‘Denial of rights behind high suicide rate in Chitral’

Sunday, December 07, 2008 By by Our correspondent

CHITRAL: Speakers at a workshop here Saturday said denial of rights to women was the major cause of increasing suicide rate among them. The one-day workshop was organised by the Easy & Equitable Access to Justice for women of Chitral — a project launched by Legal Awareness Programme of Human Rights (Laph) funded by Ireland-based NGO Trocaire, at Bamboret village of Kalash valley. The speakers said there was only one female doctor for 100,000 women patients and only three per cent girls students reach metric level and the rest could not continue with their studies owing to variety of reasons. The speakers criticised education system in Chitral especially in Kalash valleys. They alleged that some teachers remained absent or pay 2,000 per month to educated girls to take classes. Those how spoke on the occasion included Gulshad, Niaz Ali Shah, Wazir Zada (Kalash), Sher Muhammad minority councillor, Nabaig Advocate, Sheda, Khurshid Ahamd Naib and Rahmat Elahi.