LAHORE - Violence against women is continuing to increase at an alarming pace and no concrete steps are being taken to stop these gruesome violations of women's fundamental rights to life, security and freedom to make independent choices in private and public arenas. The Aurat Foundation's quarterly report (from April to June) for the province of Punjab states. The report is made under the foundation's 'Policy and data monitor on violence against women' and was presented at a seminar held at a local hotel on Monday. The report has been compiled by Nabeela Shaheen and Abid Ali. Speakers at the seminar included advocate Shamim Malik, advocate Irum Sajjad Gul, Shahtaj Qazilbash, Rubina Sehgal, Neelum Hussain, Nabeela Shaheen and Abid Ali. The speakers expressed concern over the growing number of incidents of violence against women. "The crimes committed against women are not registered and brought to the fore by law enforcement agencies. They are dismissed as being a 'private affair'. Due to this attitude of police the real situation of crimes against women is not known." "Man does not view women as individual but as property. This leads to crime. Women are not given independence to make their own decisions. This is the reason that honour killings take place and there are forced marriages." "The parliamentarians, women councillors, members of civil society, government institutions, lawyers organisations and intelligentsia should play their due role to liberate the women from cruel customs and traditions," the speakers said while exploring the issue from different angles. The purpose of the data collection exercise and its subsequent dissemination is to constantly remind the decision makers and all other stakeholders about the gravity of situation and to make them realise the urgency of an all out concerted effort, at all levels, to combat and eliminate gender based violence in Pakistan. It is also a social awareness campaign to ensure that there is zero tolerance for violence against women in society, both in rural and urban areas. The report has been categorised incidents of violence depending on the nature of violence. These have been categorised as murder, domestic violence, hurt and body injury, kidnapping, firearm, suicide, beating, trafficking, burning, forced marriage, rape, torture, honour killing, harassment at work place (physical and sexual) and any other kind of violence. The report shows that a total of 828 incidents of violence against women occurred in 35 districts of Punjab between April 1 and June 30 this year. The percentage of the cases of kidnapping is highest that is 30 percent among the recorded cases followed by the percentage of murder 20 percent, body injury or hurt 6 percent, rape 13 percent, domestic violence 2 percent, suicide 9 percent, sexual assaults 4 percent, burning/acid throwing 2 percent and torture 6 percent. The report also points out the relationship of the victim with aggressor. Almost 50 percent aggressors were husbands. According to graph 73 percent cases are registered, 19 percent unregistered while the number of unknown cases is 8 percent. The report also takes into account the analysis of the motives behind the incidents of violence.