The Hindu : Court saves girls from marriage

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Jul 26, 2002

International

International

Court saves girls from marriage

By B. Muralidhar Reddy

ISLAMABAD JULY 25. The bizarre marriage of two young girls in a village in the Punjab province to men old enough to be their grandfathers came to a naught today after a storm of protest from the civil society and a directive by the Pakistan Supreme Court to investigate the matter.

The girls aged 15 and 14 were given in marriage by their relatives to protect four men in the family convicted on murder charges. After a lower court convicted them, they struck a deal for an out of court settlement with the opposite party under which they promised to give their girls and gold.

As a result the girl aged 15 was given in marriage to a man aged 77 and the 14-year-old became the wife of a 55-year-old man. As the scandal became public and the Supreme Court directed the sessions judge to submit a report, the bridegrooms divorced the girls on the advice of local elders.

A number of cases of involving assault of women in the rural areas of Punjab have surfaced ever since the scandalous `honour rape' incident hit the headlines. The `honour rape' involved the assault of a women by four men in a village on orders by the local panchayat as a punishment for the alleged intimacy of the 11-year-old brother of the victim with a woman of ``higher status''.

The incidents have triggered a furious debate in Pakistan on the need for a review of the Islamic laws introduced by the former military dictator, Zia-ul-Haq. They provide for convicts — even those on death row — to be pardoned if the victim's family agrees to accept cash compensation, called Qisas. Providing women as compensation is not allowed.

The Supreme Court of Pakistan on Wednesday took notice of the reported compromise between two parties in Mianwali about the pardoning of four convicts, and directed the sessions judge to submit a report within three days. The Chief Justice, Shaikh Riaz Ahmad, in his order, ruled: "The compromise deal as reported in the press prima facie appears to have been reached in violation of the law of the land and against the norms of the civilised world''.

He took suo motu notice after reading a news item in the July 24 issue of Dawn with the headline "Girls & gold save four from gallows''.

The report said the family of Sardar Khan, Mohammad Akram Khan, Mohammad Ashraf Khan and Asmatullah Khan, who were awarded the death penalty in a double murder case by the sessions judge of Mianwali, had struck a deal.

It said that after the rejection of the appeals by the superior courts, and the mercy petition of the convicts by the President of Pakistan, the parties entered into a compromise deal with the help of prominent people of the area.

Under the deal, the accused party agreed to pay eight million rupees as compensation, besides giving away eight girls to the men on the complainant side.

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