There is a disturbing rise in child abuse cases in Pakistan. According to UNICEF, the reason is lack of proper law enforcement, negligence of parents and lack of awareness among the children and the society.
He also said that the major factor for paedophilia in Pakistan was the easy access of people to children due to the negligence of parents.
When unable to feed a growing family, desperate parents farm out their children to affluent homes to serve as servants, maids or nannies (child-keepers is the more proper sense in which these children are employed in those households). These children then become, effectively, the wards of their employers.
The birth parents remain out of sight, perhaps hundreds of miles away, unaware that their babies are just so much flesh and burdened bone for the caprice of their unbecomingly unkind lords. Justice has been put aside for these children.
The brutal murder of a 12-year-old maid, believed to have been killed by her powerful employer, has stunned the country. But from the corrupt government to the honour killing of a wealthy woman, the country’s rich always get away with it.
Shazia Masih, a tiny 12-year-old who looked years younger than her age, was laid to rest a few days ago after a Christian funeral at Lahore’s Cathedral Church. She had been employed by the wealthy and influential lawyer, and for a generous $8 a month.
The term ‘child abuse’ covers a wide array of very diverse kinds of crimes subjected towards the minors. It signifies physical as well as mental pain. When an adult tries to fulfil his labour needs at a lower cost, that is also child abuse. When a child is exploited as a commodity and traded for monetary or non monetary produce, it is child abuse.
When an adult forces the child to push himself beyond his strength overlooking all health guidelines for children, that can also be considered child abuse.
Pakistan is a country that does little in protecting its young children from the many horrors of child abuse that they are exposed to in and around the green pastures.
SANA SULTAN
Faisalabad
