Black badge of 'honour killing'

Human rights activists hold placards during a protest in Islamabad against the killing of a pregnant woman Farzana Parveen. – AFP Photo

It is business as usual on Fane Road, a busy Lahore street where three-month pregnant #Farzana Parveen was killed last Tuesday, attacked by a group of 25 people, including her father, brothers and cousins. Punished for marrying against her family’s wishes, she fell only a few steps away from the Lahore High Court. #honourkilling

On a Saturday morning, the street isn’t too crowded. Still, there are lawyers leaving and entering their chambers. There are a few in black coats relaxing with a cup of tea outside a tea stall. Did any of these men see Farzana come under a barrage of bricks? Few are willing to talk about the brutal murder. “The incident took place early in the morning,” says a man who works at a small bustling eatery in the street. He, like others, ‘heard’ about the murder when he came to work at around nine.

For cigarette vendor Mubarak Ali scuffles between the litigants are a common sight. “It is difficult, and dangerous, to come in the way of those who are out to kill.”

Initially, Ali admits having seen Farzana’s killers run past his stall towards their cars, their clothes soaked in her blood. But then he changes his mind. “We open our shop after eight, much after the time when the murder was committed.”

A lawyer is far more frank and comes up with his own epitaph for Farzana, who was three months pregnant: “This is always the fate of women of her character.”

Noor Ahmed, a cousin of Farzana’s husband Mohammad Iqbal, and a few other relatives were accompanying the couple to court that day. Following her marriage to Iqbal last January, Farzana’s cousin Mazhar Iqbal, had filed a case with the police saying she had been abducted. Her statement in the court could help quash that case.

“We were ambushed a few yards from the court. A woman grabbed Farzana from behind and others pelted her with bricks,” Noor tells Dawn sitting outside a house in Mauza Sial village, around 250km from Lahore, in Jaranwala district.

The accounts of witnesses speak of indifferent onlookers and of policemen protecting the court building who refused to be drawn into a ‘personal’ matter. Even her husband hid under a car when the attackers came, rather than stand by his love — a woman who had “brought immense happiness” to his life and had “died for him”.

In Mauza Sial, Iqbal sits surrounded by men of his family giving interviews to local and foreign reporters. Journalists have stormed the place ever since he brought Farzana back home to bury her Wednesday last. He rattles out emotionless statements. “I want justice, no less. I will not compromise with her killers.”

His response to a question about him diving for cover as Farzana faced the attackers is: “One has to save one’s life.” A moment’s reflection later: “You’re right. It was my duty to save her. She loved me and my children. I failed her.”

Farzana leaves behind many others who failed her. The police have tried their trusted method of taking away from the victim some of her innocence. “We have an FIR that alleges she was already married when she went away with Iqbal,” says a policeman at the Syedwala police station, an hour’s drive from Mauza Sial. Another policeman calls Iqbal a crook who had killed his first wife to marry Farzana. That murder case was quashed after the family forgave Iqbal.

Iqbal says that was an accident. “She was trying to stop me from going to Farzana’s place. I was angry. I grabbed her by her throat and pushed her. She fell and hit her head against the hard floor. That killed her.”

In the village, all the relatives of the slain woman have left. Their homes are locked. The police have already arrested Farzana’s father, who surrendered himself immediately after the murder, and four others.

“Such killings are not uncommon in this area,” notes Zahoor Abbas, a cousin of Iqbal’s first wife. “Women are violated and murdered in the name of honour every day. Nothing gets reported in the media. Compromises are made and deals done. Farzana’s case would also have gone unnoticed had it not taken place in Lahore and in close proximity to the high court.”

He isn’t far off the mark. As many as 869 cases of honour killings were reported last year, according to the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan. The true numbers are said to be much higher.

A police official says the perpetrators and complainants are often from the same family. “In cases where a woman is killed by her in-laws, the victim’s family does a deal with perpetrators and accepts blood money. Blood money is perhaps the best option available to the poor who don’t have resources to pursue the case.” Dawn News