The 88th Academy Awards was widely criticized for nominating overwhelmingly white actors, directors and writers. But filmmaker Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy, who became the first Pakistani to win an Oscar in 2012 for her short film, Saving Face, was an exception. She again won the best documentary short award for her latest film, A Girl in the River: The Price of Forgiveness, which tells the story of a girl who survived an “honour killing” in Pakistan. Obaid-Chinoy has since been hailed as a symbol of Pakistani achievement and one of the country’s most renowned advocates for women’s rights.
But the discourse in Pakistan that followed her award has gone beyond her personal success. On the one hand, her Oscar set off a debate on what kind of message she is sending to the world about Pakistan by calling international attention to what many regard as a horrific reality within the country. On the other hand, there is a renewed focus on reporting honour killings and what action Pakistan can take to put an end to them. Just days before the ceremony, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif met with Obaid-Chinoy and proclaimed he would eradicate honour killings in Pakistan.
Honour killing, when mostly women and girls who have committed allegedly shameful acts are murdered by her family members to restore their honour, is an ancient tradition found in cultures throughout the world. The United Nations estimates that five thousand honour killings occur annually, although advocacy groups believe the actual number is much higher. According to different human rights organizations, Pakistan takes a large share of the global total with roughly a thousand honour killings every year.
Obaid-Chinoy with Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif - who she claims to have influenced greatly with her work
In the past, international attention brought momentum to local activists and evoked a government response
In making A Girl in the River, Obaid-Chinoy transformed a small news item into the story of Saba Qaiser, who survived being beaten, shot in the head and thrown into a river by her uncle and father for choosing her own husband. Her attempt to dodge the gun shot is marked on her face by the graze of the bullet which ripped her left cheek. Her father, who was interviewed for the film, took the act as a point of pride.
Upon Obaid-Chinoy’s Oscar win, some criticized the award on social media under the hashtag #WeDisownSharmeen out of concern that a misleading image of Pakistan was being displayed. Twitter users, among them prominent activists, politicians and journalists, accused her of defaming Pakistan and opportunism by playing into the Western media’s overwhelmingly negative portrayal of the country.
But others responded saying that honour killings in Pakistan need to be discussed frankly and openly. In an article for Dawn, writer Hamna Zubair argued that the documentary was just as much about resilience as injustice, and that Obaid-Chinoy’s duty as a filmmaker was to present a truthful, un-sanitized image of Pakistan.
In the past, international attention to an issue in Pakistan has brought momentum to local activists and evoked a government response. Last year, when the New York Times revealed that the software company, Axact, had been churning out diplomas through fake online degree programs, the government began an investigation into the company. Since the popular Facebook page Humans of New York featured profiles of bonded laborers working at brick kilns, more police raids have been conducted to free them.
Saba Qaiser, whose struggle is depicted in Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy's film
Activists caution that the impact of the award is meaningless if limited to an Oscar moment
Even Obaid-Chinoy’s last Oscar-winning film, Saving Face, helped bring attention to the issue of acid attacks. The government subsequently passed the Acid and Crimes Bill in 2014 which mandates specific punishments for the crime of throwing acid on an individual with the intent to harm.
The latest Oscar award is being seen as a potential game-changer for honour killings as well. But activists caution that the impact of the award is meaningless if left to a brief Oscar moment. The hope is that renewed attention will mark the beginning of a long, slow fight to change the laws and attitudes that allow honor killings to continue.
Photo credits - AFP
“The fact that this kind of international award pushes greater policy and a greater focus on trying to make sure that they change it is a huge thing. But at the same time we have to remember that the cultural mindset changes much of the laws, and that will take greater time,” says Maliha Zia Lari, manager of law and gender at the Aurat Foundation, a women’s rights organization in Pakistan.
Legally, honour killing falls under section 302 of the Pakistan Penal Code, which defines the punishment for murder. It was originally considered a crime against the state, with a punishment of death, life imprisonment or a prison sentence of up to twenty five years depending on the circumstances of the case.
That changed in the late 1970s under President Zia ul-Haq, whose administration redefined murder as a crime against an individual and proscribed what it believed were the appropriate Islamic punishments. Still in force today, these include the death penalty, life imprisonment, compensation for the victim of the family and, most controversially, forgiveness for the perpetrator by the victim’s family.
Activists have criticized the “forgiveness” provision of the law as allowing the perpetrators to get away with honour killings. Because honour killings often happen within families, perpetrators can easily have another family member forgive them because they are the victim’s kin. Cases are often settled this way before any evidence is presented, and no punishment is given.
Legislators attempted to resolve this in 2005 by inserting a new clause into the Penal Code that gave a minimum punishment of fourteen years for anyone who had committed an honour killing. But the forgiveness clause remains in force. As long as the perpetrator is forgiven, he or she can avoid the minimum sentence depending entirely on whether or not the judge presiding over the case requires evidence before any settlement.
Without fear of repercussions, honour killings have often been invoked to settle disputes unrelated to matters of honour. In her work, Maliha has come across cases in which one family killed the daughter of another family that had not paid their debts to them on the claim that she had an affair.
Maliha asserts that the law needs to be reformed to require taking away the option of forgiveness in honour killing and prohibiting final judgements until after evidence has been reviewed in the court.
But any legal solution will face challenges in implementation as long as honour killings remain socially acceptable and governance is weak. The much harder task, advocates say, is cultural and systemic reform.
Farida Shaeed, the executive director of the women’s resource centre Shirkat Gah, says that long-term progress on honour killings will be achieved after mass campaigns to inform people of their rights and the rule of law. This includes revising textbooks, training low level civil servants and law enforcement on the legal system and making courts more accessible to women among other priorities.
According to Shaheed, campaigns will be need to target segments of society who are cut off from knowledge of the legal system.
“How do people know about the laws? Basically they learn them through their socializing process. Here we are stuck in a situation where the socialization process really doesn’t tell you anything about the laws,” she says.
Maliha adds that while socio-economic gaps need to be taken fully into account, the problem of honor killings spans class groups. She cites the example of Samia Imran, the daughter of a wealthy politician who was murdered in 1999 by a hired gun because she was seeking a divorce. For her, this attests to the need to dissociate honour from killing in all levels of society.
Some past and ongoing efforts have shown a sincere effort to end honour killings. For example, Baluchistan conducted a special training with police officers in 2004 to eliminate the practice. Organizations and lawyers have made several recommendations to the government on how to change the current laws.
Yet honour killing and the attitudes that permit it remain a feature of Pakistani society. That was brutally demonstrated in 2014 when Farzana Parveen was stoned to death in Lahore. Police officers were accused of standing by while a mob threw bricks at Parveen for marrying by choice.
“It’s a whole system that we are trying to change and I’m not surprised that it takes us this long. Unfortunately, we don’t seem to move forward in any kind of consistent manner,” says Shaheed.
The renewed attention to honor killings in the aftermath Obaid-Chinoy’s Oscar win could set off the kind of discussion advocates hope to see. But they suspect that the national celebration, or disowning, of the award will not do much to change the situation on the ground without deep reforms.
Shehryar Nabi is a freelance writer and communications assistant at the Consortium for Development Policy Research
