"In the cases of swara, people don't provide evidence against each other, because they are from the same village and community," Naveed Khan, a senior police official told AFP in Mingora, the district headquarter of Swat.
"In the single swara marriage case in 2012,
all 12 accused were set free because there was lack of evidence against them. Nobody speaks up in such cases."
Officers arrested
65 suspects in the nine swara cases in 2013, including Saneeda's father, Khan said, but their fate rests with the courts.
Women's rights groups say the government needs to do more to crack down on swara.
"There are more than
15 cases of Swara, which have been highlighted," Tabassum Adnan Safi, the chair of a local women's campaign group, told AFP.
"We are working to make
women aware of the evilness of this custom. Besides these awareness campaigns, we also protest
against Swara and raise voice for the protection.
"But getting evidence in such cases is no doubt a big challenge because nobody talks about it."
Minallah says that nothing will change until
the police and prosecutors are prepared to challenge the authority of local elders -- a difficult task in areas where such traditional power structures are deeply entrenched.
"An awareness has been created
against swara, that is why there are more reported cases, but the authorities need to take strict action against jirgas and stop them violating the law," she said.
And there are those, even in the legal community,
who defend the practice staunchly.
"
It is helpful in removing deadly enmities among scores of tribes, saves dozens of lives and brings peace among families," Syed Kareem Shalman, a practising lawyer in Mingora, told AFP.
"If a family, which gets a bride in Swara mistreats her, faces revenge from the family who give their daughter to resolve the dispute."
Source :
Pakistan's child brides married off for 'honour' | NDTV.com
it was not aimed at you.
