Will Pak ever punish perpetrators of honour killings?

The recent murder of a 16-year-old girl in Pakistan's Abbottabad for helping her friend escape to marry according to her own will has yet again brought to the fore the gruesome incidents like honor killings and killing for refusal of marriage proposals besides exposing the fact that there is no existence of any law in the country which would punish the perpetrators of these crimes.

The girl Ambreen was last month taken from her home to an abandoned house drugged, killed and placed in the backseat of a parked van on the behest of a 15-member Jirga. The van was then set on fire.

The recent cases of honor killings, forced marriages, acid throwing and killing for refusal of marriage proposals in the country is a testament to the fact that criminal justice system has become dysfunctional and failed to protect citizens from the brutal and tyrant actions.

The life and honour of females in Pakistan today is cut short with no fear of punishment by the perpetrators.

A recent article published in The Nation highlights several such incidents and the woes of the feminine gender in Pakistan.

21-year-old Maria Sadaqat, a female school teacher, was tortured and set on fire by the school principal along with five others after she refused a marriage proposal. The perpetrators sprinkled kerosene oil on her at her house in Murree.

Sadaqat, who succumbed to her injuries at Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS) on June 1, is not the only victim of such barbarity.

Despite countless incidents of such inhuman activities across the country, it is quite regrettable that no action has been initiated yet to bring the perpetrators to book.

In another gruesome incident, a 16-year-old girl of Bheel community was killed after being sexual assaulted by the son of a police constable when she went into the farmland in Khipro town of Sanghar in Sindh.

The people from her community and the civil society activists have been staging protests for the perpetrator's arrest.

In the latest case of honour killing in Karachi metropolis, Sumaira, 16, was murdered by her brother in April. He slit her throat with a kitchen knife after he found her talking to a man on her mobile phone at the doorstep of her home in Orangi Town.

Though countless incidents of sexual assault and honour killings occur in rural areas of Sindh, only few are being reported.

The article suggests that the only way to control this atrocious and vicious crime of killing innocent girls is through speedy justice and severe punishments to the offenders.