Selective morality

We love to talk about morality, religion and the idea of what is culturally correct in a society. And we especially love to d all this when it comes to this country’s women. From society to state, everyone seems inured against the idea of punishing persons who violate or threaten the safety of a woman. A young woman in Lahore has been beaten, tortured and had her head forcibly shaven, allegedly by her husband and an employee or friend of the man. Her only crime: refusing to dance in front of him and his friends. In a video that has been circulated across social media, the victim has said that over the four years since she married this man, he had beaten her many times, hanged her upside down from a fan, tortured her and subjected her to all kinds of humiliation.

This is heart-wrenching. But is it surprising? In a 2016 study to formulate an index on peace and security for women in 153 countries, Pakistan placed 150th on the list. All South Asian nations finished well ahead of Pakistan. Clearly, morality or professed religiosity do not compel us to protect our women. We prefer to leave them in the hands of beasts – and will only speak up if any woman dares to challenge this norm. In the case of Asma, the woman who has gone public with her story, the Kahna police station reportedly refused to register an FIR and instead demanded money. The matter has now been taken up by the minister for human rights and the IGP Punjab, who has ordered that she be provided all possible help. Her husband and his accomplice are currently in police custody.

While this story has reached the media and audiences across the country, we simply do not know how many other women suffer similar brutality within their homes, locked away from public view. Few are brave enough to record messages or even report their suffering to family or to police. Society, after all, does not like women who complain. It would prefer them to suffer in silence, quite possibly until the day they are killed. International and local organisations monitoring domestic abuse believe that between 75 to 90 percent of Pakistani women are subjected to it in one form or the other. These are shocking numbers. Asma needs all our support to recover from an ordeal that was spread out over years. But we must also ensure that other women are protected from such a fate. Networks that could give them a voice need to be built and set up to offer them some semblance of shelter and some respite from lives lived in violence. Till then, our society will continue to chastise women for daring to speak up – even as women continue to be raped, abused and killed.