Noor Mukadam’s murder and our need for the perfect victim

Pakistan's justice system is broken, but so is our society.

I’m going to write about Noor, who was brutally raped and beheaded, by the socialite son of a prominent Pakistani businessman, in Islamabad.

But first, I want to tell you about Nabila.

Nabila, like Noor, died a gruesome death. Nabila, like Noor, was raped.

Nabila’s family, like Noor’s family, was determined to get justice and it seemed they did for 10 years, then things fell apart.

While Noor Mukadam was a diplomat’s daughter who had mostly grown up outside Pakistan, Nabila grew up in a farming village in Okara district.

Close to Nabila’s home in Haveli Lakha, 100 miles from Lahore, you see more tractors than cars.

And while it is green as far as the eye can see, it's only accessible by unpaved roads and surrounded by unregulated brick kilns, so the smoke in the air guarantees you can’t see far.

Justice for both Noor, the city girl with frequent flier miles and Nabila, the village girl who’d never travelled beyond Lahore, relies on a very broken justice system, and a society that only wants to give justice to the perfect victim.

And the only way around it is a family that is willing to fight both: the system and society.

I often wonder if I ended up becoming a statistic like them, how far would my family go to get me justice? Would they have it in them to put their energy, years, and resources into the court system? Would they be able to withstand the character assassinations, rumors, and gossip in court and within their social circles and beyond? Who in my loved ones would be willing to become social pariahs, so dead me could get justice in court?

I hope by the end of reading this, you realize the justice system is broken, but so is our society. And we can play a part in fixing the latter by recognizing the role we play in demanding perfect victims. Because I’m about to introduce you to someone, who might be a perfect victim to you.

Nabila

An old picture of Nabila.

When Nabila was 14, her father divorced her mother Shahnaz, abandoned the family and ran off with someone else. I’m told stories like this are quite common in Haveli Lakha.

Shahnaz’ former in-laws soon reached out and suggested she marry Nabila off to a man named Sajid in their extended family, so she would have “less responsibility.” Shahnaz refused citing that Nabila was just a child and Sajid a grown man.

Instead of burying herself in sorrow or shame, Shahnaz was determined to single-handedly secure her children’s future. She had inherited a small patch of land in Haveli Lakha that could be developed and become a source of income and a home for her 4 children, but she needed money.

So she moved to Lahore to work at a salon, leaving her family in-charge of Nabila and her kids.

A few months later, Nabila disappeared. Neighbors reported that Sajid had abducted her. Shahnaz made her way back to Haveli Lakha and reported it to the police. They looked for Nabila everywhere.

Three days later Sajid brought her back home. He had raped Nabila.

He told Shahnaz she must marry Nabila to him now, because she is “ruined.”

Instead, Shahnaz went to her local police station and filed a rape complaint against Sajid.

Then she took Nabila and her other kids back to Lahore and made sure pressure was exerted from Lahore for the case to be investigated in Haveli Lakha and for Sajid to be arrested.

Shahnaz was a trailblazer in her village, but also in Pakistan.

Sajid was arrested. His conviction took a few years. But it happened.

And he became one of the rare rapists in Pakistan to actually be convicted. Pakistan’s rape conviction rate is 3%. That means only 3 in 100 men accused of rape are convicted. But take that statistic with a pinch of salt, because most rapes are not reported in the country. According to UNFPA, 56% of women in Pakistan who have experienced any type of physical or sexual violence have not sought help and or talked with anyone about the violence.

When Nabila turned 18, she got a proposal from someone her age in the village. He was gentle and saw what happened to Nabila as a crime and was protective of her. Shahnaz says this was the main reason she married Nabila to him. She said her daughter was a trauma victim and needed a partner who recognized that and was gentle with her every day. Years passed, and they had four kids together. Shahnaz now had enough money to develop her land, and Nabila and her husband took care of it and raised their kids there in Haveli Lakha.

Everything seemed to be going OK. Except the occasional harassment from Sajid’s sister Fatima, a local lady health worker, who’d demand entry into their house to give the children immunizations while she called Nabila a whore.

Then one day Sajid was released. He had served his 10 year sentence, came back home, and blamed his family for not ostracizing Nabila’s family for what “they” had done to “him.”

Fatima’s harassment got worse. She wanted Nabila and family to leave the village. At one point a kid from Fatima’s family broke Nabila’s 7-year-old daughter’s arm.

Then in July of 2022, while Noor's family was fighting for justice for her in Islamabad’s courts, the WhatsApp messages started coming in Haveli Lakha.

Someone had doctored Nabila’s face onto a very pornographic image of sex and shared it widely with the village and the neighboring village.

The image was obviously doctored but it was too graphic in nature to actually pay attention to the doctored nature of the face. It showed a naked woman with a penis entering a vagina, with a face fully visible pasted in - Nabila’s.

Nabila contacted her mother and they soon discovered the photo had originated from Fatima and Sajid’s 12-year-old nephew. Shahnaz started collecting evidence of voice notes from villagers saying they had received the image from the 12-year-old, Fatima and her other nephews. An FIR was filed. The 12-year-old and his two cousins and Fatima were arrested. Their phones were confiscated and the police determined that the doctored pornographic material originated from the child and spread through the cousins and aunt. But Shahnaz and Nabila did not feel like that was justice, they knew Fatima was behind it. As the FIA investigation continued, all the accused were released on bail.

Meanwhile every time Nabila stepped out of her home, children in the village would spit at her and call her a whore. When her kids would be playing, children would spit on them and call their mom a whore.

Nabilas’s children.

Nabila and her kids went to Lahore to stay with Shahnaz to lie low for a bit. But the kids had to return to school, so they returned to Haveli Lakha.