body responsible for giving legal advice on Islamic issues to the Government of Pakistan and the Parliament, declared that DNA tests are not admissible as the main evidence in rape cases. A spokesman for the council said that DNA evidence could, at best, serve as supplementary evidence but could not supersede the Islamic laws laid out for determining rape complaints.[82]

• Human trafficking in Pakistan
• Domestic violence in Pakistan

Regional:

• Rape in India

General:

• Women in Pakistan