The International Women’s Day was observed across the country on March 8 with a renewed commitment by representatives of government, political parties and civil society to improve the plight of women.

The event has turned into an annual ritual as on this day each year several functions are held in major cities.

While several women-related issues remain a point of concern for rights organisations, the issue of violence against women, especially honour-related murders, is one of the most debated.

Incidents of killing of women, and sometime men, on pretext of breach of family honour, have frequently been reported in media, but still such incidents occurring in rural areas hardly get proper coverage.

Even in urban areas, the concerned police often try to twist the motive behind the murder in such cases by not mentioning the words “honour killing” and instead mention domestic dispute as the motive.

Due to same discrepancies proper data of honour-related offences are often not available. Some of the organisations, including Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP), Aurat Foundation, and Lawyers for Human Rights and Legal Aid (LHRLA) collect the data which is mostly dependent on incidents reported in the media.

According to Madadgar National Helpline, Peshawar, working for women and children by providing them free legal aid, around 1,600 women and girls were killed in the country in 2013 in the name of honour, rape and other reasons. Madadgar president Zia Ahmad Awan stated that 217 women were first raped and then killed, 220 women were killed in the name of honour whereas 1,164 women were killed due to other reasons. He said that 452 women had committed suicide.

According to data compiled by his organisation, at least 370 women and girls were sexually abused in different parts of the country of which 185 suffered gang rape.

Legal experts believe that the existing provisions of the law are insufficient to check such incidents. Steps taken by different governments for checking the crimes through making amendments to the law failed to bear fruit.

The coalition government of Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid had brought amendments to the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC) and the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) through the Criminal Law (Amendment) Act, 2005, which was published in the official gazette on Jan 11, 2005, for curbing honour-related offences.

As in such cases an offender often gets acquitted after entering into compromise with the family of deceased woman, therefore, these amendments were mostly aimed at checking the practice of compromises which take place between the offenders and legal heirs of deceased women.

Furthermore, prior to those amendments even the definition of honor-related offences was not available in the law. Now the PPC states: “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.”

As there was reservations over the practice of entering into compromises by legal heirs of a deceased woman in such cases certain amendments were made to the CrPC.

A new sub-section (2a) was included after Section 345 (2) of the CrPC whereby an offence committed in the name or pretext of karo kari, siyah kari or similar other customs or practices may be waived or compounded subject to such conditions as the court may deems fit to impose having regard to the facts and circumstances of the case.

The courts have now been empowered to sentence a person to over 10 years imprisonment in cases of honour-related offences under the principle of ‘fasad fil arz’ (mischief on earth) mentioned in Section 311 of the PPC. Now under the amended section an offender shall be sentenced to a prison term of not less than 10 years even if the legal heirs have pardoned him.

However, courts very rarely invoke this section of the PPC when an accused is acquitted on the basis of a compromise.

Still people have been acquitted on the basis of compromises under the Qisas and Diyat provisions of the PPC. Moreover, at the time of registration of FIR the police often do not mention the real motive of honour-related killing which also goes in favour of a suspect.

A legal expert dealing with cases of criminal nature suggested that more changes were required to be made in the PPC and CrPC. He said that the section dealing with the principle of ‘fasad fil arz’ should be highlighted and especially the judicial officers should be made aware of it.