The little slaves

Developing a hard outer shell is essential if you are going to survive as a gora in Pakistan. You need to become beggar-blind, never make the mistake of looking them in the eye. No, it is not going to make much difference telling that man to stop beating his donkey. And how old is the child carrying a load of bricks up an incline to the kiln? Look away… look away. That village wedding you went to, the one where it looked like a couple of oversized dolls being betrothed? Or the other wedding where the groom in his dotage stood next to a weeping girl that had her future written all over her face? Look away… look away.

Without the shell you see everything. Feel everything. Want to reach out. Change things. Halt the abuses. Nurture and protect the children. And shell-less you are drained in days… weeks at most. Sucked dry. A bleeding heart left without a drop of the red stuff.

The personal carapace is carefully maintained, has been for years. Pretty much immune to all but a direct nuclear hit. My daily bread is of the stories of inequality, the have-nots by the many millions. They are written about from the Olympian heights of a comfortable office in a comfortable house with domestic staff that cater to my needs and provide the added layer of insulation between self and a hard old world.

But not entirely immune. Not entirely. And a little girl with a battered face and horribly scarred hands has got through my protective layers. Readers of this column will probably be aware of the story. And if you aren’t then you should be because it is off the scale in terms of the truly appalling. A girl sold by her family for a reported Rs18,000 when she was eight to an additional district and sessions judge with whom she lived a life of servitude and abuse. Matters came to light when pictures of her injuries appeared on social media. The judge and his wife were duly arrested, accused of a range of offences — and now look likely to walk free as the father of the child has ‘forgiven’ the judge in an appearance he made in court. The judge hearing the case took the view that the child was being untruthful.

Take a look at those injuries, Dear Reader. Don’t look away. Take a look. Self-inflicted? Really? The father of the child said he had ‘investigated the matter on his own’ — and found the case to be false. Oh really? Here is what a medico-legal officer of the Pakistan institute of Medical Sciences said in his report… ‘There is swelling and blackening of right upper and lower eyelid … swelling and burn marks superficial in nature on the torso … abrasion on the right side of face and over left ear’.

Speaking as a social worker that investigated many cases of child abuse in the UK I can tell you that no child is able to inflict injuries such as that on themselves. Think about it. Ten-year-old beat themselves up… burn themselves… like that? To what end? What was their motive? You think she had a sophisticated plan that involved extensive self-harm to in some way implicate her employer? And how perversely purblind was the judge that found ‘forgiveness’ to be appropriate? Remember that forgiveness is also tantamount to an admission that an offence took place. The additional district and sessions judge really had inflicted those wounds. Really had beaten this child. Really had kept her in confinement. And likely his wife had a hand in it as well — complicit if not an actual abuser. But no worries hey… they are forgiven.

So what is the Land of the Pure about to do to protect this child who has been returned to the custody of her father? Zip. Nada. Nowt. It’s just one of those cultural things, isn’t it? The way things get done here. Bit like honour killing really. Anybody going to make a fuss about this beyond having a huff on Twitter? How about taking the child in? Anybody? Anybody? Yup this one really did get through the hardened layer. You comfy? I hope not.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 5^th, 2017.

Like Opinion & Editorial on Facebook, follow @ETOpEd on Twitter to receive all updates on all our daily pieces.