{"id":8202,"date":"2017-07-12T18:51:29","date_gmt":"2017-07-12T16:51:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/?p=8202"},"modified":"2017-07-12T18:55:08","modified_gmt":"2017-07-12T16:55:08","slug":"virginity-test-tajik-bride-takes-own-life-groom-faces-jail","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/2017\/07\/virginity-test-tajik-bride-takes-own-life-groom-faces-jail\/","title":{"rendered":"Virginity Test: Tajik Bride Takes Own Life, Groom Faces Jail"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"hdr-container\">\n<div class=\"row\">\n<div class=\"col-title col-xs-12 col-md-10 pull-right\"><\/div>\n<div class=\"published\"><\/div>\n<div class=\"col-publishing-details col-xs-12 col-sm-12 col-md-2 pull-left\">\n<div class=\"publishing-details\">\n<div class=\"authors\">\n<ul>\n<li>\n<div title=\"Farangis Najibullah\">By: Farangis Najibullah \u00a0&amp; Orzu Karim<\/div>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<div title=\"Farangis Najibullah\">Source: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rferl.org\/a\/tajik-bride-virginity-suicide-groom-jail-\/28612536.html\">RFERL<\/a><\/div>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"col-lg-12 separator\"><\/div>\n<div class=\"col-multimedia col-xs-12 col-md-10 pull-right\">\n<div class=\"cover-media\">\n<div class=\"media-block media-expand\" style=\"text-align: center;\">\n<div class=\"img-wrap\"><\/div>\n<p><span class=\"caption\"><a href=\"https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/07\/191F72F1-FCCA-4FD7-98EC-2CE354FF7961_w1023_r1_s.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-8203\" src=\"https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/07\/191F72F1-FCCA-4FD7-98EC-2CE354FF7961_w1023_r1_s.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1023\" height=\"575\" srcset=\"https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/07\/191F72F1-FCCA-4FD7-98EC-2CE354FF7961_w1023_r1_s.jpg 1023w, https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/07\/191F72F1-FCCA-4FD7-98EC-2CE354FF7961_w1023_r1_s-300x169.jpg 300w, https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/07\/191F72F1-FCCA-4FD7-98EC-2CE354FF7961_w1023_r1_s-768x432.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1023px) 100vw, 1023px\" \/><\/a>Rajabbi Khurshed took a fatal dose of vinegar 40 days after her wedding to Zafar Pirov.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"col-xs-12 col-md-2 pull-left article-share\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"body-container\">\n<div class=\"row\">\n<div class=\"col-xs-12 col-sm-12 col-md-10 col-lg-10 pull-right\">\n<div class=\"row\">\n<div class=\"col-xs-12 col-sm-12 col-md-8 col-lg-8 pull-left bottom-offset content-offset\">\n<div>\n<div class=\"wsw\">\n<p>Rajabbi Khurshed had no say in most of the misfortunes that befell her.<\/p>\n<p>Her parents arranged the 18-year-old woman&#8217;s marriage, in her native village of Chorbogh in May, to a man she&#8217;d never met. The Tajik state obliged Khurshed to undergo a prenuptial medical exam, which in her case included a virginity test that while technically optional is routinely demanded of young women by either or both families. And her new husband, 24-year-old Zafar Pirov, cast her out weeks later after humiliating her with further virginity tests and demanding that he be allowed to take a second wife.<\/p>\n<p>In the end, a despondent Khurshed seized the only control she felt was left.<\/p>\n<p>Forty days after her wedding, the young woman, who had dropped out of school to help her parents look after two disabled brothers, drank what Tajik authorities say was a fatal dose of vinegar. She died at a local hospital in Chorbogh, in the southern Vose district, hours later.<\/p>\n<p>Her family said Khurshed told them on her deathbed that she had been under enormous pressure from her husband since their wedding night and &#8220;couldn&#8217;t take it any longer.&#8221;<\/p>\n<div class=\"wsw__embed \">\n<div class=\"media-block media-expand\">\n<div class=\"img-wrap\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\" enhanced\" src=\"https:\/\/gdb.rferl.org\/CA4D0AA1-943B-4D48-A85C-4ED539CDA682_w650_r0_s.jpg\" alt=\"Rajabbi Khurshed's mother says her daughter was a victim of &quot;slander and violence.&quot;\" \/><\/div>\n<p><span class=\"caption\">Rajabbi Khurshed&#8217;s mother says her daughter was a victim of &#8220;slander and violence.&#8221;<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>Her mother, Fazila Mirzoeva, said Khurshed had never had a boyfriend or an intimate relationship with anyone. She was a virgin and had a doctor&#8217;s certificate to prove it. Mirzoeva called her daughter a victim of &#8220;slander and violence,&#8221; and said the family has directed public pleas to President Emomali Rahmon and other officials to intervene to help preserve Khurshed&#8217;s reputation.<\/p>\n<p>Pirov, meanwhile, faces charges of driving his new wife to suicide and could face up to eight years in prison.<\/p>\n<p><strong><a class=\"underline\" href=\"https:\/\/www.ozodi.org\/a\/28601115.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Speaking to RFE\/RL&#8217;s Tajik Service\u00a0<\/a><\/strong>from his parents&#8217; home in Chorbogh, he defended himself by insisting that his new wife was not a virgin on their wedding night, no matter what her documents said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;She drank vinegar when I demanded that she go back to her parents&#8217; home,&#8221; Pirov said.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Mandatory Medical Check-Ups<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Premarital sex is taboo in conservative Tajik society and can lead to a lifetime of public scorn for women.<\/p>\n<p>Mandatory medical check-ups for both bride and groom were instituted in 2015 primarily to prevent the spread of HIV\/AIDS, hepatitis, and other sexually transmitted diseases, but they are frequently expanded to include virginity tests for women. Registrars can refuse to recognize a marriage if the couple fails to undergo the tests and provide the proper medical certificate.<\/p>\n<p>Khurshed had opted to undergo a so-called &#8220;purity&#8221; test and received a doctor&#8217;s letter confirming the result.<\/p>\n<p>But in the poorest of Central Asia&#8217;s five post-Soviet republics, where wages are low and corruption is widespread, many Tajiks believe that doctors&#8217; certificates can be bought with a bribe.<\/p>\n<p>Pirov said he took his new wife to two different clinics, including one in the capital, Dushanbe, to undergo further tests to prove her purity. Both confirmed Khurshed&#8217;s virginity, but Pirov was adamant that the doctors were wrong and said he continued to demand that his bride &#8220;tell the truth.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Eventually, just weeks into their marriage, he pressed his bride to let him bring a second wife into the household. &#8220;My wife gave me a written statement that she allows me to get a second wife because she wasn&#8217;t a virgin when we got married,&#8221; Pirov told RFE\/RL.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Hundreds Of Virginity Disputes<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>A Vose district court has imposed a travel ban on Pirov pending the trial, though no date has been set.<\/p>\n<p>Virginity disputes have torn families apart in Tajikistan.<\/p>\n<p>Courts recorded about 600 cases citing virginity disputes in 2014, before the prenuptial medical tests were introduced. Most involved women suing their husbands for wrongly declaring them &#8220;impure&#8221; on their wedding night.<\/p>\n<p>In 2014, a 19-year-old bride from the Dushanbe&#8217;s Rudaki district successfully sued her new husband for slander after he beat her and sent her back to her parents&#8217; home on their wedding night, accusing her of not being a virgin.<\/p>\n<p>The bride, identified by her first name, Husnigul, underwent several court-appointed medical tests that concluded her virginity was maintained even after her wedding night. The court declared Husnigul a virgin and ordered the bridegroom to pay her financial compensation. Husnigul said she filed for divorce, declining her husband&#8217;s offer to put the dispute behind them and begin married life together.<\/p>\n<p>The head of the National Forensics Center in Dushanbe, Yahyo Odinaev, speculated that in some cases men &#8220;fail to perform out of their own inexperience or other psychological factors&#8221; but place the blame on their brides.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By: Farangis Najibullah \u00a0&amp; Orzu Karim Source: RFERL Rajabbi Khurshed took a fatal dose of vinegar 40 days after her wedding to Zafar Pirov. Rajabbi Khurshed had no say in most of the misfortunes that [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":8203,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[90,85,60,88,8,59,49],"tags":[759,761,760],"class_list":["post-8202","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-editor-selection","category-human-rights","category-human-rights-and-democracy","category-slider","category-tajikistan","category-tajikistan-2","category-womens-rights","tag-forced-marriage","tag-polygamy","tag-virginity-tests","country-tajikistan","Documents-statements-multimedia"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8202","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8202"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8202\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8205,"href":"https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8202\/revisions\/8205"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8203"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8202"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8202"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8202"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}