The community of the Asian country in Italy is numerous but closed. Especially for young women often forced by the family to the traditions of retrograde Islam that isolated them for a normal life.
«My father told me that his word was worth more than any other, that it was now all combined. And he added that if I kept saying no, he would have killed me. “ Duray is moved while talking to Panorama. Twenty -two years old, Pakistani, in 2022 he fled from that violent parent who imposed her the most rigid Islamic tradition: she had promised her in marriage to a larger cousin in her country of origin. Duray arrives with his family in Italy, in the Marche, when he is five years old. He grows and attends school, but soon he understands that he will never have a life like the same age. «What made me suffer the most was not even power out. To my father I didn’t even ask: for him to go out alone he meant simply to violate the rules ». Duray is one of the many girls in a community of the Asian country who live practically in prison in Italy. Families often come from backward areas such as Punjab, on the border with India, where, for example, donkeys are still used to move and transport loads. In Italy they are found only for an economic goal, without none the will to integrate. They just need to put together the money necessary to return to Pakistan and build a house. While in the foreign country, however, they recreate a microcosm where tribal traditions and Islam confuse and feed an aberrant sense of family honor. So it happens that religion is used to justify practices that cancel the possibility of making decisions on their existence, only for women because males have no restrictions.
Duray goes on with his story: «I was just out for the school, the rest of the day I had to stay at home. So I drawing my favorite singers, Selena Gomez and Ariana Grande. I couldn’t have a phone, let alone go to the class trip. Even in the classroom I always wore the Pakistani traditions, although over time I had devised a trick. I changed going to school, so my dad did not see me. Above the jeans I put wide trousers, which I removed before the lesson. Via also the veil, there. When the first time I left my hair free was a beautiful feeling … once, however, my father surprised me so dressed in this way. He made me remove the jeans and snatched them. “You are a whore,” he screamed me. “
For Duay, freedom therefore begins in 2022. With the refusal of the engagement ring of the future groom, obviously chosen by the parents. To the death of the father’s death, his sister Najaf, also little more than adults, asks the carabinieri for help. Since then the two girls, together with the mother, live in a protected community, far from the violent man who wanted slaves. In Italy there are many Pakistani families who force their daughters in similar conditions. According to Istat data, on 1 January 2024 there are about 160 thousand Pakistani citizens, equal to 3 percent of the foreign population. They are mainly concentrated in the northern regions, first Lombardy followed by Emilia-Romagna and therefore by Tuscany. Men are mainly used in agriculture and small trade. The women who work, however, are just 7.2 percent. On the other hand, according to the traditional family scheme, they must remain at home and avoid contacts with the outside. At most they can, like Duray, attend school, without however being able to tighten friendships. In this environment, however, the strident comparison with western uses and customs takes place. Here, for the daughters of immigrants, takes place a sort of emotional short circuit.
Alessia, educator of a community for girls in Central Italy, also testifies. «I had to deal with many families of this type. In many cases they refuse the country that hosts them. In general they think that Italy – and the West in general – are places of perdition where malpractice dominates. They do not want children and daughters to mix with boys of their age. I still remember the father of a sixteen year old of Muslim origin during the protected interviews. At first he seemed willing to listen to us, but as soon as he understood that his daughter wanted to continue seeing a young Italian, he began to shout, saying he should immediately marry him. He even threw herself against the girl. Until then, he had recited the part of the accommodating father ».
The news then tells how some situations of these young women, who only aspire to a normal life, end up in drama. It happened to Saman Abbas, the 18 -year -old Pakistani killed in Novellara from relatives because he did not want the usual combined marriage, smoking the economic profit that that union would bring. He was his mother Nazia, on the night between April 30 and May 1, 2021, to deliver it to his killer, Uncle Danish, according to what was reconstructed by the judges of the first instance trial. For parents there was the sentence of life imprisonment and 14 years of imprisonment the uncle. While this article comes out, the appeal sentence is about to be pronounced which could also lead to the sentence of two cousins of Saman, Ikram and Nomanulhaq, since the prosecutor asked for the prison for all five family members.
It is rare that a mother opposes the fate of her daughter, paying at that point a very high price too. Perhaps the only example is that of the 46 -year -old Shannaz Begum, killed on October 3, 2010 in the province of Modena. She was stoned by her husband and son, in the courtyard of the house: she defended her daughter Noshenn who, in fact, had refused the usual combined wedding. Recently, there have been events that, if not extreme, tell other violence and frustrations. In Viterbo, a few weeks ago, two Muslim parents were sentenced for having beaten the fourteen daughter, forced to wear the burqa and read the Koran. In Brescia, the municipal councilor of Indian origins Balwinder Singh, elected in a center -right civic list, resigned after being investigated for having beaten the daughters “who wanted to live to the western”. At home, Saman’s murder, a “right” crime, would have justified because, according to his beliefs, the honor must be safeguarded at all costs. Even when it means passing over the love that should be the strongest: of a father and mother for the girl who have put in the world.
