Religious groups say law protecting women from abuse 'un-Islamic'

An all-parties conference asks the government to retract the law passed by Punjab Assembly last month


Reuters March 15, 2016
JUI-F chief Maulana Fazlur Rehman and other leaders attend a joint meeting of religious organisations on Women Protection Bill in Lahore on March 15, 2016. PHOTO: NNI

LAHORE: An all-parties conference convened by Jamaat-e-Islami and attended by powerful religious groups asked the government on Tuesday to retract an "un-Islamic" law that gives unprecedented protection to female victims of violence.

The Women's Protection Act, passed by Punjab Assembly last month, gives legal protection to women from domestic, psychological and sexual violence.

It also calls for the creation of a toll-free abuse reporting hot line, women's shelters and district-level panels to investigate reports of abuse and mandates the use of GPS bracelets to keep track of offenders.

Fazl says PM has promised to tweak women’s law

Domestic abuse, economic discrimination and acid attacks made Pakistan the world's third most dangerous country in the world for women, a 2011 Thomson Reuters Foundation expert poll showed.

But since the law's passage, many conservative clerics and religious leaders have denounced it as being in conflict with the Muslim holy book, the Quran, and the constitution.

On Tuesday, representatives of more than 35 religious parties and groups came together for a conference called by the Jamaat-e-Islami party and condemned the women's protection law as un-Islamic.

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"The controversial law to protect women was promulgated to accomplish the West's agenda to destroy the family system in Pakistan," read the joint declaration issued at the end of the concrescence. "This act ... is redundant and would add to the miseries of women."

The passage of the new law was welcomed by rights groups but spirits have since dampened as conservative voices have increasingly called for its retraction.

CII rules women's protection law 'un-Islamic'

On Monday, Fazlur Rehman, the chief of one of Pakistan's largest religious parties, the Jamiat-e-Ulema Islam, said Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had promised him at a meeting that he would address the reservations of religious parties.

“Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif heard our reservations against the Punjab Protection of Women Against Violence Act 2016. He promised to amend the law so that it doesn’t contravene the teachings of the holy Quran,” Maulana Fazl told journalists at his residence.

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Earlier this month, the Council of Islamic Ideology, a powerful Pakistani religious body that advises the government on the compatibility of laws with Islam, declared the Women’s Protection Act un-Islamic.

A prominent lawyer has also filed a petition in the top sharia court asking it to strike down the law.

COMMENTS (19)

Kolsat | 8 years ago | Reply @Tauseef: So according to you abuse of anyone is ok. Stopping abuses in society is not a western concept all civilised societies should follow it. People who think such as you disgust me.
Kolsat | 8 years ago | Reply I was amazed to read this news item. On one hand these same religious leaders tell the world that Islam considers women as equal and then oppose the law protecting women from abuse. How can any religion permit abuse of anyone let alone women? There is something very wrong somewhere.
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