How millions of clicks and a viral video made Pakistan safer for women
Videos go viral all the time. Most of the time, they are click-bait: Clips of cute kittens or puppies, people caught in surprise situations and so forth. Sometimes videos are of terrible things: Police shooting innocent people, natural disasters.
The video from Dera Ghazi Khan that went viral a few weeks ago was of the last sort, disturbing and dark. While not as graphic as some that are easily available on the Internet, it showed an angry man beating a young woman. Later it was discovered that the man was the woman’s father, and she was being beaten for daring to speak up to him.
Domestic abuse has for a long time been Pakistan’s open secret. It happens in most homes and is almost never reported. Scars and bruises are hidden away or ignored by the people who choose not to see them. Neighbors and relatives keep quiet. The fear of being publicly shamed keeps domestic abuse under cover. Left as a private matter, victims have no recourse to justice.
Recently the state has tried to tackle the issue. High publicity cases, such as that of actress Qandeel Baloch and others, have sparked public debate. In some cases, laws have emerged to try to deal with the problem, such as the Punjab Protection of Women Against Violence Act 2015. The Act allows women to stay in the home — or be provided with alternative accommodation — in the case of domestic disputes. Cases can be registered against abusers and protective orders can be obtained against harassers and stalkers who harrass women.
The legislation was a huge step in the right direction. In March 2016, Basra Bibi went to a police station in Lahore, alleging that her husband had been abusing her for the past year. Her case was to be registered under the Protection of Women Bill. Her husband Tayab was arrested on charges of domestic abuse. Notably, before the Act was passed, Basera Bibi had staged a sit-in in front of another different police station when police had refused to file a case of abuse against her.
Two years after Bibi’s case, provisions of the Act have produced another milestone. Instead of being watched, mourned and forgotten, the viral video of Abdul Majeed beating his daughter generated tremendous outrage. Unlike newspaper reports or gossip passed through the grapevine, the images of a woman being beaten, and having no option but to bear it, exposed the dirty secret of family abuse in a way that just could not be denied. Internet users expressed anger at the government. Why was the government not doing anything, many asked.
The public pressure resulting from the original viral video and the prompt action of the Chief Minister’s Strategic Reforms Unit start a new chapter for Pakistani women.
Rafia Zakaria
Then the Government did act. The Strategic Reforms Unit, set up by the Chief Minister of Punjab, watched the video. Abdul Majeed was subsequently arrested. A First Information Report was filed in the case, and then, in a move possibly unprecedented in Pakistan, the female police officers of the Strategic Reform Unit were ordered to take the defendant to court. That picture, showing four female police officers leading Majeed to court, also went viral.
A picture is worth a thousand promises to protect or provide justice for women. The picture, now circulating everywhere on social media, proved that the digital realm can hasten justice for women. The initial video, the outcry of those who watched it and the actions taken by the Government showed how different facets of society can work together to make the world safer for women.
Pakistan has struggled long and hard to figure out how to change attitudes towards women and to attack the scourge of domestic violence. The public pressure resulting from the original viral video and the prompt action of the Chief Minister’s Strategic Reforms Unit start a new chapter for Pakistani women. Abusers, who previously had no fear of being caught, now need to think again.
The victory in Punjab, one hopes, will soon go viral and replicate itself all over the country. Change, it seems, can sometimes come with simply a click, or millions of clicks, all working to make the country a safe place for its women.
• Rafia Zakaria is the author of The Upstairs Wife: An Intimate History of Pakistan (Beacon 2015) and Veil (Bloomsbury 2017). She writes regularly for The Guardian, Boston Review, The New Republic, The New York Times Book Review. Twitter: @rafiazakaria
