Parveen says it is the lack of justice, more than the disfigurement, which has “robbed me of the will to live.”
She is still in pain from the attack, and stays at home most days to avoid the stares. Her mother works as a housekeeper and her eldest son, an 11-year-old, quit school to work as a gravedigger.
There are shelters in Karachi where she and other abused women can learn skills in order to earn a livelihood.
“It is important that these women consider themselves survivors and not victims. It is essential for their rehabilitation and reintegration into society,”
said Uzma Noorani, who runs one such shelter.
But it's hard to see yourself as a survivor when you are treated like a pariah.
“Acid attack victims are avoided like the plague, like AIDS,” Tariq, the women's rights activist, said. “They're considered someone punished for doing something wrong. People would ask their kids to stay away from such victims, stay away from their influence.”
Rubina Qaimkhani, a Pakistani minister in charge of women's affairs in Sindh province, acknowledged that the government could do more, but said there was a need to change the mindset of the entire society. “We are making laws and trying to create awareness among women of how they can fight for their rights,” she said.
Laws already on the books bar sexual harassment in the workplace and criminalize acid-throwing. But a bill specifically addressing domestic violence failed to make it out of Pakistan's upper house because of opposition from hard-line religious parties.
Zohra Yusuf, the chairwoman of the Human Rights Commission, says the legal system does little to protect the rights of people like Parveen, but that society is slowly changing.
“You hear of a lot of cases of women marrying of their own will,” she said. “You are seeing a bit of change that, you know, they will not accept patriarchy all their lives.”
