Dr Saba Khattak
saba@sdpi.org
We all know her case well — raped on the orders of a panchayat (village council) with over one hundred witnesses. The alternative systems of justice, as many women’s rights and human rights activists have emphasized, deny women their rights. In this case, the panchayat usurped a woman’s rights and implemented one of the worst forms of violence — sexual assault, not a rape but a gang rape. Further, the panchayat decided that she should pay for what was supposedly her 12-year old brother’s transgression — accused of having an “affair” with a girl of the other tribe. Whereas according to Mukhtaran, he had been sodomized and the accusation was a cover-up for what had actually happened.
There are several layers to the sexual violence that takes place in our society. Women are usually held responsible (“they invited the attention”, they deliberately put themselves in circumstances where the man assaulted them”, “they did not observe haya” etc). Even where they are not responsible by such standards, as in this case of gang rape, they are still expected to end their lives for the sake of family’s “honor.” Ultimately, the woman has to pay for the crime committed against her.
The next layer, and this has emerged as a pattern over the last two decades, is the impunity with which the influential people in a community disgrace women as a means of teaching a lesson or imposing their will. From stripping and parading women naked to the panchayat or jirga’s decisions to gang rape or execute gruesome killings in the name of honor (karo kari, siyah kari, ghairat, hacking to death or simply killing through the bullet of a gun), all these methods of gendered violence have become acceptable. Further, such violence has witnesses, who are too overwhelmed by what is happening. The spectacle is about the power of torture, making the witnesses realize that it can happen to them if they raised their voices.
When an old woman raised her voice against the torture and eventual murder of a couple in Sindh on charges of karo kari, she was beaten up and her hair was shaved off to mark her disgrace for what was considered inappropriate behavior. Such incidents and methods of torture have one thing in common: they serve to intimidate those who might want to speak out and equally importantly, they serve to legitimate recourse to such violence. Therefore, it is increasingly “normal” for entire communities to partake in such violence and indulge in voyeurism.
Yet another layer of violence takes place when the press sensationalizes sexual violence and makes it into a sex scandal. They give names and pictures as this sells in a consumer market. Do we really need to highlight the name of the woman or her pictures? Why not focus on the perpetrators? Even in Mukhtaran’s case, few people would know the names of the perpetrators — they become faceless men.
At the national level, the system of discriminatory laws that cannot ensure justice continues to be on the statute books. How can we talk about the values of human dignity and justice when the system ensures that injustice should prevail? Some legal experts maintain that many judges shy away from convicting rapists because the punishment for rape (death) is not commensurate with the crime in Pakistan.
If the woman has not been killed, how can they sentence a man or men to death? Capital punishment was instituted in Pakistan to deter rape and gang rape. Legislators assumed that the perpetrators would desist, as they would be risking their own lives. However, the reality has been the opposite. The law, because it has not been implemented, has served to encourage rapists. Who says that the road to hell is not paved with good intentions?
If the perpetrators can get away with such a heinous crime, one can only conclude (yet again) that the structural discrimination and violence that women and men of this country face is at the heart of much of the ugly forms of direct violence that they encounter in their daily lives. Such violence appears to have become routine and naturalized.
Mukhtaran, a symbol of resistance and courage for many of us, refuses to leave her community; she prefers to focus on correcting the system to prevent other girls from facing similar situations. One solution has been to open schools for children of her community so they can raise their voices against injustice and powerlessness.
She does not couch her initiative in religious idiom but prefers to talk of justice. The daughter of one of the men who assaulted her also attends the school she runs. Mukhtaran says she gave the girl admission into the school as she should not be punished for her father’s crime. Mukhtaran really does practice what she preaches.
The importance of fighting for justice cannot be underscored enough. Although rapes stopped taking place in her community since she filed her petition in the courts, Mukhtaran fears a re-emergence of the old pattern whereby every six months or so a young girl committed suicide after being raped, if justice were denied in her case.
She now needs enhanced protection, but can the state deliver? The answer to this question and the recent judgment in Mukhtaran’s case symbolize what the future may hold for many Pakistani women who might be subjected to sexual violence.
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