Domestic Violence In Pakistan
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Domestic violence in Pakistan is an endemic social and public health problem. According to a study carried out in 2009 by
Human Rights Watch Human Rights Watch (HRW) is an international non-governmental organization that conducts research and advocacy on human rights. Headquartered in New York City, the group investigates and reports on issues including War crime, war crimes, crim ...
, 10-20% of women in Pakistan have suffered some form of abuse.Cited in: Women have reported attacks ranging from physical to
psychological Psychology is the scientific study of mind and behavior. Its subject matter includes the behavior of humans and nonhumans, both consciousness, conscious and Unconscious mind, unconscious phenomena, and mental processes such as thoughts, feel ...
and sexual abuse from intimate partners. A survey carried out by the Thomson Reuters Foundation ranked Pakistan as the sixth most dangerous country for women while India ranked 1st as the most dangerous country for women. Given the very few
women's shelter A women's shelter, also known as a women's refuge and battered women's shelter, is a place of temporary protection and support for women escaping domestic violence and intimate partner violence of all forms. The term is also frequently used to ...
s in the country, victims have limited ability to escape from violent situations. One of the main reasons why domestic violence is so prevalent in Pakistan is the deeply entrenched patriarchal norms that exist in the country. These norms place men in positions of power and authority over women and children, and they can make it difficult for women to assert their rights and seek help. In addition, the legal framework around domestic violence in Pakistan is weak, and the government has been criticized for not doing enough to protect women and children from abuse.


Overview


Definition

As defined by the
World Health Organization The World Health Organization (WHO) is a list of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations which coordinates responses to international public health issues and emergencies. It is headquartered in Gen ...
, domestic violence encompasses physical and psychological distress including sexual coercive acts towards primarily women by a current or former male intimate partner. The landmark Domestic Violence (Prevention and Protection) Act passed in 2012 by the Pakistani Senate defines domestic violence as including, “all acts of gender based and other physical or psychological abuse committed by a respondent against women, children or other vulnerable persons…” The definition then further specifies assault, attempt at assault, criminal force, criminal intimidation, emotional, psychological, and verbal abuse, harassment, stalking, sexual abuse, physical abuse, and economic abuse as some of the actions that fall under domestic violence.


Statistics

An estimated 5000 women are killed per year from domestic violence, with thousands of others maimed or disabled. Lisa Hajjar, an associate professor at the
University of California The University of California (UC) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university, research university system in the U.S. state of California. Headquartered in Oakland, California, Oakland, the system is co ...
, describes abuse against women in Pakistan as "endemic in all social spheres". In an
observational study In fields such as epidemiology, social sciences, psychology and statistics, an observational study draws inferences from a sample (statistics), sample to a statistical population, population where the dependent and independent variables, independ ...
published in the ''Pakistan Journal of Medical Sciences'' based on a
convenience sample Convenience sampling (also known as grab sampling, accidental sampling, or opportunity sampling) is a type of non-probability sampling that involves the sample being drawn from that part of the population that is close to hand. Convenience sam ...
of 218 women in the gynecology wards of three hospitals, 97% of the interviewed women said they had been victims of some form of assault, ranging from verbal abuse or threatened, to being subjected to beatings or non-consensual sex. Cited in: A study by the United Nations found that 50% of married women have experienced sexual violence and 90% have been psychologically abused. Studies by the Pakistan Nation Women's Division and Zakar et al. confirmed these statistics of high percentages of domestic violence in Pakistani households. Research has also shown high rates of domestic violence primarily in rural communities and Afghani refugees living in Pakistan. A cross-sectional survey of 490 randomly selected women from a rural health center in Pakistan of reproductive age reported that 65% of those interviewed had experienced domestic violence. A special report by the United Nations of the state of violence against women in Pakistan reported that Afghani refugees are left out of Pakistani services and of Pakistani statistics. The report noted that violence against women like child abuse and domestic violence is considerably high, however, proper statistics on this population are difficult to obtain.


Types of abuse


Physical violence


Dowry deaths

Dowry deaths have been described by the
United Nations The United Nations (UN) is the Earth, global intergovernmental organization established by the signing of the Charter of the United Nations, UN Charter on 26 June 1945 with the stated purpose of maintaining international peace and internationa ...
as a form of domestic violence in Pakistan. Women are often attacked and murdered if their in-laws deem their
dowry A dowry is a payment such as land, property, money, livestock, or a commercial asset that is paid by the bride's (woman's) family to the groom (man) or his family at the time of marriage. Dowry contrasts with the related concepts of bride price ...
insufficient. Amongst dowry-related violence, bride burnings, also known as "stove deaths", are widely reported. A 1988 survey showed 800 women were killed in this manner, in 1989 the number rose to 1,100, and in 1990 it stood at 1,800 estimated killings. According to the Progressive Women's Association such attacks are a growing problem and, in 1994 on
International Women's Day International Women's Day (IWD) is celebrated on 8 March, commemorating women's fight for equality and liberation along with the women's rights movement. International Women's Day gives focus to issues such as gender equality, reproductive righ ...
, announced various NGOs would join to raise awareness of the issue. In 1997, Lahore newspapers reported on average 15 attacks a month over a six-month interval. Women's eNews reported 4,000 women had been attacked in this manner in
Islamabad Islamabad (; , ; ) is the capital city of Pakistan. It is the country's tenth-most populous city with a population of over 1.1 million and is federally administered by the Pakistani government as part of the Islamabad Capital Territory. Bu ...
's surroundings over an eight-year period, and that the average age range of victims was between 18 and 35, with 30 percent pregnant at time of death. The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan reported that four women are killed in this manner every day, by either family members or husbands. Shahnaz Bukhari, who runs the Progressive Women's Association in Islamabad, noted "Either Pakistan is home to possessed stoves which burn only young housewives, and are particularly fond of
genitalia A sex organ, also known as a reproductive organ, is a part of an organism that is involved in sexual reproduction. Sex organs constitute the primary sex characteristics of an organism. Sex organs are responsible for producing and transporting ...
, or looking at the frequency with which these incidences occur there is a grim pattern that these women are victims of deliberate murder."


Acid attacks

Acid attacks in Pakistan came to international attention after the release of a documentary by Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy called '' Saving Face'' (2012). According to Shahnaz Bukhari, the most occur in the summer, when acid is commonly used to soak certain seeds to induce germination. Various reasons have been given for attacks, such as a victim dressing inappropriately or rejecting a marriage proposal. The first acid attack occurred in
East Pakistan East Pakistan was the eastern province of Pakistan between 1955 and 1971, restructured and renamed from the province of East Bengal and covering the territory of the modern country of Bangladesh. Its land borders were with India and Burma, wit ...
in 1967. According to the Acid Survivors Foundation, up to 150 attacks occur every year. The foundation reports that most victims are female and the attacks are often the result of an escalation of domestic abuse.


Honour killing

A recent report noted that one in five homicides in Pakistan are honour killings. The prevalence of such honour killings that have been reported are around 2,000 killings every four years. Overall, out of all homicides of both men and women in Pakistan, honour killings of women constitute 21%. Moreover, the perpetrator in most honour killings is the husband. One study found as high as 92% of all honour killings are committed by the spouse. The highest occurring reason in spousal honour killings was alleged extramarital affairs. Much of the data has been collected by the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan through newspaper reports, however, it is clear there needs to be more systematic research by a health agency is needed to assess this public health crisis and effectively plan for solutions as many cases go unreported. Another analysis of this research states that a possible explanation of the high rate of honour killings towards married women could be attributed to the generally high statistics of domestic violence in Pakistan.


Psychological abuse

Psychological abuse generally includes yelling, insulting, controlling behaviors, and threatening. In a study by Zakar et al., of 373 randomly selected married women of reproductive age interviewed in Pakistani hospitals, 60.8% reported as current victims of severe psychological violence with 15% having been victims in the past. The percentage of women going through current psychological violence far surpassed the percentages of women going through current sexual (27.3%) and physical (21.7%) violence. Moreover, more than half of these participants, 54%, reported being currently in a poor state of mental health.


Factors


Poverty

Associated with poverty is illiteracy and social stigma against domestic violence. Lack of an education due to financial reasons diminishes awareness of women’s rights. Moreover, because mental health illiteracy is especially widespread in low-income areas, many women do not receive appropriate treatment after experiencing domestic violence.


Patriarchalism

Another reason given for abuses is
patriarchalism Patriarchalism is an archetypal political conception that arose most succinctly in seventeenth century England. It defends absolute power for the monarchy, through language that emphasized the "paternal" power of the king over the state and his ...
in Pakistani society, which marginalizes the role of women. In some traditional societies, a man is considered to have the right to physically beat his spouse on his wish. According to Rahel Nardos "the dual constructs of women as the property of men and as the standard-bearers of a family's honour set the stage for culturally sanctioned forms of violence". In some cases, women perpetuate patriarchalism and domestic abuse especially in regard to mothers-in-law. Many women are expected to be homemakers and to perform key household duties. However, if a woman is not performing her duties by her mother-in-law's standards, the mother-in-law may seek to punish the woman through her son. In analysis of data from 3,867 married or previously married women from the 2012-2013 Pakistan Demographic and Health Survey, association was found between the intergenerational transfer of spousal violence and cultural views of women. Strikingly, 47% of these women agreed that beating of a spouse was justified if the wife had argued with her husband. Statistics such as this prove that patriarchalism within the Pakistani society has led many Pakistani women to believe that domestic violence is normal or even at times justified. This idea is enforced by a study done of 759 Pakistani women between the ages of 25 and 60 years old in which 27% admitted they had never told anyone of the spousal violence they had endured or were currently enduring.


Child marriage

Defined as marriage before the age of 18 years, child marriage is widespread in Pakistan and linked to spousal violence. Child marriage occurs most often in rural and low-income households where education is minimal. The Pakistan Demographic and Health Survey conducted from 2012 to 2013 reported that 47.5% of currently married women aged 15 to 24 had been married before the age of 18. Moreover, of those child marriages, one-third of those women reported spousal violence.


Marriages within the extended family

Consanguineous marriages, or those within blood relations such as first and second cousins, are considered marriages in ''biraderi,'' or brotherhood, within many Pakistani subcultures. Based on reported research, about two-thirds of all Pakistani marriages are within families. Analysis of a Pakistani Health Demographic Survey from 2012 to 2013 showed that women in consanguineous marriages are more likely to face psychological domestic abuse. However, findings in this study also reported the prevalence of domestic violence within the larger Pakistani population as well.


Increased urbanization

Another factor given for the rise in domestic violence has been due to increased
urbanization Urbanization (or urbanisation in British English) is the population shift from Rural area, rural to urban areas, the corresponding decrease in the proportion of people living in rural areas, and the ways in which societies adapt to this change. ...
. As people move from villages and increasingly live apart from an extended family, assaults are less likely to be prevented by the intervention of family members, who in past times often intervened in domestic conflicts. In particular, women who move cities or areas after marriage away from their respective family are more at risk for domestic violence. These women are left without parental or familial support as the only contacts they have are now limited to their husband and husband's family. Violent spousal relationships are perpetuated by isolation of the victim and lack of social support.


Impact on women


Physical and psychological health outcomes

Domestic violence leads to increased risk towards certain health outcomes like major depression, dysthymia, conduct disorder, and drug abuse. Moreover, because women are primary caretakers in Pakistan,
children A child () is a human being between the stages of childbirth, birth and puberty, or between the Development of the human body, developmental period of infancy and puberty. The term may also refer to an unborn human being. In English-speaking ...
also face increased risk for depression and behavioural problems. Zakar et al. found in their study that of those interviewed (373 women from Pakistani hospitals) including women who had experienced severe domestic violence, 54% reported poor current mental health. Associated with this self-reported statistic of women in a poor state of mental health was also a high prevalence of mental health disorders with anxiety and depression being the most common. In particular, physical violence has long-term, negative psychological impacts on women with stigma against mental health serving as an impediment to treatment. Physical violence may cause permanent disfigurement and ailments leading to a variety of psychological disorders, such as depression. Women are often unable to receive treatment for psychological disorders as mental health within the cultural realm of Pakistan is not considered a health matter. Mental health illiteracy leads to treatment of mental health disorders superstitiously or not at all. Another study that examined domestic violence and pregnancy among Pakistani women found that 51% of respondents reported experiencing domestic violence in the six months prior to or after pregnancy. The researchers of this study and others have suggested due to the prevalence of domestic violence in pregnant women that domestic violence be screened for during antenatal care.


Bargaining power

Women in domestic violence relationships often have no recourse of escaping due to fear of murder from the perpetrator. A vivid example of this is the practice of ''watta satta'', or bride exchange, whereby a daughter from one family is swapped for a daughter of another in a brother-sister pair. Power dynamics between the families follow a revenge-based model. If a husband is harsh on his wife then the mutual threat exists of the husband's brother-in-law being harsh on his sister. These reciprocal threats leave women in positions with little to no bargaining power. This leaves women in a position where they cannot escape a marriage because of cross bride exchange family entanglement. Adding to the complexity, divorce is also highly stigmatized within the Pakistani culture. Bargaining power of women in domestic violence relationships is also minimal due to residence with the husband's family. Particularly, in rural areas, if a woman in a domestic violence relationship is living with her husband's family, she has little recourse to seek help or escape. Studies on attitudes of domestic violence in Pakistan have shown that though these families in rural areas may wish to help their daughter, it is costly to continuously visit her. In other cases, domestic violence perpetrator families have been shown to taunt or ridicule those seeking justice.


Policy initiatives


General legislation against domestic violence

In 2009 a Domestic Violence Protection bill was proposed by Yasmeen Rehman of the
Pakistan People’s Party The Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) is a political party in Pakistan and one of the three major Pakistani political parties alongside the Pakistan Muslim League (N) and Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf. With a centre-left political position, it is curr ...
. It was passed in the
National Assembly In politics, a national assembly is either a unicameral legislature, the lower house of a bicameral legislature, or both houses of a bicameral legislature together. In the English language it generally means "an assembly composed of the repr ...
but subsequently failed to be passed in the second chamber of parliament, the
Senate A senate is a deliberative assembly, often the upper house or chamber of a bicameral legislature. The name comes from the ancient Roman Senate (Latin: ''Senatus''), so-called as an assembly of the senior (Latin: ''senex'' meaning "the el ...
, within the prescribed period of time. The Council of Islamic Ideology objected to the bill, claiming that in its current form it will increase divorces and argued that the bill considered women and children the only victims of domestic violence, ignoring elderly and weak men. The council claimed that the punishments suggested by the bill were already enacted by other laws and suggested lack of action on these laws as the reason for increase in domestic violence. After the passage of Eighteenth constitutional amendment, the matter pertaining to the bill became a provincial issue. It was re-tabled in 2012, but met with a deadlock in parliament because of stiff opposition from the religious right. Representatives of Islamic organizations vowed resistance to the proposed bill, describing it as "anti-Islamic" and an attempt to promote "Western cultural values" in Pakistan. They asked for the bill to be reviewed before being approved by the parliament. The bill was passed for
Islamabad Capital Territory The Islamabad Capital Territory is a federal territory of Pakistan, centred around Islamabad, the capital of Pakistan. It is located on the northern edge of the Pothohar Plateau, at the foot of the Margalla Hills, in the northwest of the ...
.


Specific legislation against certain offenses


Dowry deaths

In 1976 the Pakistani government passed legislation on dowry and bridal gifts in an attempt to eliminate the custom but, because of cultural and societal norms combined with government ineffectiveness, such killings over inadequate dowries continue.


Acid attacks

In 1999 the
Senate of Pakistan The Senate of Pakistan, Constitution of Pakistan, constitutionally the House of the Federation, is the upper house of the bicameral Parliament of Pakistan. As of 2023, It has a maximum membership of 96, of which 92 are elected by the Member of th ...
rejected a resolution which would have condemned the practice of murdering women for the sake of family honour. In 2011 the Senate passed the ''Acid Control and Acid Crime Prevention Bill'' to repress acid attacks in the country; the senate also passed the Prevention of Anti-Women Practices bill.


Honour killing

On April 21, 2001, the national government leader
Pervez Musharraf Pervez Musharraf (11 August 1943 – 5 February 2023) was a Pakistani general and politician who served as the tenth president of Pakistan from 2001 to 2008. Prior to his career in politics, he was a four-star general and appointed as ...
declared that honour killings were "vigorously condemned" by the government and would be treated as murder. The Ministry of Women Development set up ten crisis centres to help victims of domestic violence and raise public awareness. Particularly in 2004, Pakistan's Criminal Law (Amendment) Act passed that provided legal protection for women against any offense committed by family members for the sake of honour. However, Pakistan's legal system has done little to uphold this legislation. The National Commission on the Status of Women reports that Pakistan is doing little to bring justice to perpetrators. If the family of the victim forgives the perpetrator, then the perpetrator will be set free despite clear violation of Pakistani law. Oftentimes, families who are caught in an honour killing case come from rural areas where families must work together in a village on the daily to live. When an honour killing occurs, the family of the victim are highly likely to forgive the perpetrator based on what elders of the village advise them to do.


Support organizations

From both international and internal funding, there are a variety of NGO's that provide support to women who have endured or are enduring domestic violence in Pakistan. * Bedari (funded by
United Nations Development Programme The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) is a United Nations agency tasked with helping countries eliminate poverty and achieve sustainable economic growth and human development. The UNDP emphasizes on developing local capacity towar ...
) *
White Ribbon Campaign The White Ribbon Campaign (WRC) is a global movement of men and boys working to end male violence against women and girls. It was established in November 1991 by a group of men in Toronto, Ontario, as a response to the École Polytechnique m ...
Pakistan * Lawyers for Human Rights and Legal Aid - LHRLA * Madadgaar National Helpline 1098 * War Against Rape Pakistan * Acid Survivors Foundation Pakistan * Chayn


See also

* Forced conversion of minority girls in Pakistan * Acid throwing *
Child marriage Child marriage is a practice involving a marriage or domestic partnership, formal or informal, that includes an individual under 18 and an adult or other child.* * * * Research has found that child marriages have many long-term negative co ...
* Dowry death *
Domestic violence Domestic violence is violence that occurs in a domestic setting, such as in a marriage Marriage, also called matrimony or wedlock, is a culturally and often legally recognised union between people called spouses. It establishes r ...
* Honour killing * Honour killing in Pakistan * Honour killing of Sadia Sheikh * Honour killing of Ghazala Khan * Rape in Pakistan * Violence against women in Pakistan


References


External links


Domestic Violence (Prevention and Protection) Act, 2012 (PDF)
{{Social issues in Pakistan Violence against women in Pakistan Crimes against women