As women MPAs bring up domestic violence, men cry ‘what about us’?

MPA suggests making 2012 a ‘Child-Free Year’ to counter overpopulation.

KARACHI:

It was men versus women in Thursday’s Sindh Assembly session when MPA Jam Tamachi Unar interrupted his female counterpart’s resolution on domestic violence to say that “men are equal victims of this menace”.

Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) MPA Aisha Khoso wanted to pass a resolution to form a special committee that could study the root causes of domestic violence against women.

Feeling marginalised on behalf of the males, Unar, who is the chairman of the Public Accounts Committee, tried to draw attention to the “mental torture” men suffer at the hands of their spouses in urban areas.

“Not only women, but males are equal victims. In rural areas it is the women who are tortured by their male family but in towns and cities, it’s the other way round. I request the house to form a committee for male rights too,” he said.

The house immediately erupted into angry calls of ‘shame, shame’ that were flung like invisible tennis balls by the male and female legislators at one another. While most of the men in the assembly supported Khoso’s resolution, a few stood by Tamachi.

“Jam Sahib has two wives and it is these friends who have two to three marriages who are suffering from this problem [mental agony],” quipped home minister Zulfiqar Mirza.

Finally, the resolution was passed. It demanded the house constitute a special committee comprising law makers (male and female), female social workers and legal experts who could study the causes of domestic violence against women.  The committee would suggest by the next session the remedial steps that need to be taken. Members of the committee would be nominated by Monday.

Unar was not done with the day’s controversies. He moved a resolution to declare 2012 as the “Child-Free Year”. Unsurprisingly, it was opposed by most legislators.

Unar explained that there was a lack of healthcare, education and poverty was rising steadily. The government needs to take drastic measures to bring overpopulation under control. After a long debate, Unar deferred his resolution to the next private day.

The MPAs also passed a resolution to establish an institute of Sindhology in Karachi. A similar institute already exists in Jamshoro, but since most foreigners prefer to live in Karachi, this would help to promote Sindhi culture and knowledge.

MPA Humera Alwani said that two of her important bills, the Sindh elimination of copy culture and cheating in exams and the Mainpuri and Gutka Act, had been pending for two years.

Education minister Pir Mazharul Haq said there was already a law against cheating, therefore another bill was not required. “We want to make a complete law. I have consulted legal experts and after hectic efforts, we have prepared the bill,” she said. However, succumbing to peer pressure, Alwani finally withdrew the copy culture bill.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 11^th, 2011.