PESHAWAR, June 21: Speakers at a consultation on Thursday pointed out that the law introduced in 2004 for checking honour-related killings and violence had failed to achieve the desired results and the law needed drastic changes to make it more effective.They proposed that the offence of honour-related violence be made non-compoundable and that compromise between the parties be not allowed in such cases at any cost.

The consultation titled ‘Critique on honour killing law’ was organised by Aurat Foundation and attended by lawyers, social activists and journalists.

A threadbare discussion took place over the Criminal Law (Amendment) Act, 2004, commonly known as anti-honour killing law, and draft of the proposed amendments to the laws, including the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC) and the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC). The draft was prepared by civil society organisations.

Participants urged the government to make drastic changes to the law so that the practice of acquittal of the accused in honour-related killings and violence on the basis of compromise could be checked.

The regional head of Aurat Foundation, Shabeena Ayaz, said a draft of law was prepared by prominent women’s rights activists Late Shehla Zia in 2004 and was shared with parliamentarians so as to enact it, but unfortunately, a much diluted and a toothless law was passed by the Parliament through which amendments were made in the PPC and CrPC in 2004.

Mr Ayaz said according to a study conducted by them about honour killings in three years, from 2008 to 2010, a total of 1,636 women were killed in the name of honour across the country. She, however, added that during the same period, another 4,242 women were killed for unidentified reasons and they believed that most of them had also fallen prey to the inhuman custom.

Ms Riffat Butt, legal adviser to the National Commission on the Status of Women, presented the proposed amendments to the law. She said through he Criminal Law (Amendment) Act, 2004, amendments were made to PPC and CrPC but one major demand of declaring honour-related offences as non-compoundable was not included in it.

She proposed that in the definitions given in Section 299 of PPC sub-clause (ii) should be replaced with new elaborate one which states: “qatl committed in the name or on the pretext of honour shall mean and include qatl committed in the name or on the pretext of karo kari, siyah kari or similar other customs or practices or for the vindication of honour or ghairat, or in anticipation of violation of honour or ghairat, whether due to grave and sudden provocation or not.”

She proposed that another Sub-section 299 (c) be incorporated to the ordinance to add definition of a damage caused to a person on the name or pretext of honour.

Ms Butt recommended that a new section, 302-B, be added to the PPC for punishing abettors in crime of honour-related violence.

The draft of the proposed amendments called upon the government to add a new section in PPC so as to declare such like offences as non-compoundable.

Chairwoman of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Commission on the Status of Women Zubaida Khatoon said unless the state had not been assuming its responsibility in such like offences and the authority of the legal heirs of pardoning the offenders was not withdrawn, the problem could not be tackled.Other speakers and participants also agreed that offences related to honour should be made non-compoundable. They also said courts should avoid the practice of awarding lesser sentence to perpetrators of such crimes on the ground of mitigating circumstances and offenders should be awarded maximum sentence provided under the law.