Absence of laws to ensure women’s rights is not the problem; failure to implement existing ones is

Whereas many laws had been enacted by the national and provincial legislatures to ensure women rights and protect them from violence, the ground reality did not change much as such laws were not implemented. To improve the condition of women in the country, what is required is the implementation of the existing laws rather than making new ones.

This was the crux of the talk during a session on women’s role in parliament on Saturday on the second and last day of the First Women Conference hosted by the Arts Council of Pakistan.

The session, titled ‘Role of Women in Parliament’, was moderated by Dr Ayoub Shaikh, who conversed with four women parliamentarians -- Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan MNA Kishwar Zehra, Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz Punjab Assembly member Azma Bokhari, Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) Senator Sassui Palijo and Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf MNA Ghazala Saifi.

Palijo admitted that although the PPP had passed many laws to safeguard women’s rights in the province, their lack of implementation was a major issue. She said that in some areas of the province, brutal crimes against women such as killing them in Karo-kari did happen and often society and even law enforcers did not allow the law to be implemented.

She said that if a woman was killed in Karo-kari, her family members did not raise the issue as they were scared of society, and even when police were approached, often the SHO concerned would obstruct medico-legal proceedings by saying that such women did not deserve such legal protocols.

She, however, praised Sindh for introducing most progressive laws for women’s rights compared to the other provinces of the country.

Sassui also pointed out that though a majority of women in the national and provincial assemblies were elected indirectly, when the data of those legislators emerged who spoke nothing in the house during their tenure, most of such parliamentarians were men who were directly elected by the people.

Zehra criticised such religious interpretations that belittled women. Citing the active role of women in various spheres of life during the time of the Holy Prophet (peace be upon him), she said the first person whom the prophet confided in after the first revelation was his wife Khadija (RA), who was also actively involved in business.

She said women also participated in battles, and recalled that Bibi Zainab (RA) challenged tyranny in her times during and after the tragedy of Karbala.

Azma said the political parties should agree on not playing politics over genuine social issues like those related to women’s rights. She said the PML-N was stigmatised by certain quarters for being anti-women, but the party introduced a law in Punjab to set the minimum age for marriage.

She said that though she would have wanted a better law in this regard, it was difficult to get legislation passed since various religious schools of thought had different views on what was the appropriate age for boys and girls when they could be considered mature enough to take decisions like marriage.

The PML-N leader also asked the mothers to defeat the toxic patriarchal mindset by teaching their sons to respect women. She said her own son was not happy when she allowed his sister to be in the driving seat in many affairs and she was trying to reform this attitude of her son.

She hesitated to use the word of society for our society, saying it was more like a jungle where the principle of might is right prevailed.

The PTI MNA said that even if we considered the women’s population in the country to be 50 per cent, whereas it actually was 52 per cent, the current proportion of women legislators in parliament was not right. She said there should be at least 30 per cent women in legislatures.

The talk about equality of rights of both genders was also not apt in Ghazala’s view. She said Islam has given more rights to women than to men and both the genders have to play their role in their spheres.