It is Time: The Women’s Right Movement in Pakistan

The Women Rights movement in Pakistan is conspicuous by its absence. While there are number of NGOs doing commendable work for the betterment of women, they have been unable to coordinate their efforts to become a force to be reckoned with in the sociopolitical arena of the country.

There are number of contributing factors that ensure that this movement never becomes effective. One of them is the people’s general suspicion of western ideas. The western consumer goods always find ready buyers here, but ideas are much harder to get acceptance. The modern women’s right movement originated in the west and gained momentum in 19th century, however it was in the 20th century majority of the positive legislative changes took place, as well as the social attitudes also went through transformation. In Pakistan too thing have moved for the better but there are two major caveats, first the pace of change is very slow, and second some very fundamental rights have continued to be undermined. Therefore we get anomalous situations, for example a woman is able to study up to doctorate level with her family’s encouragement yet she cannot get married without the consent of her Wali.

There is strong resistance towards engaging in any meaningful dialogue with regard to rights of women. This resistance is both from the religious lobby as well as feudal politicians, while their motivations may be different. Whenever an atrocity against a woman is reported, there is much media hullabaloo but after some time the issue takes a back seat. It should not take a gang rape or burning alive of a woman to make our media take notice and our bigwigs to make pronouncements about women’s welfare. It should be a mainstream topic in normal times also. There are other issues, though less dramatic but very real for the women, which remain unaddressed. With a sizable number of educated women in at least the urban areas, one would expect more voices being raised on legal equality, domestic abuse, and better working conditions. Yet there is a lack of coherent mainstream discussion on women's issues.

The fragmentation of women’s rights efforts is also a result of class differences in the country. The problems being faced by poor class women are dramatically different from the situation of middle class women. The “maasi” face compound misery of poverty coupled with a low social position in her household. For her, simple survival is a challenge. In that class a wife is privileged if her husband does not do drugs and refrains from beating her up. Her sole aim is to bring food to her family, and for her good fortune is if she doesn’t die in childbirth. On the other hand a middle class office worker has different set of problems, she may have more control over her life than her maasi counterpart, but she is expected to be a perfect wife and mother meeting all the high standards set by her class and manage her job at the same time. A housewife from an upper class may seem like a very privileged begum to outsiders, but her whole life in reality hinges on the whim of her rich husband. If she keeps him happy, she continues her lifestyle, but in case of breakup of marriage she stands to lose everything. The law of divorce is heavily tilted in favor of the husband; no matter if she has spent 30 years of servicing her household, she is not entitled to have a share in the wealth her husband has accumulated during this time. It is very difficult for any single NGO or group to have a scope that encompass all the classes, and as such most operate in female literacy and poverty related areas, which in prioritization is the right thing to do. However, there is a need to engage the urban educated classes, middle and upper middle classes in a more active manner in order to build awareness and to push for legislative changes.

Any concerted women rights movement needs to build awareness across the class and political divide. It shouldn’t be seen as a policy promoted by any one political party or be dominated by any single class. One can take some positives from the Lawyers’ movement which was as non-partisan as possible in Pakistan’s environment. The activism developed in civil society for judiciary can be directed towards the women’s right also. Historically, it is a fact that people’s movements operate in a manner that they reinforce each other. The anti-slavery movement in nineteenth century US gave way to greater awareness about women’s right also. Elizabeth Cady Stanton one of the early activist authored the Declaration of Rights and Sentiments at the first women’s right convention held in Seneca Falls NY in 1848. This was in fact the start of the Women’s Suffrage movement in United States. Interestingly, these were the same decades in which labor rights movement also gained momentum. What is evident from these examples is that once the people’s desire for greater justice is roused, the exploited groups can aim for a fair chance. Presently Pakistan has a ripe scenario, it has fairly wide spread media, a sizable number of educated people to lead the way, and most importantly the recent optimism emerging from the lawyers’ movement.

There will be detractors no doubt; the debate on the law relating to Domestic Violence is a case in point. The greatest fear of a patriarchal society is that it can lose control over the women, because it is this very control that keeps the society patriarchal; the thinking goes that all sort of evils will break lose if women are given more leeway. For example one of the critique on the Domestic Violence Act is that it would lead to more divorces, which essentially means that it is ok for a wife to get beaten up as long as the marriage remains intact, but society would disintegrate if that wife wants a more decent life for herself and wants her husband to mend his ways. Still there is some room for optimism, as I referred earlier the time is ripe for a more concerted push for better laws for women and for improving the attitudes as well. For this to happen women have to take the lead, particularly if they are parliamentarians, media persons, lawyers, writers, and in professions which places them in greater visibility. They need to step up and speak up. It is Time!