IN Pakistan, violence against women and girls is a human rights crisis. Hina Zareef was reportedly killed by her father for leaving an abusive and forced marriage. In another horrifying case, a woman was reportedly burned by her in-laws during a quarrel. Hina Javed was brutally murdered in her marital home.
The reality is that, for many, a woman who asserts her autonomy is seen as someone who must be punished. Hina Zareef’s case was categorised by many as an ‘honour’-related crime. There is no honour in violence and control. Honour belongs to the woman, who had the immense courage to walk away from abuse, only to be killed by her own family.
There have been several recent reports of violence against minor girls. A minor girl in Abbottabad was reportedly sexually assaulted at school, while the autopsy of a five-year-old from Haripur has revealed that she was raped. The rot in our society is deep. It is high time we recognise the scale and seriousness of the violence being inflicted and confront it with urgency.
There must be an honest acknowledgement of rape culture in our society. Rape culture is reflected in the attitudes that justify violence, and the immediate instinct to question the victim. It is reflected in a society where we place great emphasis on controlling girls while failing to place the same emphasis on how boys are raised. It is sustained by the silence of other men who witness abusive behaviour but do not challenge it. It is reinforced by the drama industry that continues to portray controlling behaviour as romance and glamourises violence.
For many, women asserting their autonomy must be punished.
Many have advocated for the importance of sex education and conversations about consent as essential tools in challenging rape culture. It is crucial to teach children about bodily autonomy and the meaning of consent. That they have a right to say no and, equally, that they must respect another person’s no. When such conversations are treated as taboo, ignorance and harmful stereotypes take over.
Despite passing anti-rape legislation, domestic violence laws, and amendments addressing ‘honour’ crimes, a severe gap exists between enactment and implementation. This is reflected in the dismal conviction rates in cases of gender-based violence. There is a lack of political will, and a judicial process that in many cases involves re-victimisation. Last year, the Lahore High Court held that where a valid marital bond continued to exist between a husband and wife, the husband could not be prosecuted for rape.
Under the Hudood Ordinance, zina-bil-jabr (rape) was defined to exclude acts between individuals who were validly married. Subsequently, the Protection of Women (Criminal Laws Amendment) Act, 2006, introduced a revised definition of rape, and the marital rape exception was removed. Presently, the law no longer includes an exception for marital rape. If the legislature removed marriage as a barrier to a rape prosecution, the courts must not resurrect that exception. The most disturbing part of the ruling is it effectively treats marital status as a shield against allegations of sexual violence.
In ‘Hassan Ahmed vs the State’, which is before the Supreme Court, the trial court and the high court convicted the accused for rape. The Supreme Court converted the conviction for rape into fornication. The Punjab government filed a review against this decision which was dismissed.
As matters stand, the judiciary in Pakistan accepts that a case involving an alleged rape can be converted into fornication (even though fornication was not included as one of the offences in the charge). The court did not simply find the evidence insufficient to sustain a conviction for rape. It imputed consent and effectively treated the failure to establish rape as proof of consensual sexual intercourse. There is a fundamental difference between finding that there was insufficient evidence, and implying consent where the complainant has expressly stated that she did not consent.
The Supreme Court went on to say that “the complainant is also liable to be proceeded against and punished as an accused of the offence of illicit intercourse with consent”. A woman who comes forward to report sexual violence should not have to fear that, if the prosecution fails to prove rape to the required standard, she herself may be put in the dock. In a society where fear, stigma and social consequences already silence countless victims, the risk of women being put on trial will only deepen that silence.
Regrettably, dangerous stereotypes continue to persist in our jurisprudence: that the existence of a domestic or intimate relationship diminishes the allegations of violence, and that consent may be inferred from the circumstances rather than established as an express and voluntary choice.
At every level, we are failing the victims.
The writer is a barrister.
Published in Dawn, September 6th, 2026
