The public outcry over the killing of social media star Qandeel Baloch has finally moved the parliamentarians to make consensus over a bill aimed at bringing changes in two criminal laws for curbing honour-related offences. The bill – Anti-Honour Killings Laws (Criminal Laws Amendment) Bill, 2014 – was passed by the Senate in March 2015, but had not been passed by the National Assembly in the mandatory 90 days as given in Article 70 of the Constitution. Now the bill is expected to be taken up by a joint sitting of the parliament.

A joint parliamentary committee on July 21 unanimously approved the bill with certain modifications. The bill was tabled in the Senate by Senator Syeda Sughra Imam in 2014 and it suggests amendments to Pakistan Penal Code (PPC) and Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC).

The main purpose of the mover was to make a honour-related killing a non-compoundable offence so that perpetrator of such crime should not be acquitted even if he or she is pardoned by legal heirs of a deceased, killed in the name of honour.

Presently, Section 309 and 310 of PPC empowers legal heir or wali of a deceased person to waive his right of Qisas without any compensation or could enter into a compromise with the perpetrator after receiving compensation. Following amendments made in the law in early 2005 the compromise taking place between a legal heir and an offender notwithstanding, the court has been empowered to convict an offender killing a person on pretext of honour and sentence him to minimum 10 years rigorous imprisonment under the section of Fasad-fil Arz (mischief on earth).

It was in 2006 when the Peshawar High Court invoked the section of Fasad-fil-Arz under Section 211 of the PPC and sentenced a person to 10 years rigorous imprisonment for killing his wife and three daughters. A division bench of the high court had on March 8, 2006 set aside the death penalty awarded to one Mohammad Zaman, by partially allowing his appeal against his conviction by the trial court. However, the bench ruled that although legal heirs of the deceased females had pardoned the convict, he should be convicted under the section of Fasad-fil-Arz.

In that particular case the appellant was sentenced to death by the trial court in 2005 for killing his wife and three daughters aged around 18, 16 and 13. Although no clear motive was mentioned by the prosecution, the appellant claimed that the deceased used to go out of their residence without his permission due to which he got infuriated. The remaining three sons and a daughter of the appellant were legal heirs of the deceased females and they had forgiven their father.

Legal experts dealing with criminal cases believe that apart from bringing amendments in the laws several other steps needed to be taken by the federal and provincial governments otherwise these amendments, like the previous ones, would be useless.

“Even if the offence of honour-related murder is made non-compoundable or punishment is enhanced under the relevant section of Fasad-fil-Arz the government needs to improve the quality of investigation and prosecution,” said Shahnawaz Khan, an advocate of the Supreme Court. He said that it should be made mandatory that investigation in such cases should be conducted by experienced police officers not below the rank of an inspector or deputy superintendent of police.

He said that in most of honour-related offences the real motive of the offence had not been mentioned in the FIR due to which such killings were dealt as ordinary murder. He said that as honour-related murders mostly took place with consensus of family members, therefore proving such cases in a court of law was an uphill task.

About 40 sections of PPC were amended in 1990 through the Qisas and Diyat Ordinance. The ordinance was re-promulgated about 24 times and finally it was made an Act of the Parliament in 1997. That Act covers offences against human body, including murder and body hurt, and provides for Qisas (retribution) and Diyat (blood money).

Apart from making the offence of murder compoundable, under Section 306 of the PPC, the Qatl-i-Amd (intentional murder) shall not be liable to Qisas when an offender causes death of his child or grandchild, or when any wali of the victim is a direct descendent of the offender. Due to this provision several categories of killers can escape the Qisas penalty, not on the basis of any difference in the nature of their crime, but because of their relationship to the victim or the victim’s walis.

For checking the honour-related offences amendments were made in the PPC and CrPC through the Criminal Law (Amendment) Act 2004 (Act No I of 2005).

Through those amendments for the first time a definition of honour-related offences was included in the PPC. A sub-section-II was incorporated into Section 299 of PPC which defines honour related offence as: “Offence committed in the name or on the pretext of honour means an offence committed in the name or on the pretext of karo kari, siyah kari or similar other customs or practices.”

A women rights activist late Shahla Zia in one of her studies “Honour’ Killings of Women: Problems in the Law” had stated that the entire pattern established by the Chapter (Qisas and Diyat) was of privatisation of crime, whereby crimes were no longer considered offences against the State, but against individuals. “Thus, if these individuals so decide, offenders can walk free even after committing grave and heinous crimes like murder,” she stated.

Experts believe that apart from amending the laws, the government and civil society should also focus on brining changes in prevalent mindset towards such offences. They believe that the acceptability towards such crimes by vast segment of the society should be taken into consideration and advocacy campaigns launched in this regard.

Published in Dawn, July 25th, 2016