Six-year-old Zainab Ansari was sexually mauled, murdered and thrown on a garbage pile in 2018 while her parents, away on Umrah, prayed for her recovery. She was not the first such victim in Kasur, but her case shook up the conscience of the society and a bill, named after her, has been presented in the parliament.

In an exclusive interview with The News on Sunday, Human Rights Minister Dr Shireen Mazari said that the popular demand for child abusers is public hanging. “We (the government), however, had proposed hanging for rapists in The Zainab Alert, Response and Rapid Recovery Bill, 2019,” she said.

She said the opposition parties did not agree to death penalty in the sub-committee, which is why it got delayed. They have now developed an agreement that instead of death penalty, the rapists should get life imprisonment. Now that they have agreed, it is hoped that the bill will be through the committee on December 20.

Dr Mazari said that she would try to get the bill finalised before December 20 so that it can be put up for discussion in the NA session.

When asked why the government needed the opposition support on this particular bill while it has made other laws without the opposition support, she responded that the government wanted consensus on this law.

She says that the federal government is sensitising the police and the society about child abuse but due to the 18th Amendment its purview is limited to the Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT). She said the provinces too wanted law extended to their territories.

She says the police must register the case promptly after a child abuse incident is reported according to the law.

Under The Zainab Alert Bill, she explains, a special committee will be formed which “will gradually link with the Commission for Protection of Child; hence, its purview will be extended to the entire country,” she says.

She said under the proposed law, anyone may be able to issue an alert if a child is considered under threat. This message will automatically be conveyed to all authorities concerned, including the police.

The government has recently introduced Mera Bacha, a phone app. She says her ministry has taken the initiative to reach out to parents and teachers at all school in the federal capital to “educate them on how to protect their children against abuse and what should they look for while they send their children outside of the house”.

She says 12 committees comprising housewives, teachers, trainers, clerics and opinion leaders in Islamabad have been formed to educate people about child abuse.

“I have asked, all MNAs… to use the material (visual and written) to create awareness of child abuse in their constituencies,” she says.

She says a meeting has taken place in the PM House to discuss how to engage clerics in the prevention of child abuse. “Mosques can play a role in stopping this evil and we should facilitate them in this regard,” she says.

“Unfortunately, PPP Chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari formed a sub-committee in the National Assembly Standing Committee and that sub-committee took a lot of time in reaching a consensus. After that the draft bill was sent to Law Ministry which sent it back to the Standing Committee. But I am hopeful it will be put to discussion in the National Assembly by December 20,” she says.

The writer studies and teaches media. He can be reached on Twitter at @furraat