Shaming of Rape Victim in Pakistan: Pakistanis Do Not Really Believe That Rape Is Endemic In Pakistan
By Khaled Ahmed
October 3,
2020
An Indian I
greatly admire, Kamla Bhasin, whose indictment of the sick South Asian manhood
is on record, will be happy to know that one of the two men who raped a woman
on a Lahore highway in the second week of September has been apprehended. As
never before, women from across all social levels hit the streets and
protested, effectively putting the government of Prime Minister Imran Khan
under challenge. Significantly, they were protesting against the Capital City
Police Officer (CCPO) of Lahore, one Umar Sheikh, who had come on TV
reprimanding the wronged woman for “coming out so late in the night”.
Shafqat
Ali alias Bagga, a Motorway gang-rape accused
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What
happened was difficult to take. The woman — probably in some kind of crisis
that no one has bothered to investigate — had put her three children in a car
and tried to drive out of Lahore when she was waylaid by rapists after her car
ran out of fuel. The first reaction came from CCPO Sheikh, “victim-shaming” the
woman. One website, Naya Daur, reported: “The Intelligence Bureau in an
official report on Umar Sheikh had described him as a womaniser who was
financially and morally corrupt.” The IB report further stated: “Posted as
District Police Officer Sargodha (2006-2007) he remained involved in corrupt
practices”.
Sheikh had
insulted his boss, the provincial Inspector General of Police, Shoaib Dastgir,
and was not punished, thus compelling the IG to resign his post knowing that
Sheikh was “specially chosen” by PM Khan. When the women’s protest across the
country became too insistent, Khan’s ruling party, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf,
got split over the event and some leaders denounced Sheikh and asked for his
removal “after apology”. Soon, the protest proved too much even for the
misogynists of Pakistan. Sheikh was forced to apologise. He did so, in a most
insincere manner, intensifying the women’s protest which was now not only
anti-rape but also anti-government.
Pakistan’s
chief justice Gulzar Ahmed denounced the rape and questioned Imran Khan’s
appointment of a disreputable officer to the job of CCPO. The Lahore High Court
was even more outspoken about the malpractice of appointing “trouble-shooting”
officers with bad reputations.
At the
popular level where Pakistani clergy rules, people tend to equate rape with
sexual intercourse requiring four eye-witnesses if you want to convict the
rapist. A raped woman can actually get into trouble with the law if she reports
the matter to the police. In the present case, the woman has reportedly refused
to become a party to the case for fear of being dishonoured in the court of
law. No wonder, Pakistan has become a laughable hunting-ground for the
“empowered” Muslim male. In the first 60 days of 2020, as many as 73 incidents
of rape were reported in Lahore, including five gang-rape cases — 10 cases of
gang-rape were registered in the whole of 2019.
In 2002,
Mukhtaran Mai in Punjab was called to a “council of elders” to apologise to a
kangaroo court for her brother’s alleged sexual assault of a woman from a
landlord’s family. On the orders of the council, she was dragged to a nearby
hut where she was gang-raped in retaliation by four men while 10 people
watched. The case went up to the Supreme Court but Mai was not given justice
“because she was not a virgin”.
From June
2013 to February 2015, 4,960 cases of rape were registered in Pakistan, with
6,632 arrests. How many rapists were punished? Only 219, and that too with a
lot of mitigation. Post the current incident, Imran Khan has come on TV to say
that he would like to have a law that castrates the rapist; but the women
protesting on the streets of Pakistan want him to punish the police officer who
believes in the indictment of the raped woman “because she was driving late at
night”.
The
Pakistani male, even when joining the protest, doesn’t really believe that rape
is endemic in Pakistan. It is his inborn “faith” that women are “inferior” from
the day Allah created Eve and then punished Adam for Eve’s disobedience in
Paradise.
----
Khaled Ahmed is consulting editor, Newsweek
Pakistan.
Original Headline: In Pakistan, protest over a
rape turned into an anti-government movement
Source: The Indian Express
URL: https://newageislam.com/islam-women-feminism/shaming-rape-victim-pakistan-pakistanis/d/123027
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