Why grown men rape minors is a conundrum, no one has completely figured out and whoever says otherwise is a lie. Because, when you are adept at something, you control it not the contrary, therefore; we have failed time and again in finding the root answers to this nocuous act of pedophilia or perhaps we are looking into the wrong places and questions, hence, the conundrum.
The recent resolution passed by the National Assembly (NA) was an audacious decision. It, centrally, states that whoever rapes or kills a child will be hanged, publicly, to death. The resolution was passed to keep a tight rein on the increasing rape and kill ratio in Pakistan. Plenty of such cases were reported in the country recently: Zainab, Asma and now a seven-year-old Hooznoor, who was raped and strangled to death in January this year.
According to a report released by child rights organizations on 19 September 2019, 729 girls and 575 boys became victims of sexual assault during January and June in 2019 – making it seven children a day. The distressful figure enraged the public in a way that approximately 80% of the population is in support of capital punishment in public, reported Gilani Research Foundation.
There are four popular explanations of why rape happens, namely: a) sexual need, b) poverty, c) insufficiency of education, and d) lack of harsh punishments and weak judicial system. All of these explanations are ruled out, to some extent, when we perceive highly developed and rich countries like America, Australia, and South Africa implicating high rape rates – South Africa stands at 1st with 132.4 incidents per 100,000 people, reported by Nation Master, a facts and stats outlet. However, these figures do not show the cases that go unreported every day because of societal constraints. The victims and their families usually prefer to stay silent because of the fear of sexual shaming, reprisal and a bad reputation.
Another factor is the paucity of education among public apropos sexual abuse, which is a long-standing result of ignorance – due to the religious and gender axis. The talk of sexual abuse is considered taboo in Pakistan and thus, the kids are deprived of the basic education they deserve. The education about good-bad touch and who to trust and who not to should be given in the primary schools and to follow the religious ethics, trusted males could groom the boys and females could educate the girls. Moreover, parents need to step up and take responsibility because according to Association Une Vie, an NGO, 90% of the perpetrators are from the family or someone the child already knew. For example, in Zainab’s case, the rapist was no stranger but a neighbor.
However, the resolution was, chiefly, passed to set an example or a precedent for the child molesters, so it would instigate fear in them, but it still does not justify the fact that why Saudi Arabia, with such strict laws and regulations regarding sexual exploitation, has a high sexual abuse ratio.
In Pakistan, some people argue that Zia ul Haq’s tenure was free of rape cases and any kind of sexual assault because the punishments were harsh. First of all, the Hudood ordinance, under which the sexual abuse cases were tried, was discriminatory towards women and deprived them of their basic human rights. Rape was equated with adultery and if a woman, with all her might, tried to confront her perpetrator in court, the case was eventually converted to adultery if she could not prove the charges, hence, most of the women were imprisoned for years under this law. This was not the fear of harsh punishments that forestalled the pedophilic men to abuse the women, it was the women who stayed silent because of the fear.
Moreover, Pakistan is still suffering from violence under the dictator Zia. This is human psychology that when you see violence, you expect violence, and when you expect violence, you take part in it. Instead of taking a practical and logical approach towards this grave issue we are facing, the authorities are, willingly or sentimentally, taking a short and a non-binding route.
For instance, the Zainab Alert Recovery and Response Bill, passed by the National Assembly, was a promising response. The bill was designed to ease the parents’ battle in registering the FIRs and a new agency will be set up to monitor the FIRs, ZARRA. In a recent column by writer Rafia Zakaria, she broached some improvements that could further enhance the efficacy of the bill, she states that the Nadra could store convicted persons’ details in their database and inform the neighbors of the scourges present among them. A message on mobile phones could also be sent to reach the maximum population.
As mentioned earlier, an educational organization could be developed to educate the children, teachers, and parents. Rape is, indeed, an inhumane act of woe, which could be referred to as the murder of one’s soul and the predator deserves the utmost punishment for the crime but keeping in view the consequences such violent and non-binding punishments could cause to the society, there is a need for better approach to tackle and, eventually, eradicate this epidemic. One could say that merciless punishments are of no use if the rational approach is disregarded.
If we are to decimate the pandemic of rape in our country, we must understand the root questions and do away with the conundrum it is originating. And only then we could find propitious solutions and in the meantime, we should not confuse violence as justice.