Women killed with impunity as justice favours the powerful: SC

Upholds death sentence in courtroom murder

ISLAMABAD:

The Supreme Court has raised alarm over systemic impunity for violent crimes against women, noting that the justice system continues to fail those most vulnerable to brutality.

In a seven-page judgment authored by Justice Athar Minallah, the court raised alarms over the mounting cases of violence against women, observing that the bench, during the last twelve months, has dealt exclusively with the appeals arising from convictions involving capital punishment or imprisonment for life.

"Alarmingly, a significant number of these cases concern victims who are helpless women — mothers, sisters and wives — brutally killed for motives that are often petty, questionable, or grounded in misplaced notions of honour."

The judgment said these cases "reveal a justice system that appears to serve the privileged and not the weak".

A three-judge bench, by a majority of 2-1, upheld the death sentence of a husband who murdered his 28-year-old wife inside a Gujarat family courtroom. Justice Malik Shahzad Ahmad Khan dissented and converted the death sentence to life imprisonment.

The majority held that the manner of the killing was "brutal and shocking", placing it within the scope of fasad-fil-arz under Section 299(ee) of the Pakistan Penal Code.

The record shows the deceased had been admitted to Dar-ul-Aman, Gujrat, on December 18, 2013, and had been brought to the family court by police officials. She was seated inside the courtroom, waiting for her case to be called, when the appellant entered and fatally shot her multiple times in front of the presiding officer.

The judgment highlighted deep flaws in investigation and accountability in cases involving marginalised women. It noted that inquiries into crimes against the deprived or underprivileged are often "compromised, poorly conducted, or deliberately rendered ineffective," while cases involving those with privileged social status receive far more attention and institutional action.

"Public attention, institutional response, and media coverage appear to be is proportionately influenced by the social status of the victims when the crime occurs within a privileged class, the investigation tends to be vigorous, and the issue receives extensive coverage in both electronic and print media."

"However, violence against women belonging to the underprivileged and marginalised segments of the society rarely evokes similar urgency or institutional response," the ruling noted.

It added that the bench's caseload over the past year "reveals a grave absence of deterrence" in crimes against disadvantaged women.

The ruling warned that "a state where such impunity prevails — where women can be killed or brutalised without consequence and justice depends on privilege — has failed in its most fundamental duty to protect the life, dignity and equality of half of its population".

It added that selective application of justice reflects "the moral collapse of governance and the society," transforming the State into a "dominion of the few, for the few".

"A state that protects only the powerful and abandons its most vulnerable has ceased to function as a republic governed under the Constitution."

The bench expressed the expectation that the legislature and executive "shall take effective measures so as to put an end to such impunity".