Home Latest News Four Sisters Commit Suicide Over Dowry

Four Sisters Commit Suicide Over Dowry

by AFP
Shah Marai—AFP

Shah Marai—AFP

Women jumped into canal after arguing with their father, who was unable to afford dowries for them.

Four Pakistani sisters killed themselves after a row with their father, who could not afford dowries for them to get married, officials said on Friday.

The women threw themselves into a canal after arguing with their father in Mailsi, a town in the rural southern part of Punjab province. A fifth sister was pulled alive from the water.

“A poor farmer, Bashir Ahmed Rajput, could not marry his five daughters because he had no money to offer dowry,” said Malik Daud Hasnain, a senior police official. “After an argument on the issue on Thursday, his daughters became desperate and jumped together into a water canal.”

The women were aged 45, 43, 38, 35 and 31.

“We have rescued the youngest sister Fatima and also discovered dead bodies of two others. The search for the remaining bodies is on,” Hasnain said.

Dowry for weddings is a serious issue for poor families in the subcontinent and many women are unable to marry because their relatives cannot afford the gifts and money demanded by grooms’ families.

In Pakistan, the usual age for a woman to get married is between 18 and 28 and anyone older faces difficulties finding a match. Unmarried older women in rural areas can face scorn from neighbors and relatives and—with no husband to support them financially—poverty and destitution.

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4 comments

Amna Seher September 20, 2013 - 2:03 pm

Where illiteracy prevails, depression takes root there. Social taboos have made life harder for women, though poverty have found them but it does not mean that women have committed a sin. Dowry must not be a compulsion, cz to earn is not the responsibility of women.

Reply
Zo September 20, 2013 - 3:56 pm

This jahaliya practice in Pakistan is very sad. The dowry is the grooms responsibility, NOT the women. This is islamic principle, we always have a tendency to change islamic law to suit our cultural need. Very sad!!!!!!!!

Reply
Yahya Shah September 22, 2013 - 7:42 am

YES, it is the social evil. But there is a rule to curtail this. What the Multi Billion Dollars NGO are doing to implement this. What The Civil Society who always cries for petty issues on Media is doing to do some thing for this. We always talks but do not do any thing

Reply
Shamim Qureshi September 22, 2013 - 8:26 pm

Dowry in Islam
The Holy Qur’an instructs the believers
” And give the women ( whom you marry) their dower ( obligatory bridal gift) happily.
The prophet ( PBUH ) said:
The best of the marriages is one which is least burdensome in the financial sense to the families of the bride and the groom “

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