By Salman Khawaja
EVERY few months, another set of grim figures forces Pakistan to confront a reality it has repeatedly failed to address. The latest Six Months Cruel Numbers Report by Sahil, documenting 3,172 cases of gender-based violence between January and June this year, is yet another reminder that violence against women is not an isolated social ill but a deeply entrenched crisis.
The figures cover a disturbing range of offences, including murder, torture, abduction, rape and so-called ‘honour’ killings. Yet the most troubling aspect of the report may not be the sheer number of cases but what it reveals about where the violence occurs and who is allegedly responsible.
More than half of the reported incidents took place inside the victims’ own homes. Husbands and acquaintances together accounted for more alleged perpetrators than strangers. The findings therefore challenge one of the most persistent assumptions surrounding violence against women: that the primary threat comes from outside the home.
For thousands of women, the danger may instead be behind closed doors, often in the presence of people they know and are expected to trust.
This makes gender-based violence not merely a law-and-order problem but a question of power, dependency and social attitudes within families and communities. A woman living with an abusive husband, for instance, may have nowhere to go, no independent financial means and little confidence that the state will protect her if she speaks out. In such circumstances, the mere existence of laws against violence offers limited comfort.
The report must also be viewed in the context of serious under-reporting. Its figures are based on incidents appearing in newspapers. That methodology provides useful evidence of the scale and geographical spread of reported violence, but it cannot capture the countless cases that never reach the media or the police.
Victims may remain silent because of social stigma, fear of retaliation, economic dependence, pressure from relatives or a lack of faith in the justice system. In many cases, families may actively discourage women from pursuing complaints in the name of preserving ‘honour’ or family reputation.
The 3,172 cases should therefore not be treated as a complete count of gender-based violence. If anything, they are a grim indicator of a much larger problem.
The geographical concentration of cases also deserves serious attention. If particular districts repeatedly record disproportionately high numbers, government agencies cannot continue to respond to every incident as an isolated event. Such patterns should trigger targeted interventions, including specialised police units, shelters, legal aid, counselling services and community-level prevention programmes.
Similarly, the finding that most reported cases were registered with the police is encouraging, but an FIR cannot be mistaken for justice. Registration is only the first step. The real test begins afterwards: whether investigators collect evidence properly, whether survivors are protected from intimidation, whether prosecutors build credible cases, whether courts are able to conduct timely trials and whether perpetrators are ultimately convicted.
For victims, the journey through the criminal justice system can itself become another source of trauma. Survivors may be required to repeatedly recount what happened, confront social hostility and face pressure to withdraw complaints. Without legal, psychological and financial support, many women may simply find the cost of pursuing justice too high.
The state therefore needs to move beyond a reactive approach. Police action after a murder or rape is necessary, but prevention requires identifying the circumstances that allow violence to continue. Repeated complaints against abusive individuals, for example, should not be treated as isolated domestic disputes. They can be warning signs of escalating violence and should trigger appropriate protection mechanisms.
Shelters and crisis centres must likewise be accessible, adequately funded and available beyond major cities. A woman escaping an abusive household cannot be expected to navigate a complex bureaucratic system before receiving protection. Legal aid and counselling should be available alongside emergency accommodation, while police officials dealing with such cases need specialised training.
The role of society is equally important. The normalisation of domestic violence, victim-blaming and the insistence that family matters should remain behind closed doors create an environment in which perpetrators feel protected and victims feel isolated.
The language used to describe such crimes matters too. Violence committed in the name of ‘honour’ is still murder; abuse within marriage is still violence; and a woman’s decision to report an offence is not an attack on the family.
Pakistan does not suffer from a shortage of reports documenting violence against women. There is ample evidence of the scale of the problem, its geographical patterns and the weaknesses in institutional responses.
What remains scarce is the political and institutional will to learn from that evidence.
The Sahil report should therefore not disappear into the cycle of statistics that emerge every six months, generate brief outrage and are then forgotten. Its findings should be used to identify high-risk areas, strengthen protection mechanisms, improve policing and measure whether interventions actually reduce violence.
The ultimate measure of progress cannot be how efficiently Pakistan records cases of violence against women. It must be whether fewer women become victims in the first place.
Another report six months from now will inevitably bring another set of numbers. The real achievement would be if, by then, those numbers had begun to fall.
