Higher penalty for women’s harassment approved

ISLAMABAD: In a rare show concern for women without a dissent, the National Assembly unanimously passed a bill on Wednesday to provide for a higher punishment for their sexual harassment, expanding the definition of the crime to facilitate prosecution.

The Criminal Law (Amendment) Bill, which must be passed by the Senate as well to become law, amends both the Pakistan Penal Code and the Code of Criminal Procedure, increasing the punishment for the crime to up to three years in prison and a fine of up to Rs500,000 from up to one year and unspecified fine already provided in the PPC for a vague ‘insult (to) the modesty of a woman’.

The draft, fruit of a campaign by women activists, was introduced in the house early this year by then information minister Sherry Rehman, who won special plaudits from both sides of the house during speeches after the bill -- already approved by a 16-member standing committee on law with Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani cited as its minister-in-charge -- was passed without a debate.

However, some members from the both treasury and opposition benches voiced fears about the possibility of misuse of the new law, particularly in rural areas to settle scores -- though some others dismissed such concerns -- and called for an effective implementation, possibly with amendments in other relevant law and rules governing police.

The bill is the second passed by the present 19-month-old lower in three months, the first being a private bill adopted by it in early August -- and later by the Senate -- to provide for monetary and other relief to sufferers of domestic like women, children and other vulnerable persons such as the elderly and domestic servants.

It will be followed by another pro-women bill, designed to make provisions for their protection against harassment at workplaces, which was put on the agenda of the house on Monday but was put off because of an opposition walkout to protest against the controversial National Reconciliation Ordinance of former military ruler Pervez Musharraf that the government later decided not to bring for approval.

‘Harassment is one of the most common issues faced by the women of Pakistan,’ a statement of objects and reasons accompanying the new bill said. ‘They face intimidation in the marketplace, in buses, at bus stops and at workplace.’

It said this issue alone inhibited most women to move out of their houses for education, availing medical facilities and earning a livelihood.

The statement said that although the PPC already had some sections that ‘attempt to address sexual harassment to a certain extent, (their) the terminology is vague’ and open to interpretation.

It said the new amendment was ‘in the same spirit’ as of the PPC’s original section 509 and other relevant clauses providing protection to women but that it ‘elaborates and specifies what constitutes harassment of women in public, private and workplaces’.

‘This amendment will not only make public and work environment safer for women but will open up the path for more women to pursue livelihood with dignity,’ the statement said. ‘It will reduce poverty as more and more women will get the courage to enter the job market.’

The existing brief section 509 of the PPC on the subject of ‘word, gesture or act intended to insult the modesty of a woman’, defines the culprit as one ‘intending to insult the modesty of any woman, utters any word, makes any sound or gesture, or exhibits any object, intending that such word or sound shall be heard, or that such gesture or object shall be seen, by such woman or intrudes upon the privacy of such woman’.

The proposed new section 509 with modified title of ‘insulting modesty or causing sexual harassment’, additionally defines the culprit as one who conducts sexual advances, or demands sexual favours or uses verbal or non-verbal communication or physical conduct of a sexual nature which intends to annoy, insult, intimidate or threaten the other person or commits such acts at the premises of workplace, or makes submission to such conduct either explicitly or implicitly a term or condition of an individual’s employment, or makes submission to or rejection of such conduct by an individual a basis for employment decision affecting such individual, or retaliates because of rejection of such behaviour, or conducts such behaviour with the intention of unreasonably interfering with an individual’s work performance or creating an intimidating, hostile or offensive working environment.

NA unanimously passes organ transplant bill

ISLAMABAD: The National Assembly on Thursday unanimously passed a landmark bill to regulate transplants of human organs in the country, making their sale and unauthorised transplant punishable with up to 10 years in prison.

The house suspended some rules to take up the Transplantation of Human Organs and Tissues Bill immediately after the standing committee on health presented its report on the draft based on a Musharraf-era ordinance and adopted it without a debate to honour Pakistan’s iconic kidney transplant surgeon Dr Adeeb Rizvi, who had campaigned for framing such a law and was present in a visitors’ gallery to witness the proceedings.

Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani, Speaker Fehmida Mirza and members from all parliamentary groups made brief remarks after the vote to congratulate the house for adopting the important bill, which will become permanent law after its passage by the Senate, and to praise Dr Adeeb’s services in the field.

An identical bill introduced in the previous National Assembly on Aug 17, 2007 could not be taken up for a vote before the house ran out its tenure but it was saved in the form of an ordinance promulgated by then president Pervez Musharraf on Sept 4 the same year.

The ordinance is one of 37 Musharraf decrees which need parliament’s approval by Nov 28 to remain in the field after losing the cover of the former military president’s controversial Nov 3, 2007 emergency proclamation held unconstitutional by a Supreme Court ruling on July 31.

The bill provides for a regulatory mechanism, including a high-level federal monitoring authority and evaluation committees, for the removal, storage and transplantation of human organs and tissues for therapeutic purposes and prohibits the practice of their sale to foreigners which gave Pakistan the reputation of a virtual kidney bazaar where rich foreign patients could buy kidneys from poor people for transplantation at local kidney centres.

The new law will allow a voluntary organ or tissue donation by at least an 18-year-old living donor to any other ‘genetically and legally related’ person, who is a close relative such as a parent, son, daughter, sister, brother and spouse, with authorisation from an evaluation committee of specialists in the field helped by local notables to be set up for every medical institution and hospital where at least 25 transplants are carried out annually.
‘In case of non-availability of (such) a donor …, the evaluation committee may allow donation by a non ‘close blood relative’ after satisfying itself that such donation is voluntary,’ the bill says.

‘In the case of regenerative tissue, i.e. stem cells, there is no restriction of age between siblings,’ it further says.

The bill also provides for donation to be effective after death if a person aged at least 18 years, authorises any medical institution or hospital approved by a 10-member monitory authority headed by the health minister and including heads of organisations of the medical profession and specialists.

It says transplants and removal of human organs ‘shall only be carried out’ by recognised professionals after a written certification from an evaluation committee.

The bill prescribes an imprisonment for up to 10 years and a fine of up to one million rupees for those involved in the removal and human organs without the prescribed authority as well as their sale. Contravention of other provisions of the law will be punishable with up to three years of imprisonment or with a fine of up to Rs300,000, or with both. A medical practitioner convicted for unauthorised removal of human organs for transplant will also be liable to ‘appropriate action’ by the Pakistan Medical and Dental Council, including removal from its register for three years for the first offence and permanently for the subsequent offence.

Earlier, Minister of State for Law and Justice Mohammad Afzal Sandhu introduced a bill seeking an amendment in the Code of Civil Procedure aimed at checking what its statement of objects and reasons called ‘frivolous litigation’ by enhancing the amount of compensatory costs to be awarded by a court to Rs100,000 from the existing Rs25,000.