Boy do we need education. What’s the use of having nukes and even Kashmir when our people do need even have access to basic human rights such as education? What do you think? Is it worth fighting others’ battles while our own suffer in ignorance?
I higlighted some of the stuff that I found particularly disgusting.
http://www.dawn.com/weekly/review/review5.htm
In the name of custom
By Abdul Sami Paracha
Women are still treated as objects to be bought and sold in certain parts of the tribal areas.
Many women in Pushtoon tribal society are still regarded as machines and the obedient servants of men. With a dismal literacy rate of 0.32 per cent, their plight is best encapsulated in a famous local saying (mostly told as a joke): “Women are meant to fetch water and collect wood during the day and work on the eleventh child in the night, as their husband wishes.”
The ‘sale’ of girls and boys has also been in vogue in certain areas. In many cases, the deal is struck by none other than her father and brother. While men seek beauty and are willing to pay anything for it, women have no choice but to accept the decision.
Noor Jan Orakzai is a Malik (elder) of the Mamozai tribe of the Orakzai Agency. He has seven daughters and sighs with disappointment that his tribe has fixed Rs60,000 as the rate of a girl. Earlier, it was up to the father to decide the rate and one could easily get Rs150,000 for an average girl. Four of the girls are his brother’s, after whose death his wife was married to Noor Jan. Those who practice the custom claim that they are not buying women but offering bride-price, as opposed to dowry, for them.
The nomadic Ghilji, Kochi and Jaji women are the most costly because of their pretty faces, height and muscular physique. A girl can fetch Rs300,000 or a hundred sheep for her family. Similarly, the Afridis also pay a huge price for a girl’s hand. In the Mohmand and Bajaur Agencies in the extreme north of the NWFP, because of extreme poverty, the bride-price is very low. But nobody is given away free of cost.
Women who are priced highly in this area feel honoured, with the deal taking months to finalize.
It has been seen, in extreme cases, that warring tribes aim for women and girls who, after they are caught, are then sold off, resettled or forcibly married to them.
In 1998, about 65 women were reported missing in fighting between two groups in the Orakzai and Kurram Agencies. Instead of taking lives to bring each other down, they (the tribes) attack each other’s honour, to sully it in the eyes of neighbouring tribes. The act also helps to get leverage in case a jirga (a reconciliatory meeting) is held at the end of the war. There have been reports confirming the fact that rival tribes had sold better-looking women and girls to pimps in Peshawar’s flesh trade market.
According to local sources, during the last 20 years, in the Orakzai Agency alone, at least 19 girls have been condemned to honour killings. The number exceeds 100 if the other tribal areas are included. From the 20 cases, only three of the men involved were killed. The remaining fled the area, leaving behind their loved ones to be sacrificed. In Pushto these women are called Tora which means ‘stigma’, the same meaning as the term Karo in the interior of Sindh. Here, too, the same term is used for killing them in the name of honour. For the judgement of Tora, only one witness is sufficient, who can himself perform the ritual at the scene or can report the matter to the families of the couple, who can then kill them separately in their homes. In most of the cases, the absconding male never returns to his village for the rest of his life
The tribesmen also buy women from the other provinces for the sake of prostitution. During a military operation in the famous gun-manufacturing town of Darra Adam Khel, the army recovered dozens of girls from the dens of hotel owners. Most of the girls, kept in the CIA cell in Kohat while they waited to be handed over to their families from different parts of the country, reported that they had seen sunlight after more than a year. The hotel staff had offered some of them to truck drivers, while others were sold to potential buyers soon after reaching the tribal area. Since then, no word has been heard about them. The influential tribesmen, who are still involved in this inhuman business, were never arrested nor punished. Instead, they were all exonerated after they had paid a fine under tribal norms to the administration and the elders.
In 1998, four school teachers were kidnapped by a group of women traffickers from Darra Adam Khel. A proclaimed offender, Mujahid, who acted as a go- between, later sold them to another party in Parachinar for Rs250,000. From there, these innocent school teachers were whisked away to Swat to a newly-established brothel. One girl managed to escape from the den following which the police got the other three released too. However, under immense pressure from the other tribes, the parents did not allow them to enter their homes.
The man who had taken the girls from Darra to Kohat was kidnapped by the tribesmen and was burnt alive in the bazaar to avenge the girls’ kidnapping. His name was Riaz. No investigations were conducted into the case and the file was closed at the request of the teachers’ relatives.
Rich tribesmen of Orakzai, Waziristan and the Kurram Agencies would buy girls from Swat, Charsadda and Mardan at extremely low prices. Afterwards, they would kill their enemy next to their wives, declaring them to be Tora. To discourage the practice of making alien women scapegoats, elders have now banned such killings and imposed a restriction on them, saying that only local girls could be killed on such charges, not outsiders.
Honour always demands sacrifices from women. In 1945, Israrullah was engaged to Bibi Khani. He left soon after to work in Bombay. He returned in 1986 to bury his wife-to-be who had died while waiting for him. In these areas, such women are respected. The people of their tribe proudly proclaim: “Sar aey spin kro” (For the sake of honour, she became old and died a virgin).
There are other bizarre traditions for maintaining honour. In a village near Bannu district lives a tribe which welcomes the barat with rotten eggs, vegetables and fruit. The bride accompanies her in-laws and she is seen off in the same manner. Dr Fazal Ahmed, a resident of the village, says that they indulge in this practice for the preservation of their honour.
The sale of boys, meanwhile, is restricted to business of a sexual nature. In Pushto such boys are called Nobanra, or the passive ones. Those who are between the ages of 10-20 years are called Ichray, those between 20-35 years are called Banta and those 35 years old and above are called Kansra.
In most cases, these boys have run away from their homes, mesmerized by stories of the glamourous life found in the cities. While seeking shelter, they fall prey to traffickers. (I wonder why do these men still need to turn to homosexuality even though they treat their women like **** .)
However strong a lion may be, it cannot fight vultures alone. Similarly, the downtrodden and weak among us need the help and support of organizations to fight discrimination. For one is not born by birth without honour, it is society which makes people good or evil.