Around 77 percent of honour killing cases end in acquittal of criminals, a pilot study on ‘Honour Killing in Pakistan and Compliance of Law’ revealed. The study report was launched by Legislative Watch Programme for Women Empowerment of Aurat Foundation (AF) recently, stressing need for a consolidated plan of action to ensure implementation of the law against honour killing. Author of the report, Maliha Zia said that lack of data from courts, available consolidated data, categorization of First Information Reports (FIRs), and reluctance of persons to comment on the incidence of `honour’ killings were the main reasons affecting the implementation of the law. The study showed that a lot of cases were highlighted in the media but were not reported with the police and if registered even not classified as `honour’ killing. The language used in the FIRs was not gender sensitive, she said, adding that courts usually gave decisions against the victim by using the provision of ‘grave and sudden provocation.’
Another factor which hindered the compliance of law was the fact that most of the `honour’ crimes were committed by the family members and the `unwillingness’ of the family to lose another family member, so most of the cases end up in forced compromise. Maliha said that the institutions concerned also lack the commitment for implementation of the law.
Commenting upon implementation of the law, Aurat Foundation Chief Operating Officer Naeem Ahmed Mirza stressed the need to look into the hurdles to the implementation of the law against `honour’ killings, which was passed in 2004.
77pc honour killing cases end in acquittal of criminals: study
