ISLAMABAD - A bill proposing autonomy of the National Commission on the Status of Women (NCSW) is likely to be presented before the Parliament in the next session in December to get it passed. The NCSW chairperson Anis Haroon informed this at a consultative meeting Wednesday. She said after the struggle of seven years finally the bill for the autonomy of NCSW is going to be discussed in the next session of the parliament on December 15. She said the bill that has already been tabled in the House and is going to be discussed in the standing committee of Ministry of Human Rights then it will be presented in the House to be approved. According to information the Commission after the passage of the bill will have autonomy and directly report to the president and prime minister. The NCSW had organised a consultation session with civil society representatives to finalise the amendments proposed by the Commission in Pakistan Penal Code that criminalize the offence of domestic violence against women. Regarding the proposed bill of domestic violence Anis Haroon said the provinces have already been taken on board for introducing the legislation on the subject and there is some progress already made on this front in three provinces. However, we still feel that there is a need to have some sort of legislation on the subject at the federal level. For this reason, she said, the NCSW has prepared some amendments to criminalise domestic violence under the existing penal code. She said the proposed bill has full support of the legislature and the parliamentarians have asked civil society to support the bill for its early approval. The Law Committee of NCSW had proposed some amendments in the Pakistan Penal Code with reference to domestic violence. Some definitions of some of the offences which constitute domestic violence were made to determine and prescribe the level of punishments. In the consultation, the proposed amendments were thoroughly examined and reviewed by the participants. The participants debated on all aspects including definitions, and corresponding punishments of the bill and came up with some recommendations. The participants unanimously agreed to rename the bill to Prevention of Domestic Violence Act while prescribing the punishment, they suggested that the culprit should face the imprisonment and fine both. Tahira Abdullah said the proposed fine and sentence of three months to one year in the proposed bill is mockery of the victim and it will hurt the victim instead of the perpetrator. The participants sought to increase the sentence from minimum six months to three years with fine and also proposed to provide some psychological counselling to the perpetrators. Naeem Mirza, Chief Operating Officer (COO), Aurat Foundation, said due to Qisas and Diyat there was duplicity of laws thus proposed to remove definitions of violence because they were falling under the ambit of Qisas and Diyat that was accepted by all the participants. After the consultation with the civil society and nongovernmental organisations, their suggestions will be added into to the proposed amendments for domestic violence that will be sent to the Ministry of Human Rights, and then to the Cabinet and at the end will be tabled in the parliament for approval. The civil society representatives and the members of NCSW were mostly suggesting amendments in the proposed bill according to their personal experiences and based on assumptions. And the need was felt to put suggestions of genuine stakeholders into the bill and there should have been some kind of consultation with the victims of domestic violence or the general public.