Pakistan is still one of the countries where the poverty rate is still rising. According to the estimates released by the World Bank in June 2021, the poverty rate in Pakistan has increased from 4.4 to 5.4 percent. In this regard, power purchase parity of fewer than two dollars per day has been standardized. More than 2 million people in Pakistan are living below the poverty line. The poverty rate in Pakistan is 39.3% while the lower middle class has a daily income of $3. 3.2 and a middle-class income is earning $5. 5.5 per day. This ratio is 78.4% per day.
According to a 2018 report by the National Police Bureau, the proportion of women in the police force was less than 2% while out of a total of 391,364 police personnel in the country, only 5,731 were women. Meanwhile, the recruitment of women in the force has increased in past years with the help of international funding. A large number of women are being recruited and serving in the Special Security Unit (SSU).
In Pakistan, there are measures to address the issue of abusing working women in various fields, where they are working in the majority.
Women’s rights groups, including the Federal Ombudsman for Harassment, have not been able to recognize these issues. This shows their performance and will.
The petition received by the Additional Inspector General of Police, Sindh, entitled “Justice for the daughter of Eve”, is enough to prove what happens to women recruits in Sindh Police. In this petition, some women have mentioned their abuses. Reading this petition, it is estimated that now the organizations working for women’s rights will have to plant their volunteer women in different places after which they will be able to address women’s rights in the true sense of the word.
It is written in the petition addressed to the police officers that we girls are on duty at the police headquarters, out of compulsion and hardship we had chosen the police department for ourselves. For which home, parents and siblings have left. It is the job of the police officers to take care of our parents and our honor after recruitment. We face people in this department on a daily basis who are obsessed with lust. Whenever there is a hearing with the DSP or SSP, the reader and the operator tell us a specific place to come where their issue will be resolved without a hearing, due to which we have to do all that.
The petition also states that the DSP and his readers and operators have set up separate rooms at the Sindh Police Headquarters, where our deeds are heard in exchange for respect, honour. There are some of our girls, with whom DSP Headquarters and some readers and operators sexually abuse, we have their photos and videos safe which will be given in case we hope for justice. If we are not given justice by IG, DIG etc. then we will be forced to approach the representatives of the media.
In the petition, the lady police officer had also suggested that a special female police officer be appointed for the ladies personnel whose reader should also be a female officer so that the ladies police could discuss their problems with them. It is unknown at this time what happened with the cops after filing this application, as the inquiry officer in police always tries to save his coleague.
Who doesn’t remember that Syeda Ghazala, a well-known name and first lady of Karachi Police, had also leveled a similar charge against the police officers who was later completely silenced. Some female officials have also written letters to senior officials complaining about the harassment of officers. Reporting experience suggests that if an organization or individual gives these women a sense of security, they will keep on raising issues and stick to their complaints.
One of the issues of our institutions is that here women get emotional and complain but later withdraw the complaint saying that it is a misunderstanding on the interference of parents and other members, which not only spreads the mistake in the society but increases the number of other criminals of the same nature, instead of regretting their actions, continue to do such things. The latest example of which is the case of harassment inside Haripur University to which the university administration remained silent on the complaint and after our reporting, there was a stir, social organizations started moving and other girls also got courage so action was taken against both the teachers within a week or two.
It is recalled that a nephew of a senior officer of SSU use to meet the women of the organization in a similar way as if he was a member of their club. If there is no hope, sometimes compulsion leads a person astray. Recently, a lower-scale police officer has been removed from the police station, about whom there were similar complaints. Even there, women were not ready to come forward.
There is a need for women police officers to form associations for their rights; report any such incident so that their increasing number in the police force is protected from harassment.
