Crimes of rape and sexual molestation of minor girls and boys are on the rise because police and prosecution do not consider such crimes as heinous, nor worthy of being taken seriously as long as victims belong to poor and downtrodden sections of society. For such a decadent school of thought to exist and prevail in Muslim majority country is sad, because Islam places responsibility of protecting weak and poor on state and society. Prophet (PBUH) emphasised importance of respecting dignity of women and the fact that all his surviving children were girls whom he loved.
Political patronage and a corrupt police have created a perception that the State has given a Gaming License to spoilt brats to commit murder or rape and get away with such heinous crimes. In a country where minimum marriage age for girls is 16, it is shocking when police, state prosecution and even lower judiciary allow rape of a class 8 girl by an activist of PML-N Youth Wing to be misconstrued as consensual sex.
Is it not gender bias to treat crimes of murder by boys of same age as juvenile crimes, where a murderer cannot be given capital punishment, but the same protection is not given to female victims of rape? Even Council of Islamic Ideology had no hesitation when they went out of way to give judgment that DNA cannot be used as credible evidence in a case involving gang rape of a woman within the premises of Quaid’s Mausoleum at Karachi? The CII needs to understand that DNA was invented by Almighty when he created Adam and Eve, but it took scientists millions of years to discover this. Denying DNA as credible and authentic evidence violates Almighty Allah’s declaration that human beings are “Ashraf-ul Makhluk” and capable of discovering most of what He has created and also that Islam is a religion for all ages.
ALI MALIK TARIQ
Lahore
