Violence against women marked an increase in the last year (2013) as 277 women, including 135 children, were raped as against 207 in the previous year. Of the victims, 62 were killed after violation while the figure was 55 in 2012, according to the annual report of Bangladesh Society for the Enforcement of Human Rights (BSEHR). A total of 53 women were killed for dowry while 42 others suffered torture for the reason, said the report. The BSEHR report also showed a 133 percent rise in violation against women during the period and termed it ‘extreme’ as 77 women, among them 35 adults and 42 children, were gang- raped of the total 277 rape victims across the country. Miscreants also killed 62 women, including 46 children and 16 adults, after abuse at that time, the report also revealed. The BSEHR prepared the report based on data collected mostly from media reports and the real incidence of violence must be higher than that, BSEHR secretary general Advocate Sigma Huda said on Saturday.
“The incidents of violation of human rights, especially violence against women, mostly take place in the rural areas though the situation in the urban areas is also alarming,” she noted.
Only punishment could not act as a deterrent to violence against women; people should change their mindset and attitude to women, she added.
Rights activist Alena Khan, the chief executive of Bangladesh Human Rights Foundation, said the human rights situation is always very much related with the overall political condition of the country.
“As the law enforcement agencies had to concentrate mostly on tackling the political unrest, the opportunist perpetrators took the advantage of it and the women became their easy target,” she observed.
“Not that the law enforcers are ignoring the issue of violation of human rights. I think they with their present manpower could not cope with the prevalence of the crimes, leading to an increase in the trend of violence against women,” Alena said.
The overall human rights situation deteriorated at the end of the last year with the religious extremists unleashing violence following the execution of Jamaat-e-Islami leader Abdul Quader Mollah on charge of crimes against humanity, Chairman of National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) Dr Mizanur Rahman said.
“The human rights situation was improving in the country but it deteriorated at the fag end of 2013 after the execution of Quader Mollah,” he added.
“When the religious extremists started unleashing violence across the country, some people started to take advantage of it. The opportunists capitalising on the political turbulence took the benefit of it, causing an increase in different criminal activities like rape, gang rape and torturing and killing women for dowry,” Rahman said.
-With The Independent input
