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Does Honor Killing Really Make You Honorable?

While reading the paper trying to keep abreast of all the news, first thing that catches my eye, is a news about a mother who burned her teenage daughter alive as a punishment for eloping to marry her boyfriend, and she proudly shouted about her murder in the street afterwards.

Parveen Rafiq, tied her daughter Zeenat, 18, to a cot, doused her in kerosene and set her alight in the family home in Lahore. Mrs Rafiq then went outside and began shouting on the street to neighbors, that she had killed the teen for bringing shame on her family, while beating her chest.

It really took me a  while to digest this news. It felt like someone had drained the very life out of me. I was numb. Was she her real mother or a step-mother?  Was she forced by someone to do that? What exactly is going on in our country? Shockingly, surrounded by these questions – I did some detailed Google research and yes there I was sitting in disbelief.

“Two days before the incident, the family coaxed the deceased to come back home on the pretext that they will send her off with their consent. However, when once she returned, her mother doused her with petrol and set her alight.”

After reading the entire report I felt that I was living in some kind of agnostic society; rejecting the idea of God. The people are not only far-fetched with the words like knowledge or literacy, they also seem to be unaware to the existence of Allah. They live within a cave where their ego rules over them. Killing in the name of ‘honor’ is a common act nowadays in our country. Nearly 1,000 women are killed each year in the name of so-called ‘honor killings,’ in Pakistan – for allegedly violating conservative norms on love and marriage. This shows that how immune and desensitized we have become as  human beings. This also displays man as puerile and irrational.

Education for such people is just secondary. The first and the foremost teaching of Islam and religion should be provided to them. There is absolutely no justification in Islam for “honor killing.” Those who commit these crimes can expect hell fire as their punishment, in addition to the wrath and anger of God, as the verse from the holy Quran describes.

On that account: We ordained for the Children of Israel that if anyone kills a person – unless it be for murder or for spreading mischief in the land – it would be as if they killed all people. And if any one saved a life, it would be as if they saved the life of all people.” (Holy Quran, Chapter 5, Verse 32)

These murders should be prosecuted as such. No society, Muslim or otherwise – should tolerate such murder. There is no leniency in Islam for such crimes, those who commit these crimes are either ignorant of Islamic teachings, or they try to invoke religion to get lenient treatment.  In both the of the cases, they must be punished as murderers, in order to establish justice and in order to act as a deterrent to those who would consider committing such crimes.

This matter of honor killing should be stopped as it not only demonstrates our illiteracy as a nation, but also shows quite clearly how people through their actions have become antithesis of rational thought. There is no honor at any extent but what exists is only shame!

 

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