SUKKUR: An alarming rise in the cases of honour killing, commonly known as Karo-kari in local parlance, was witnessed last year as 176 people, most of them women, fell prey to the unbridled custom, according to the Sindh Suhai Sath, a non-governmental organisation.

A man accused of having an extramarital relation is declared ‘Karo’ and his woman counterpart ‘Kari’ by their community under this custom and both are liable to be killed by their blood relatives.

Dr Ayesha Hassan Dharejo and Advocate Farzana Khoso, the chairperson and co-chairperson, respectively, of the organisation, told a press conference here on Thursday that 93 people were killed in such incidents in Kandhkot-Kashmore, Jacobabad, Shikarpur and Ghotki districts alone.

According to the statistics compiled by the organisation, 27 people (23 women and four men) were killed in Kandhkot- Kashmore district, 26 people (14 women and 12 men) in Jacobabad district, 23 people (18 women and five men) in Shikarpur district and 17 people (14 women and three men) were killed in Ghotki district in 2021.

They pointed out that chargesheets were filed in 649 honour killing cases but only 19 of the accused were convicted. Those nominated in 136 cases were acquitted while 494 cases were pending a trial. They noted with concern that the conviction rate appeared to be around two per cent, and attributed the position to weak prosecution, slackness on the part of police and anomalies in the law and justice system.

They also quoted the Sindh police record suggesting that 769 people, 510 of them women, were killed in the name of honour during the 2014-19 period.

Published in Dawn, February 5th, 2022