Inteha Bibi’s happiest moment was her engagement last year. Everyone in the family celebrated. Bibi, 25, believed she had not only found a perfect match but also freedom from a centuries-old custom of north-west Pakistan that had hung over her head since she was 12.
But within months, her fiance and his family had broken off the engagement. The outdated and illegal custom, known as ghag – a Pashto word meaning proclamation that allows another man to forcibly claim a woman as his intended wife – had reared its head.
