Pakistan censors ban TV show over rape scenes: ‘Tarnishes our image’

The 2020 Lahore rape case sparked nationwide protests after local police scolded the victim for travelling at night without a male guardian.

Pakistan censor board banned a TV drama over scenes of gang rape saying that the series would "tarnish" the nation's image by depicting it as an "unsafe place for women". The scenes are reminiscent of a notorious gang rape case, the regulators said adding that the show names "Hadsa" would be banned due to parallels to the real-life case of a French-Pakistani mother raped in front of her small children after her car ran out of fuel near Lahore.

The poster of "Hadsa" show which has been banned in Pakistan.

"Portrayal of such (a) heinous act will not only trigger the trauma of that unfortunate victim but would also tarnish (the) country's image," the order from Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (PEMRA) said.

The 2020 Lahore rape case sparked nationwide protests after local police scolded the victim for travelling at night without a male guardian. Then-police chief Umar Sheikh repeatedly berated the woman who was a resident of France. He said that she could have probably "mistook that Pakistani society is just as safe" as France.

PEMRA suggested that "Hadsa", which began airing last week, would cause overseas viewers to wrongly "perceive Pakistan as (an) unsafe place for women", as it did not portray a "true picture of Pakistani society".

Lawyer Muhammad Ahmad Pansota told AFP that he had lodged a complaint against the show with PEMRA on behalf of the rape victim.

“She said to me actually that whenever she watches an episode, or how people react when they watch it, she has to go through the entire trauma again. She's not very comfortable with that,” he said.

Episodes four and five of "Hadsa" show a woman and her son being kidnapped and assaulted by a gang when their car breaks down. It later reveals the character was raped.

Before the series was censored, actress Hadiqa Kiani, who plays the woman, said it was not based on real-life events.

"Unfortunately, the horrific act of rape and violence happens far too often in our society," she wrote on the social media site X (formerly Twitter), adding, "'Hadsa' is not based on any one person's story, it is based off of a sickly common part of our reality."