8,000 incidents of violence against women

The year 2010 saw 8,000 incidents of violence against women in the country indicating a decrease of 6.85 per cent compared to the preceding year.

This was stated by the Aurat Foundation Resident Director Shabina Ayaz while releasing the annual report on the violence against women at a press conference here on Tuesday.

Accompanied by Deputy Resident Director Shireen Javed, she said the report was compiled under the Policy and Data Monitoring on Violence against Women Project from January-December 2010.

Unveiling the report titled ìViolence against Women in Pakistan; A qualitative review of statistics 2010,î she said incidents of violence gathered by the Aurat Foundation during this period were based on the cases reported in newspapers as mostly no first information reports (FIRs) were registered in a large number of incidents that reflected the citizen’s lack of confidence in the police.

Shabina Ayaz said violence against women may take the form of beating, torture, rape, burning, confinement, honour killings, acid-throwing crimes and women trafficking which were condemnable in any civilised society.

She said the total number of reported cases of violence against women in Pakistan were 8000 from January 1 to December 31, 2010. These were lower than the 8,548 cases reported in 2009.

“Out of the 8,000 incidents, 5,492 cases of violence were reported from Punjab, 1,652 from Sindh, 650 from Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, 79 from Balochistan and 127 from Islamabad. The figure in Islamabad is alarming given the smaller population and high security maintained in the capital,” she pointed out.

Of the nature of the violence, she said 2,236 women were abducted, 1,436 were murdered, 557 were killed in the name of honour, 928 were raped, 633 committed suicide, 32 women were attacked with acid and 38 were victims of stove burning.