When rapists become ‘suspects’
By Naimat Haider
Kainat Soomro should not have sought revenge after she was gang-raped by four men in Dadu back in 2007. It cost her her brother’s life. She was raped. Fine. Hundreds of girls are raped in the country and around the world, but no one has lost a brother in her campaign to punish rapists.
Her brother, Sabir, was killed and his dead body was thrown somewhere in Balochistan. His crime was that he had been pursuing his sister’s case in courts. His family claims that Sabir, 24, was kidnapped from the village of Mehar in Dadu district in March this year when he had gone home to sell the family house in order to pay the expenses for fighting Kainat’s case in courts.
Yet, Kainat says she will never abandon her cause until her abusers are punished. It leaves us wondering what good has her fight done so far for her. The only thing she has achieved is that now her rape case is being referred to as an ‘alleged rape case’ and her rapists were called ‘suspects’. Now they have been declared innocent.
However, the girl is stubborn. Here is a description of the things that have happened to her since the incident of her rape. Kainat was only 13 when she was gang-raped. Her family moved to Karachi to pursue the case in courts. A district and sessions judge in May this year acquitted all four accused in the rape case by granting them the benefit of doubt. Sabir was killed. Her family attempted to take the deceased’s corpse to the Governor House and the police stopped their march.
She still insists to go on. She cries, makes allegations and swears to never quit even if her body is riddled with hundreds of bullets.
Her voice seemed to be heard when Sindh Home Minister Dr Zulfiqar Mirza told the Sindh Assembly that the government would provide full security cover to whatever left of Kainat’s family. However, Kainat’s family believes the provincial government will never move beyond statements.
Meanwhile, Sabir’s father has claimed that Sindh Women Development Minister Tauqeer Fatima Bhutto and Adviser to Sindh Chief Minister on Information Jameel Soomro, weeks before Sabir’s death, had told them that Sabir was not kidnapped or arrested, but he had gone underground to take advantage of the situation.
Kainat should have learnt long ago that her will is just not enough to take her all the way on her mission, especially after all this misadventure. She should have realised that conscious people and government authorities in this part of the world are blessed with the art of recognising trickery in no time. That she shouldn’t have sought revenge. That she even shouldn’t have got raped in the first place.
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Source: The News
Date:7/1/2010
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