Crimes against women growing in nation’s ‘bastion’

Two NGOs release report on violent crimes against women in 2010.

ISLAMABAD: Violence and crimes against women are nowhere near any noticeable decline despite the efforts of NGOs  and growing social awareness against gender prejudices.

This is the conclusion of a report on violence against women that are going to be announced shortly.

In 2010, “the more vulnerable citizens in the country were greatly exploited and made victims of violence,” states a draft of the report prepared by Aurat Foundation and Violence Against Women (VAW) watch group at a local hotel on Thursday. The already grim state of affairs for women seems to be made a tad bleaker by the fact that FIRs were not registered in a large number of cases that only appeared in newspapers in 2010, reflecting the citizens’ lack of confidence in the police.

Out of a total of 8,000 incidents of violence against women reported in 2010, 5,492 were reported in Punjab, 1,652 in Sindh, 650 in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P), 79 in Balochistan and 127 from Islamabad. Given the smaller population and high security maintained in the federal capital, the figures from Islamabad are quite alarming.

Compared to 2009, the figures for 2010 suggest a decrease of six per cent in the total number of violent incidents. However, this could be due to the fact that the recent floods led to the loss of official, judicial and crime records and media attention was focused on relief activities throughout the country.

From the total number of reported incidents, the highest number pertained to abduction/kidnapping (2,236), followed by murder (1,436) and rape/gang rape (928). Acid attacks and burning were the least reported crimes.

A comparison of figures from 2009 with those of 2010 shows a total of 12.53 per cent increase in abduction/kidnapping and 3.76 per cent increase in murder. The number of rape incidents curiously remained the same in both years. In the case of acid throwing and burning, there was a decrease of 39.62 per cent and 24 per cent respectively.

Of the total number of abduction/kidnapping cases, 1,890 were reported in Punjab, 246 in Sindh, 77 in K-P, two in Balochistan and 21 in Islamabad.

Of murder cases, 758 were reported in Punjab, 309 in Sindh, 328 in K-P, 15 from Balochistan and 27 in Islamabad. Of the total rape incidents, 741 cases were reported in Punjab, 157 in Sindh, five in K-P, six in Balochistan and 19 in Islamabad.

In Punjab, the most frequently reported incidents were abductions/kidnappings (1,890), followed by murders (758) and rapes (741). In Sindh, the top three crimes were murder (309), honour killings (266) and abductions (246). In K-P, murder took the top spot (328), followed by domestic violence (89) and abduction/kidnapping (77). In Balochistan, the most reported crime was honour killing (36), followed by murder (15) and suicide (8). In Islamabad, 27 murders, 21 abductions/kidnappings and 19 rapes were reported.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 25^th, 2011.