Each year our Human Rights Commission comes up with its annual report on the state of human rights in Pakistan. Since the turn of the century, their onerous job (gathering information and statistics in this country is a veritable nightmare as lies and falsifications are the order of the day) has possibly been made easier by the fact that little has changed, that the same pattern of violations and the disregard of law continue unabated.

The report for 2003 brings little cheer. Those who suffer the most from the abuse of human rights are our women and children and their lot is as was. There has been no let up in the violence perpetrated against women, mainly in the name of religion or of time-honoured, outdated, brutal custom. The female literacy rate remains at the most at 20 per cent, kept at that level on purpose by the religiosos and feudals who hold inordinate sway in this moderate, progressive land of ours.

Over six million children, rather than being sent to school, are sent out to work in inhuman and dangerous conditions where they earn a pittance for their extended families. Poverty has blossomed and bloomed and the estimate is that there are now 50 million out of the 160 millions who live below the poverty line.

The absence of any form of order and of the application of the hundreds of laws on our statute books continues to cause immense suffering to the larger mass, the lower income groups. There are some 85,000 prisoners held in our jails, of which 3,000 are juveniles. Crime, violence and the negation of law and order flourish side by side. Sectarian terrorism took care of over 100 lives, innocent or otherwise, religion as with all other facets of the Republic being a deeply divisive influence.

One major lament is that complaints regarding the excesses committed by 'powerful' individuals and by the administration were more or less equal in number. Few citizens, only 800 in 2003 (most victims being devoid of hope or faith in the state) bothered to complain. The HRCP wrote 282 letters to the authorities, who responded to 45, bringing little joy or relief.

We have non-functional assemblies, at the centre and in the provinces. The government of the NWFP, under the guidance of the province's spiritual leaders, is making valiant attempts to drag its citizens back into the dark ages. Again, the main target is 50 percent of its population - its women, and this despite the constitutionally mandated number of women who sit in the assembly. They are all either helpless or in thrall to their menfolk. The MMA government could do little about electing women to its assembly, but when it comes to the local bodies elections, its honourable members have the upper hand and employ it with force.

To take the example of Lower Dir, out of 204 seats reserved for women in the 34 union councils, 196 were kept vacant as only eight brave and determined women managed to file their nomination papers. The religious parties in power got together and signed a notarized agreement to prevent women from contesting and another agreement to prevent women from even voting. Similar agreements were drawn up and signed in Swabi, Mardan and Dir. Malakand went one better. Its pious God-fearing leaders declared that all religious rites - weddings and funerals included - of any women who stood for election or who voted would be boycotted.

The latest anti-women ploy involves the upcoming local bodies by-elections in Lower Dir. A decision has been taken by the learned men of religion to bar women from contesting. This is in complete violation of the NWFP Local Government Election Rules of 2000. Concerned women parliamentarians at the centre have lodged a strong objection with the Chief Election Commissioner, but to no avail. He, as with government officialdom in general, is either helpless or unwilling to take on the clergy whose clout at the moment is supreme as they are 'needed' to sustain the pseudo-democratic legislature put in place to appease the western powers.

Yet again, this can only be sorted out by President General Pervez Musharraf, whence all powers flow. Ostensibly, with the presidency dramatically strengthened, the federal and provincial governments should be mindful of his wishes and orders. They should be, if he wields his stick.

If there is any application of law, it is always of the wrong kind. Where our women suffer the most is under the Hadood Ordinances that persist despite the persistent calls for their repeal from individuals and HR bodies within and without the country. True and qualified experts on Islam have stated that they make a mockery of Islamic justice, and that they are not based on Islamic injunctions. Over 210,000 cases under the Hadood laws are under process in Pakistan's legal system. This is an utter disgrace, and disgraceful are the forces of darkness and their appeasers.

The most demeaning aspect for this country of discriminatory laws against women is the disgusting practice known as 'honour' killings. In 2003 over 600 women citizens of Pakistan were slain in the name of honour. The practice is widespread, and it is condoned by a large chunk of our educated graduate (genuine and bogus) legislators either imbued with religiosity or firmly in a feudal mindset. The other set of laws which should go without debate is the Qisas and Diyat Ordinance which makes is possible for crimes such as 'honour' killings to be pardoned by relatives of the victim and for monetary compensation to be paid for female victims at half the rate of male victims.

A second bill attempting to alleviate the lot of women is now in the National Assembly and was read out on the floor last Tuesday by MNA Sherry Rahman, who is apparently the sole woman with the gumption to make the right noises and to attempt to actually do something. Perhaps if she had the support of her fellow 72 women MNAs of whatever party who sit with her, it might add grease to her tired elbow.

'The Protection and Empowerment of Women Act 2003' opens up: "Whereas gender discrimination is prohibited by the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan and whereas it is necessary to provide for the protection and empowerment of the women of Pakistan so that they may enjoy the right to life with dignity as equal citizens of Pakistan which is necessary for the emancipation and upliftment of the whole nation....".

It calls for the compulsory free primary education of all children under ten years of age, for the equal participation of women in all walks of life, and for the minimum of one-third recruitment of women into government service, with no discrimination in pay on the basis of gender. Domestic violence, which includes 'honour' killings and the quaint practice of murdering unwanted women by setting them alight with household stoves, is to be punishable in the same manner as personal injury or culpable homicide under the Pakistan Penal Code. And most importantly the bill calls for the repeal of the Hadood Ordinances. It also deals with the right to marry the person of a woman's own choice, the right to divorce, property rights and inheritance, the state of women prisoners, and the mandatory participation of women in certain government organisations.

The first bill dealing with the protection of women presented soon after the general elections which brought in 73 women to the National Assembly was lost in space, opposed by the usual opposing obscurantists. Now, let us remember the noises made by President Pervez Musharraf's handpicked adviser on women's affairs, Nilofar Bakhtiar. Soon after the elections she held forth about how ripe the time now was for women to make a difference, how they must be made to understand their rights, their role in society and their responsibilities. She is authorized to sit in the House and to participate in its debates, unelected though she is, having lost to Info-Tsar Sheikh Rashid Ahmed in his home constituency. Amazingly, it was Nilofer Bakhtiar who opposed Ms Rahman's bill on a 'technicality'. Odd, because if technical grounds were valid, how could it have appeared on the floor? What is her problem? Does she feel upstaged?

If the general's own people who sit in his parliament (over 50 per cent of the total number of honourable graduates should perhaps be on the other side of rows of iron bars) are blocking the betterment of the rotten state of our poor and deprived women, what hope can there be for moderation, toleration, progress and all the other attributes preached by the general? If the women parliamentarians, of whom we had great hopes, are stymied when they attempt to do their job, not only by the forces of darkness with whom they sit, but by the forces of moderation (pretenders?) who are supposed to support them, then, is all not lost?

Do we have to remind the ignorant and the uncaring and the selfish, again and again, that no nation can survive for long on the sufferings and misery of its people?

e-mail: arfc@cyber.net.pk.