Beyond paper

We must think about creating greater awareness about laws protecting women's rights.

Just recently, two women were made victims of an acid attack in Karachi, after one of them refused a marriage proposal. Such incidents continue to take place, despite that fact that we have in our statute books more laws protecting women than at any previous time in our history. Most have been introduced by the present government. We also have more women in assemblies than many other countries. The harshest provisions of the dark Hudood law have also gone and since 2008 more legislation has been added offering women protection against domestic violence, against harassment in the work place and safeguarding them and their rights by putting in place tougher penalties for acts such as forced marriages, the deprivation of property or traditional customs such as vani. A new law on acid attacks has also been introduced and made its way through parliament.

All this is obviously good news for women who remain among our most vulnerable citizens. But despite the pieces of legislation introduced over the years, we haven’t seen change in the status of women on the ground. Perhaps it is too early to expect so much. But given the urgency of our own situation and the number of fearful crimes committed against women, perhaps, we need more action. In fact, worryingly, several reports produced over the last few months have noted that atrocities against women appear to be increasing rather than declining.

First of all we must think about creating greater awareness about the laws. This effort should be concentrated on police and administrative officials as well as the general public. We need to go even further. There are too many laws in our country which have remained nothing more than words inscribed on paper year-after-year and decade-after-decade. This must not happen in the case of the laws against women and for that we need to take proactive action at many levels, beginning with media campaigns and changes in school curriculums.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 29^th, 2011.