LAHORE, Feb 1: Among various things this country can boast of, violation of human rights has to fall side by side poverty and illiteracy. That is not to say that the law and order situation is satisfactory or the political atmosphere healthy.

In every international report Pakistan holds a proud place as a country rated-w (worst) in most categories. Whether it is the Amnesty International, the Human Rights Watch or the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, with every passing year Pakistan never seems to cross the red margin in their annual reports.

The latest report of the International Network for the Rights of Female Victims of Violence in Pakistan (INRFVVP) highlights some of the worst facets of life in this country.

The INRFVVP is a non-profit organization, which was launched by Dr Riffat Hassan, an internationally recognized name in the subject of Islam and a professor at the University of Louisville in the United States, in February 1999.

Its annual report, released last month, aims to identify the commission of unchecked atrocities in Pakistan. The killing of female infants, honour killings, prohibition on girls' education, high rate of instance in rape, pre and post-natal mortality and the government's laxity in removing all laws discriminating against women featured prominently in the INRFVVP's 2004 report.

The practice of female infanticide, believed to be rampant in India only, turned out to be one of the major ills afflicting our society. Information gathered from the Edhi Foundation revealed that over 280 decomposed bodies of babies killed were discovered in 2003, 80 to 98 per cent of them were bodies of female infants.

Each year, the Edhi Foundation declares, nearly 250 unwanted babies are abandoned and nearly all of them happen to be females! This, of course, is the outcome of aberrations in a society drawing heavily upon flawed traditions sustained to keep the balance tilted in favour of patriarchy.

Female infanticide is not the only brutality committed against the misfortune of being a girl. In the first half of 2004, girls' schools came under attack by extremists in the Northern Areas.

They went out setting schools on fire to refrain girls from going to schools, which they believed were established by the NGOs to pollute their minds. Calling modern education un-Islamic, the extremists managed to keep a substantial number of girls from attending schools, reported the INRFVVP.

In the face of such extremism the government's reaction was lukewarm and no extraordinary methods were used to erase the scourge of bias. Despite the hype of improving women's health, the government failed on that count as well.

The World Health Organization estimates that one woman in 38 risks dying from complications during pregnancy or while giving birth. Infant mortality rate remained ever so high in 2004 as did the incident of complications. But the health departments in all the provinces did little to improve on the figure of the WHO. There again it was only too apparent that the health of a woman was secondary and Pakistan had to maintain its dismal record of being one of the countries where gender equality was meaningless.

Keeping in step with the policy of reneging and sidelining the women's issues, the two most discriminatory and ill-applied laws, which the government conveniently sacrificed to political expediency were the bill passed against honour killings in 2004 and the cold shelving of the Hudood Ordinances.

A hurriedly passed bill by parliament against honour killings failed to serve the purpose of justice, as it left two other laws of qisas and diyat to be abused by the perpetrators.

Giving in to the pressure of religious hard liners, the two laws were left untouched. The report stated that the justice system gave the victims no shelter from these laws.

These are religious laws, but are being abused and/or applied wrongly, as Islam could never sanction the injustice that female victims suffer as a result of the way they are being applied.

As the law stands now killing of women will remain a compound able crime, exonerating the perpetrators with the help of invoking the laws of qisas and diyat. The Hudood Ordinances promulgated during the Ziaul Haq regime, are by far the most abused ordinances with nearly 10,000 cases of Hudood registered each year mostly against women.

The Musharraf government's lack of seriousness to deal with women's issues vital to the development of the country, crystallized when once again he gave in to the demand of the religious extremists by not revoking them.

Even though Justice Majida Rizvi (retired), chairperson of the National Commission on the Status of Women, recommended that these laws needed serious amendment, her recommendations went unheeded.

More than two decades later, since the fight began to repeal them, the Hudood Ordinances remain this country's biggest weapon against women in limiting their role in society.

The INRFVVP's report on the status of women has neither added nor detracted anything substantial to the government's pro forma. It is just another report among many which might not be worth a profound read by those preferring status quo to change.