Violence against women in Pakistan

rdf:langString Violence against women in Pakistan

rdf:langString Violence against women, particularly intimate partner violence and sexual violence, is a major public health problem and a violation of women's human rights in Pakistan. Violence against women in Pakistan is part of an issue that faces the entire region the country is situated in. Pakistan is a highly patriarchal society, and took a long time to enact laws for the protection of women. In the 2019 Women, Peace and Security Index, Pakistan ranked 164 out of 167 countries. Pakistan is worst among nine South Asian countries on access to mobile phones, financial inclusion, and discriminatory norms for women. Around 12.2 million girls, compared with 10.6 million boys, remain out of school in Pakistan, poverty compounding challenges to girls' educational opportunities. The only positive to take from the Index was Pakistan's achievement of 20 per cent representation for women in parliament and a slightly better indicator than India on bias towards sons. In 2017 there were an estimated 746 honour crimes, 24 stove burnings, 18 cases of settlement marriages. Many cases go unreported, and many of these reported cases go unprosecuted. Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) system in 2017 has been hailed as a success in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Legal experts are critical of the system, noting that ADR can delay action. Many remain concerned with patriarchal influence in a decision-making process that has traditionally disadvantaged women. In 2019, the Ombudsman for Sindh province informed the Supreme Court that out of 350 cases, action was taken in just eight cases. The largest province, Punjab, has received 116 complaints since the establishment of the office in 2013, resulted in 42 convictions, 15 acquittals, 27 withdrawals, and 24 still ongoing cases. It also reviewed 13 appeals. Four decisions were set aside, five decisions upheld, two cases were declared time-barred, while two remain ongoing. Women in Pakistan mainly encounter violence by being forced into marriage, through workplace sexual harassment, domestic violence and by honour killings. A survey carried out by the Thomson Reuters Foundation ranked Pakistan as the sixth most dangerous country in the world for women.