The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP), in its report for 2013, claimed that 2,576 cases of rape were registered in Punjab, as compared to 130 cases in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and 27 gang-rape cases in Sindh. The commission’s figures don’t include marital rape, which it described as “a form of violence which figures nowhere in the Pakistan Penal Code”.

Punjab Police figures state that 1,651 rape cases were registered in the province in first six months of the current year, out of which challans were issued for only 990 cases. When we look at these numbers and also consider that convictions in rape cases are close to zero, It appears that any man can commit the most horrendous kind of crime against women with impunity.

“The number of cases in Punjab is far greater than the other three provinces, because of its (high) ratio of population. Rape is reported more too in Punjab,” argues Fauzia Viqar, chairperson of the Punjab Commission on Status of Women (PCSW). “There is feudalism in interior Sindh while Balochistan has almost no movement of women. There is far greater mobility of women in Punjab.”

While the incidence of rape remains high, Punjab too suffers from the legal and procedural issues surrounding rape. Then there are cultural attitudes, which criminalise a rape victim rather than enable her to become a survivor.

Systemic flaws and cultural attitudes criminalise a female rape victim rather than enable her to become a survivor

“The rape survivors’ families are no different from the rest of the society; they discourage victims from regi-stering or pur-suing cases, in an attempt to sweep everything under the carpet,” says Mukhtar Mai, a survivor of gang-rape and now a women’s rights activist. She dispelled the impression that many rape survivors are unwilling to register or pursue cases, pointing to the day-to-day incidents of suicide carried out by victims of sexual assault.

“Society looks at the sufferer as if (getting raped) was her own fault. That’s why I founded an organisation which also provides shelter to rape survivors in Multan and Muzzaffargarh, and ensures their security not only from the accused but also from their relatives,” Mai explains. She thinks there hasn’t been an increase in the incident of rape in recent times, but more that people have greater awareness and they report more in police stations.

Viqar, however, points to problems with the police and their methods of policing. She argues that rape incidents continue with impunity because state institutions are not doing their job. “Proper and flawless investigation into the cases is a must, but police in Pakistan are vastly inefficient. Then there is political influence in police and administrative matters, which are hurdles to the provision of justice,” she says. This ultimately leads to dependence on a higher authority, the chief minister for example, to take note of an incident. “If investigations follow their due course, nobody has to take any notice or pay visits to victims.”

Lawyer and rights activist Asad Jamal claims that most rape cases are manipulated by the police, while courts also don’t fulfil their responsibility and ignore drastic flaws in the investigation process.

"The rape survivors’ families are no different from the rest of society; they discourage victims from registering or pursuing cases, in an attempt to sweep everything under the carpet. Society looks at the sufferer as if (getting raped) was her own fault

Mukhtar Mai
Survivor of gang-rape and now a women’s rights activist

“Rape is a non-compoundable offence and there cannot be any out-of-court settlements in such cases. But I have seen that even high courts accept a settlement (raazi nama) which is against the law,” says Jamal. “Judges’ behaviour also defies the law, as often they ask the survivor in court, before everyone else, whether she accepts the settlement. This does not make any sense.”

Jamal says even consensual sex with girls below the age of 16 falls in the category of rape, but most lawyers and judges are not aware of the law. He considers evidence-gathering another issue, saying that the forensic lab in Lahore, which cost billions of rupees, was not properly used and it takes month to carry out a DNA test when the evidence is almost destroyed.

Mai too is critical of the treatment meted out to rape survivors: “They get the same treatment in courts as they get in police stations. There is hardly any difference. Women are looked at from the same prism by all — whether it is the police, political (community) leaders or the government.”

Former Punjab Inspector General of Police (IGP) Ahmed Naseem claims that most registered cases of rape are, in fact, cases of elopement — which is not an offence under the penal laws.

“The women’s families, often under social pressure and following their lawyers’ instructions, twist the facts to turn the case into one of rape, since they know that rape is a grave offence. They create a scene, implicating the main accused person, of forcible abduction and rape as they know they cannot charge the man with whom the woman eloped with,” Naseem says.

The former IGP says that it’s not an easy task to forcibly take an adult woman and bundle her into a vehicle, as mostly portrayed in first information reports (FIRs). He adds that FIR figures are only allegations made by women’s families, and the situation is mostly cleared up in court, where a woman often issues a statement in favour of the accused and she is allowed to go home with him.

But Mai believes that in most of cases, the FIR is flawed to begin with — which leaves many a lacuna for alleged rapists to escape punishment. Often, courts and judges also see foul play on the part of the police but choose to ignore it. She claims that not a single police official has been punished for faulty investigation, which was essential to ensure proper prosecution.

“The so-called judicial activism in recent years has been of little help to victims. The former chief justice, Ifitkhar Muhammad Chaudhry, initiated it for personal gains and that’s what he achieved. There has been a little change in the attitude of courts towards rape victims,” she claims.

When it comes to the law, Viqar believes that the existing law, especially Qanoon-i-Shahadat, hinders provision of justice to rape survivors. “Under one of the clauses, the victims’ character or previous sexual experiences are also given consideration. This is quite irrelevant; it is rape if someone forces another person to have sex with them without consent,” she says.

The PCSW chief explains that MNA Shaista Pervaiz Malik has tabled a bill in the National Assembly for amendments to laws on rape, which seeks stringent punishment for the offender, proper investigation into the case, and punishment for delinquent/corrupt police officials for flawed investigation and protection of rape victims.

A similar bill was tabled in the Senate by Syeda Sughra Imam of the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) earlier this year, which seeks amendments to remove lacunae in the PPC, CRPC and Qanoon-i-Shahadat Act. Imam told the Senate Standing Committee on Law and Justice that there was zero conviction in rape cases in the country during the last five years due to the flaws in the anti-rape laws.

She has suggested amendments to Article 218-A of the Constitution, dealing with investigation, proposing in the bill, “Whoever being a public servant, entrusted with the investigation of a case, registered under section 376 of the Pakistan Penal Code, fails to carry out the investigation properly and in breach of his duties, shall be punished with imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to three years, or with fine, or with both.”

In another proposed amendment, she suggests changes to Article 228-A of the Constitution, dealing with the disclosure of the rape survivor’s identity. One of its sections states, “Whoever prints or publishes the name or any matter which may make known the identity of any person against whom an offence under Section 376 is alleged or found to have been committed (hereafter in this section referred to as ‘the victim’) shall be punished with imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to three years and shall also be liable to fine.”

Viqar argues that both these bills should be put together for amendments to the law. She says there is little development on the legislation front, due to the business of the Parliament being disturbed because of the sit-ins in Islamabad.

Meanwhile, Jamal is adamant that inefficiency, negligence, bias and a high number of cases play their role in the flawed functioning of courts when it comes to rape cases. This leads to rapists easily getting off the hook. “Rape cases remain pending for years, and the victims have to experience the unbearable ordeal of recreating the scene of being raped again and again. This naturally hurts her self-respect,” he says.

Published in Dawn, Sunday Magazine, October 26th, 2014