Tag: domestic help

  • Domestic worker murder case: boy’s seven-year-old sister was handed over to prime suspect for marriage

    Domestic worker murder case: boy’s seven-year-old sister was handed over to prime suspect for marriage

    A 10-year-old domestic worker in Lahore was beaten to death for taking out food from the refrigerator without the permission of the people he worked for. The house owners also brutally beat six year-old Rizwan, the younger brother of Kamran.

    The police investigation has revealed that the prime suspect, Abul Hassan, who was arrested from Bahawalpur, wanted to marry the seven-year-old sister of Kamran. The minor girl was also recovered from Bahawalpur. Hassan was hiding in Bahwalpur to avoid his arrest, reports Dawn.

    Abdul Hassan claimed to be a spiritual healer, and the father of the children used to visit Abdul Hassan.

    Hassan himself was a follower of a spiritual healer living in Dera Ghazi Khan. Hassan told Irfan, the father of the children, that his spiritual healer has asked him to marry an underage girl. Irfan then handed over his daughter to Hassan in a ceremony held in Dera Ghazi Khan.

    The information was revealed after the police were able to get recordings of phone calls between Hassan and the the spiritual healer who resides in DG Khan.

    Lahore Investigation DIG Kamran Adil while talking to Dawn said that the father of the children neither contacted police to lodge a case against their employers, nor pursued the investigation process.

    He said that the father would also be charged with human trafficking for selling his minor daughter to Hassan.

    In response to a query, the DIG stated that although the primary suspect claimed that the minor was 13-year-old, the documentation, including her record with the National Database and Registration Authority (Nadra), indicated that she was no older than seven.

    He claimed that the authorities were attempting to verify Hassan’s marital status as well.

    As per details, the owners of the house where the two minor brothers worked got angry at Kamran and started beating him and Rizwan after they found Kamran was taking food from their refrigerator.

    They then took them to the hospital and left them there. Kamran could not sustain his injuries and died in the hospital.

    A first information report (FIR) that was registered against five accused involved in the incident. A police spokesperson said that the police had arrested three accused, including Nasrullah, Mehmoodul Hasan and Shazia Bibi.

  • Domestic violence calls increase about 52% in 2021

    Domestic violence calls increase about 52% in 2021

    Punjab Women’s Helpline reportedly received 52 per cent more calls about domestic violence from different parts of the province in 2021 as compared to the previous year.

    In the records, an increase of 38 per cent rise was seen in the number of kidnapping cases. Violence outside homes cases was increased to 563 as compared to 497 in 2021, reports Express Tribune.

    Calls against child marriage increased by 31 per cent. Similarly, the helpline received 35 per cent more calls for custody of children as this year 441 cases were recorded.

    On the other hand, there was a decline in complaints about inheritance share and forced marriages.

    However, complaints against forced marriage decreased by 35 per cent.

    The helpline 1043 addressed the inquiries and complaints related to workplace harassment, gender discrimination, property disputes, inheritance rights, domestic violence, hostels, day-care centres and other facilities for working women.

    Last year, the number of sexual harassment cases had increased up to 300 per cent in Lahore.

  • Cabinet bans employing children as domestic workers

    Cabinet bans employing children as domestic workers

    The federal cabinet has approved a bill against the employment of children as domestic help across the country, Minister for Human Rights Dr Shireen Mazari has said.

    According to details, the minister during her speech in the Senate on Friday said it will be applied once further work on the bill is finalised.

    “Violence and mistreatment of children start from these households,” Mazari said, mentioning that the new bill is government’s effort to end the violence against children.

    According to the new clause, any child under the age of 14 years can not be hired as domestic help. If anyone violates the law, strict action will be taken against them.

    The move came after several child abuse cases were reported from across the country. A campaign was also started on social media against the domestic employment of children. The government had also faced criticism for its lack of laws on the issue.

    Dr Mazari had been trying to include domestic labour by children as an unsafe line of work under this act.

  • Caged children

    Caged children

    The year is 2020. We have rules. We have laws. Yet we have children who live in cages — who are enslaved. The news of a minor domestic worker’s death after being beaten and tortured by her employers for letting “expensive pet parrots escape from their cage” sent chills down everyone’s spine. It also made one’s blood boil over the callousness of the employers who had employed an eight-year-old girl at their house to ‘take care’ of their infant. And then they killed her over a small mistake. Is the cost of a poor minor ‘housemaid’ worth nothing compared to pet parrots no matter how ‘expensive’ they may be?

    Zohra Shah’s employers – who were arrested soon afterwards – did not just kill the child but also recorded the girl being tortured on cell phones recovered by the authorities. One video reportedly shows the minor girl locked up in a large birdcage as a form of punishment. Did the couple think locking up a child in a cage was okay at some level? Are we human beings or barbarians?

    It shows another side of our society as well: we all know someone who has employed minors at their homes. We usually turn a blind eye to this ‘slavery’ because they are not our own children. They are children of the poor – people who have no choice but to let their children work for strangers just so they can make ends meet. Even if we don’t condone such practices, we don’t condemn them either – at least not vocally. We outrage at the latest incident of a minor domestic worker but soon we will forget her name. Until the next incident. And the cycle continues.

    Minister for Human Rights Dr Shireen Mazari says that domestic child labour should be declared hazardous under the Employment of Children Act 1991, as this is “the quickest way to protect children in the absence of a proper law to protect domestic labour”. This is a short-term solution. We need proper child labour reforms. Declaring domestic child labour ‘hazardous occupation’ may help to some extent but when the law already says that children under 14 years of age cannot be employed and we see children younger than that working around us, how will it benefit the children? How will it ensure that children are not losing their childhood because the state failed to ensure their rights?

    Pakistan is a signatory to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child but children from lower-income groups have no rights whatsoever it seems. The impunity with which Zohra Shah was tortured and subsequently killed by her employers shows that the rich and powerful think they can get away with anything, even if it’s taking away someone’s life. How will we ensure justice for an eight-year-old girl who was born to a family so poor that they did not have the money for an ambulance that could take the body back to their village and to arrange a funeral?

    ‘Justice for Zohra’ does not mean punishing the couple who beat her to a pulp, subsequently leading to her death, but it means that we make sure there are no more Zohras in Pakistan. That we make sure an end to the practice of minors being employed in private households, that we ensure children get their basic right to education and do not lose their childhoods enslaved in cages, both literally and metaphorically.