The incumbent federal government has notified a new Anti-Rape Special Committee. The new committee consists of 26 members including medical experts, lawyers, legal experts, lawmakers, and bureaucrats.
According to the official notification, former senator Ayesha Raza Farooq will head the committee. Other members include Mehnaz Akbar Aziz, Chief Secretaries of Punjab, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Balochistan, and Sindh, representatives of the National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA), Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (PEMRA), and Law Ministry.
Ex-prosecutor general Punjab Ehtisham Qadir, former Additional Inspectors General (AIGs) KamalÂuddin Tipu and Taimoor Ali Khan, advocates Ismat Mehdi, Khalid Parveen, Ambreen Qureshi, Ghazala Yasmeen, Nida Ali and Sharafat Ali, development consultant Valerie Khan, Mohammad Ali Nekokara, Zainab Mustafa, anchor Maria Memon, Police surgeon Sumayya Syed, and forensic expert Ayesha Sarwar are also the members of the committee.
The former federal government led by the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) had formed the Anti-Rape Special Committee in December last year for the first time. The first committee consisted of 40 members and it was led by the then Parliamentary Secretary for Law, Maleeka Bukhari.
The committee was formed under sub-section (1) of section 15 of the Anti-Rape (Investigation and Trial) Act 2021. Under this law, numerous other measures have been introduced as well.
These include the establishment of special courts to hear rape cases, the use of modern practices to investigate the cases, and the creation of a register of convicted sex offenders.
