Daily Times

Fatema Sohail has highlighted the chronic disease called domestic violence running in most of the households in our part of the land. The pictures of Fatema Sohial, with bruises on her face, have gone viral with hashtag #MohisnAbbasHaider. Though the world marks October as a domestic violence awareness month, we need to mark every day as a ‘domestic violence awareness day’, given the overwhelming presence of one of the most heinous potential crises in Pakistan. A victim keeps on living with an abuser as a spouse praying for good days, which never come. A life with a spouse should ideally be about love, care and protection, but in many cases it turns out to be full of physical abuse, verbal too, and with the passage of time, it often gets worse. Go to any physician in a neighbourhood, and they will tell you that how many victims of domestic violence suffer cruelty on an average street. A family physician often comes across victims with broken bones, bruised eyes and displaced joints.

The heart-wrenching episode of Fatema Sohail went viral for the matter involves a celebrity singer and actor. Several celebrities and civil society activists also stood behind her even before Mohsin Abbas Haider shared his version. The matter is with the police, which has recorded the statements of both the sides. This is the time that the nation turns to the infuriating happenings that happen behind closed doors where victims undergo violent ordeals every day in silence, and they never speak or they think society is not ready to listen to them. In the case of Fatema Sohial, the same thing happened: throughout her four-year marriage, she suffered the pain with daunting despair and in silence hoping that the birth of a child will change the behaviour of her spouse.

The police should investigate the case on merit. Arrests over domestic violence are not common. The foremost reason for lack of police action remains the silence of the victims. Many think that the sufferers do not report to the police because of the absence of stringent domestic violence laws. It is need of the hour that the definition of the domestic abuse be made broader and cruelities like beating, intimidation, coercion and control be legally recognised as domestic violence. Social scientists and civil society activists should work with law enforcers to find the reasons that why many cases go unreported and thus unpunished.

The problem called domestic violence cannot be ignored. Let us address it right here and right now. And the best ways to address the problem are: raising awareness about it, supporting the victims and survivors and understanding the brutality of the problem. *