Declaration on the rights of person belonging to national or ethnic, religious and linguistic minorities

1. The state shall take measures where required to ensure that persons belonging to minorities may exercise fully and effectively all their human rights and fundamental freedom without any discrimination and in full equality before the law.                                                             Article 4

The Constitution of Pakistan
Equality before the law:
1. All citizens are equal before the law and entitled to equal protection of law.
2. There shall be no discrimination on the basis of sex alone.                                        Article 25

Full participation of women:
Steps shall be taken to ensure full participation of women in all spheres of national life.   Article 34

Report: Commission of Inquiry for women- Pakistan, 1997
2. As an acknowledgment of the seriousness of the issue, the law in Pakistan has recently been amended to introduce the death penalty for gang rape. Its effectiveness and impact is yet to be seen. Legislation, howsoever strong, is never sufficient in itself. It must be accompanied by devices to change the attitude and perception prevalent in the patriarchal society, as well as the will to strictly implement the law.                                                                                                 p. 82

Discrimination against women in the criminal laws
Hudood Ordinances
A set of Five Penal laws (Hudood Ordinances) enforced in 1979 blatantly discriminate against women. The most controversial is the Offense of Zina Ordinance that deals with rape, adultery, prostitution and abduction crimes which in its application make no distinction between adultery and rape. The condition of ‘four male Muslim eyewitnesses of impeachable character’ results in prosecution of rape victims under the charges of adultery. According to the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan in 2005 at least 4,621 women were jailed under discriminatory laws including Hudood ordinance.

The Law of Evidence
Along with Hudood laws, the value of a woman’s court testimony under Section 17 of the Qanun-e-Shahadat 1984 (Law of Evidence) was reduced to half of a man’s witness with implications in criminal cases and civil suits.

Qisas and Diyat Ordinance
Offenses dealing with injuring the human body including murder (Section 299 to 338 of Pakistan Penal Code) were amended by Qisas and Diyat Ordinance in 1990. Qisas means causing similar damage to the offender as punishment. Diyat is compensation in cash or kind paid by the offender if victim or heirs agree to accept.The law became an instrument for covering up honour killings, the worst form of violence against women. The offenders, who are usually the immediate family members, get pardoned easily. The violence against women increases as a result because the offenders (relatives and influential) can pressurize the legal heirs to waive the punishment (Qisas) against compensation. The law also has inherent gender biases e.g. in case of murder, the heir of the victim if minor or insane, the mother and grandmother will not be entitled to forgive.

Women’s protection: A big question
The government tried to take credit of championing the cause of women by introducing some legal amendments in past two years. However these halfhearted initiatives failed terribly in achieving more than a self satisfying rhetoric. The Punjab Assembly failed to pass the bill against domestic violence till 2006 tabled in 2003 by a women member of the Assembly. The National and other Provincial assemblies did not come up with a legislation to stop domestic violence.