Four men rape 18 year-old teacher in name of tribal justice

Our correspondent reports from Meerwala in southern Punjab on the horrors of ‘honour’

MUKHTAR MAI wept continually as she described how she had been gang-raped on the orders of an unofficial tribal jury as a punishment for her brother’s alleged affair with a woman of a higher caste.

Wrapped in a brown shawl, the 18 year-old village teacher told how her screams had been drowned by laughter and jeers from a crowd of 500 people as she was dragged into a mud house by gunmen. Inside she was raped in turn by four men — including one of the members of the jury or jirga, a local court without official status.

“I begged and pleaded with them, but they were like animals,”Mai said as she struggled to come to terms with her suffering. “One of them put a gun on my head while the others tore up my clothes.” Her father, a poor farm worker, and an uncle heard her cries but were helpless in the midst of hostile armed tribesmen.

It was around midnight when a battered Mai emerged, almost naked, from the house. The crowd started to disperse as she crawled back to her home few hundred yards away, helped by her father, Ghulam Fareed.

For more than a week after the attack on June 22, nobody took any notice of a crime that is seen almost as routine in Pakistan’s backward tribal regions. Her small, remote village lies in the feudal southern end of Punjab province, where women are treated virtually treated as chattels and often fall victim to tribal honour.

The poor farmer could not dare to challenge the powerful and politically influential tribal jury. “They threatened us with dire consequences if we reported the crime to the police,” Fareed said. “We are poor people and cannot think of taking them on.”

Nevertheless, eventually the crime became national news after a local newspaper reported it on June 30. The police, who had tried earlier to cover up the crime, finally acted, but it was too late. The main accused — including the members of the tribal jury — had already fled. Six people who abetted the crime were arrested after the Punjab Government sacked the local police chief.

The ordeal of Fareed’s family, who belong to the socially low Gujjar tribe, began when his 12 year-old son, Abdul Shakoor, was accused of having an affair with a 22 year-old woman of the higher-caste Mastoi tribe. The boy was brutally beaten and locked up by his alleged lover’s family, who said that their honour had been offended and called for revenge.

“Our honour can only be restored after we disgrace one of the boy’s sisters,” the family reportedly told the tribal jury.

Shakoor denied the allegation of having “illicit” relations with Salma Bibi, but his plea was rejected. The jury, dominated by Mastoi tribesmen, ordered Fareed to produce one of his daughters. He had no choice but to comply.

Mai, the eldest of his five daughters who gave Koran lessons to the village children, had agreed to go with her father. “I never thought that they will give such a ruling,” she said.

“I am like your daughter and a sister. Don’t do this to me,” she shouted as the jury passed the order. But they would not listen. An elderly jurist joined two brothers and a cousin of Salma in carrying out the verdict. “My life was destroyed after that humiliation. I thought of committing suicide,” she said.

Yet the nationwide protest that has followed news of the rape and the Pakistani Government’s promise to take action has given her some ray of hope that she might receive some justice. “I want them to be publicly hanged,” she said.

Tribal jirga, which continue to exist in many remote and backward regions, do not have any legal sanction in Pakistan, but they are used by tribal leaders to maintain their influence.

The military government has ordered tough action against the police officers involved in the apparent cover-up and failed arrests of the culprits. But the villagers are sceptical that the main accused would ever be punished.

Despite the government’s instructions, the police are reluctant to take action against the influential feudal and tribal lords who have allegedly provided shelter to the criminals. It has been reported that the police are pressurising Mr Fareed and his daughter to change their statements. “We are not sure whether the tribal jury could give such a ruling,” a senior officer said when asked about the investigation.

While the police denied that any other similar incident had taken place, the villagers said that the use of gang-rape as a device to avenge “the honour” was quite common in the area. According to a report in a local newspaper, a young girl committed suicide after she had been gang-raped.

There have also been reports of murder of a large number of women, particularly in the tribal areas, in the name of honour. There have been many cases in which a woman was killed only on suspicion of having had extramarital sex.

The independent Human Rights Commission of Pakistan has expressed concern over the increasing incidents of crime against women. “The gang-rape of a young girl as a form of punishment presents an alarming picture of the conditions in which so many women live and the atrocities they face,” Afrasiab Khattak, the commission chairman, said.

He said it was clear that such a crime could not take place without the connivance of the local authorities, especially the police. The commission has demanded the immediate disbanding of all tribal jirgas.