KARACHI, Jul 19 (IPS) - While a Presidential fiat
grants bail to 1,300 females facing trial for
various offences, it is unlikely to permanently
benefit those charged with adultery under
Pakistan’s notorious religious-based ’hudood’
laws — long criticised by rights groups as being
anti-women.

President Gen. Pervez Musharraf’s reform
ordinance, ushered in on Jul. 7, excludes from
bail women charged with murder, acts of terrorism
and economic crimes. It must gain parliamentary
approval in four months, or lapse.

’’If Parliament does not pass this into an act,
then on November 7 this year, these bailable
offences will automatically become
non-bailable,’’ explained Nasir Aslam Zahid, a
former judge who recommended complete repeal of
the Hudood laws in his well-known 1997 report,
’The Commission of Inquiry for Women’.

Zahid, who now runs a legal aid centre for women
in Karachi’s Central Prison, was critical of the
presidential order on other counts and said it
should have helped release women charged with
economic offences. "It is always men who make
their wives and sisters scapegoats for financial
misdemeanours carried out in their (female
relatives’) names.’’ Rights groups have long been
campaigning on behalf of a large number of rape
victims who ended up being falsely accused of
adultery and been incarcerated under the 1979
Hudood Ordinance (HO) laws.

Musharraf’s reforms closely follow a public
debate, hosted last month, by Geo TV, a private
television channel. While little real headway was
made during the debate, in which religious
scholars and jurists supported or opposed HO,
participants were unanimous that it was
undesirable in Islam to keep women in prison.

Earlier this month, the President also directed
the Council of Islamic Ideology (CII) to draft an
amendment to the HO, after consulting all schools
of thought.

Some officials said that the President has
indicated the government’s intention to scrap the
HO laws completely. And this has provoked the
ulema (religious scholars) to vow, at a recent
convention, that they would protect Hudood laws.
The ulema also condemned statements issued by
civil society groups, demanding repeal of the HO,
as ’westernised’ and made at the behest of the
government.

Promulgated in 1979 by the then military dictator
Zia ul Haq, to strengthen his campaign of
Islamising the country, Hudood laws have since
been running in tandem with the country’s secular
legal system. Subsequent governments tried to do
away with them but invariably buckled under
pressure from the religious right. Even
Musharraf, after promising to amend the laws when
he took over power five years ago, was forced to
backtrack.

Hudood covers a range of crimes, but the most
controversial of them pertains to rape. If a
woman cannot prove that she has been raped by
producing four witnesses she could end up being
charged with adultery — punishable by being
stoned to death.

According to the Human Rights Commission of
Pakistan (HRCP), of the nearly 6,000 women and
children in prison, 80 percent have been charged
with adultery under the HO and most are from
disadvantaged sections of society.

While the apparent move against Hudood laws has
been hailed by civil society and rights groups,
some remain sceptical. Far too often, and on too
many issues, the government has first parried and
then bowed to the religious right.

"The President does not always know what he is
talking about. The institutions that could do the
work of ending discriminatory laws have been
undermined, and only bad rhetoric is left," says
I.A Rehman, noted rights activist and director of
the HRCP.

Musharraf’s inability to act stems form the fact
that he draws political backing from
fundamentalist parties such as the Muttahida
Majlis-e-Amal and the Pakistan Muslim League.
Both support the HO and other discriminatory laws.

Even now the government has not called for a
repeal but requested an amendment, Rehman points
out. "The government never wanted to repeal the
HO. It is afraid of going to the parliament as it
avoids debate on any issue and it is not equipped
to deal with the mullahs (religious leaders).’’

’’The government is asking CII to review the HO
because it wants a compromise. It knows the
council will not call for a repeal," says Rehman.
He predicts that at the most the amendments will
"make prosecution more difficult, plead for easy
bail to accused and suggest a harsh penalty for
false accusation."

Ayesha Mir, a lawyer with the women’s rights
group, ’Shirkatgah’, looks at the president’s
order as a ’’positive step". But she is also
concerned about rehabilitation. Where will they
go once they are freed? What plan does the
government have for their protection and
security?"

Rehman, thinks that rights activists can now
’’claim credit for prying open the Pakistani
ruling elite’s mind. It has taken them 26 years
to move this first step’’.

There are other questions left unattended. "The
big hitch is the bail (money) which most women
won’t be able to pay and so they will remain
behind bars,’’ said Zohra Yusuf, a member of the
HRCP. (END/2006)