BJP Muslim Leader Sana Khan Murdered By Her Hindu Husband, Body Discarded In River
New
Age Islam News Bureau
13
August 2023
• BJP Muslim Leader Sana Khan Murdered By Her Hindu
Husband, Body Discarded In River
• Iran Teen, Face Of
Anti-Hijab Protests, Sonia Sharifi, ‘Abducted’, 'Tortured' For Second Time
• Afghan Universities Ready To Readmit Women But Not
Until Taliban Leader Says It’s Ok, Official Says
• After two years of Taliban rule, uncertainty clouds
women's education in Afghanistan
• The Changing Status Of Karachi’s Women
Compiled by New
Age Islam News Bureau
URL: https://newageislam.com/islam-women-feminism/bjp-muslim-sana-hindu/d/130439
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BJP Muslim Leader Sana Khan
Murdered By Her Hindu Husband, Body Discarded In River
Sana
Khan. Image Source: India Today
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August 12, 2023
A Muslim woman leader of the
minority front of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) from Nagpur in Maharashtra was
allegedly murdered and her body thrown into a river in Jabalpur in Madhya
Pradesh.
The police said on Friday
evening that they had rounded up three suspects, including the woman’s husband
and his two accomplices in connection with the case.
Her family members,
including her brother, had lodged a complaint about her missing at Nagpur. The
family had suspected that Sana might have been murdered.
A team of the Nagpur police
had come to Jabalpur and launched an investigation with the help of MP Police
into the matter and subsequently nabbed one Amit Sahu alias Pappu, whom Sana
had reportedly married in court six months ago.
Police officials said during
interrogation, Amit confessed to having bludgeoned Sana to death in his rented
apartment at Rajula colony in Jabalpur after the two had a dispute over money
and other issues.
He, along with his friend
Rajendra Singh, then disposed off her body by wrapping it in plastic and
throwing it into the Hiran river near Jabalpur.
A police team from
Maharashtra would take custody of the three accused and take them to Nagpur,
where the case was registered at Manakpur police station on the complaint
lodged by Sana’s family.
Source: The States Man
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Iran Teen, Face Of
Anti-Hijab Protests, Sonia Sharifi, ‘Abducted’, 'Tortured' For Second Time
Iran
Anti-Hijab Protests: Sonia Sharifi
-----
By MallikaSoni
Aug 13, 2023
Iran Anti-Hijab Protests:
Sonia Sharifi shared an image of a head wound saying that she suffered the
injury at the hands of security forces.
Sonia Sharifi, whose image
on a car with her hands in the air became a symbol of defiance amid anti-hijab
protests in Iran, said that she had been abducted and beaten by the authorities
for a second time. The teenage girl is among many others who have faced the
wrath of a crackdown initiated by Iran following protests that swept the
country last year.
When Sonia Sharifi's family,
friends and neighbours gathered in the streets of Abdanan to celebrate her
homecoming last time, the protests had been happening daily for four months.
Eight months later, Sonia Sharifi shared an image of a head wound saying that
she suffered the injury at the hands of security forces when they detained her
again. She said that she was dragged from her car and blindfolded, before being
abducted and beaten.
Hengaw- a group that monitors
human rights violations in Iran- said that the 17-year-old suffered multiple
injuries and was "left alone in one of the streets of Abdanan after being
threatened, interrogated, and tortured for more than two hours".
More than 500 demonstrators
have died and thousands have been arrested, according to the Human Rights
Activists News Agency (HRANA) while several protesters have been executed. The
country's Revolutionary Guards previously accused "hostile media" of
"lying" about Sonia Sharifi's arrest in December. The authorities
have so far not commented on the teenager's claim.
The attack comes about a
month before the one-year anniversary of the death of Mahsa Amini who died in
police custody- triggering anti-hijab protests across the country. As the anniversary
nears, US-based Iranian news channel Iran International reports that Iran's
security agencies have begun to intimidate and threaten protesters.
Meanwhile, an independent
international fact-finding mission on Iran urged the government to "end
its continuing crackdown on peaceful protesters" in a report submitted in
July.
Source: Hindustan Times
Please click the following
URL to read the full text of the original story:
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Afghan universities ready to
readmit women but not until Taliban leader says it’s ok, official says
BY RIAZAT BUTT
August 12, 2023
KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) —
Afghanistan’s universities are ready to readmit female students, but the ruling
Taliban’s leader has the ultimate say on when that might happen — if it happens
at all, an education official said Saturday.
The Taliban barred women
from campuses last December, triggering global outrage. Girls had been banned
from school beyond sixth grade soon after the Taliban returned to power in
August 2021. Afghanistan is the only country in the world with bans on female
education.
Afghanistan’s higher
education minister, Nida Mohammed Nadim, said at the time the university ban
was necessary to prevent the mixing of genders and because he believed some
subjects being taught violated the principles of Islam.
He said the ban, issued from
the southern city of Kandahar by the Taliban leader Hibatullah Akhundzada, was
in place until further notice.
An adviser at the Higher
Education Ministry, Molvi Abdul Jabbar, said universities were ready to readmit
female students as soon as Akhundzada gives the order for the ban to be lifted.
He was unable to say when or if that would happen.
Akhundzada “ordered that the
universities be closed, so they closed,” he told The Associated Press. “When he
says they are open, they will open the same day. All our leaders are in favor
of (restarting girls’ education), even our ministers are in favor of it.”
Jabbar said he last met
Akhundzada seven or eight years ago. He fought alongside him against the
Russians during the 10-year Soviet war in Afghanistan and has been part of the
Taliban for 27 years.
His comments are another
sign of diverging opinions within the Taliban about the decision-making process
and Akhundzada’s edicts, with chief spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid moving quickly
to reject reports of division. They also show the authority that Akhundzada
wields over the Taliban.
Minister Nadim had presented
the ban as a temporary measure while solutions were found to fix issues around
gender segregation, course material and dress codes. He said universities would
reopen for women once they were resolved.
The Taliban made similar
promises about high school access for girls, saying classes would resume for
them once “technical issues” around uniforms and transport were sorted out, but
girls are still shut out of classrooms.
“Everything is ready in
advance, whether it’s school or university studies. It may be that the (start)
times are different, boys in the morning and in the afternoon there will be
girls. Or there will be girls in the morning and boys in the afternoon.”
Source: Apnews.Com
https://apnews.com/article/afghanistan-taliban-women-university-ban-f2ffb09a8bacc80b371ad2be88d9b182
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After two years of Taliban
rule, uncertainty clouds women's education in Afghanistan
13 Aug 2023
Afghanistan’s universities
are ready to readmit female students, but the ruling Taliban's leader has the
ultimate say on when that might happen — if it happens at all, an education
official said Saturday.
The Taliban barred women
from campuses last December, triggering global outrage. Girls had been banned
from school beyond sixth grade soon after the Taliban returned to power in
August 2021. Afghanistan is the only country in the world with bans on female
education.
As reported by AP, the
Minister of Higher Education in Afghanistan, Nida Mohammed Nadim, stated that
the imposition of a ban on universities was deemed essential in order to
prevent the interaction between genders and due to his belief that certain
subjects being taught were in contradiction to the principles of Islam.
He noted that the ban,
issued from the southern city of Kandahar by the Taliban leader Hibatullah
Akhundzada, was in place until further notice.
An adviser at the Higher
Education Ministry, Molvi Abdul Jabbar, said universities were ready to readmit
female students as soon as Akhundzada gives the order for the ban to be lifted.
He was unable to say when or if that would happen.
Akhundzada “ordered that the
universities be closed, so they closed," he told The Associated Press.
“When he says they are open, they will open the same day. All our leaders are
in favour of (restarting girls’ education), even our ministers are in favour of
it."
Jabbar said he last met
Akhundzada seven or eight years ago. He fought alongside him against the
Russians during the 10-year Soviet war in Afghanistan and has been part of the
Taliban for 27 years.
His remarks indicate further
evidence of conflicting viewpoints within the Taliban regarding decision-making
procedures and Akhundzada's directives. Chief spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid was
swift to dismiss reports of internal disagreements, underscoring the sway that
Akhundzada holds over the Taliban's functioning.
Minister Nadim had portrayed
the ban as a provisional step, aimed at addressing concerns regarding gender
segregation, curriculum content, and dress regulations. He articulated that the
reopening of universities for women would occur once these issues had been
effectively resolved.
The Taliban offered
comparable assurances concerning girls' access to high schools, asserting that
classes would recommence for them after resolving "technical issues"
related to uniforms and transportation. However, girls are still unable to
attend classes, despite these commitments.
“Everything is ready in
advance, whether it’s school or university studies. It may be that the (start)
times are different, boys in the morning and in the afternoon there will be
girls. Or there will be girls in the morning and boys in the afternoon."
Source: Live Mint
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THE CHANGING STATUS OF
KARACHI’S WOMEN
Arif Hasan
August 13, 2023
In a traditionally
segregated society, a change in the status of women alters every aspect of
society — from local governance, to trade and commerce, to politics and gender
relations.
Pakistan is passing through
this phase, and there are those who, like the authors of this article, believe
that the coming two decades are going to be the ‘decades of Pakistani women.’
In this context, this
article tries to identify the changes that are taking place in Karachi. It
draws upon the observations and experiences of Arif Hasan during his 30 years
of work in Orangi and with the Urban Resource Centre (URC) Karachi, in addition
to numerous surveys, reports, interviews and studies done by his office; an
analysis of present-day trends within the youth and grassroots movements by
Dhuha Alvi; an ongoing anthropological study of her family by Khadija Imran;
and discussions with visitors, of every category, to Arif Hasan over a period
of 40 years.
The trends discussed in this
article apply to individuals and groups in all of Karachi, including low-income
settlements — except for new settlements on the fringe of the city or groups of
juggis [shacks] scattered all over the city. Even within the settlements,
individuals and groups have varying levels of exposure to the world around them
and, as such, generalisation is difficult.
The people, neighbourhoods
and public spaces of Karachi have undergone a radical transformation over the
past seven decades. These social changes are most pronounced among the lives of
the city’s women. What impact does that have on society?
Forty years ago, society in
Karachi was very different from what it is now. Pre-Partition settlements were
ethnically and caste-wise homogenous. People of the same caste or tribe,
irrespective of their income, lived together. Examples of these settlements are
Sheedi Para, Rama Swami, and Gazdarabad.
The Muhajir settlements that
emerged after Partition contained neighbourhoods made up of extended families
and people from the same region of India. They were settled in these localities
of Karachi by informal developers, in an attempt to create homogeneous
neighbourhoods.
Although they were
ethnically different, these settlements, in many ways, shared a common gender-
and family-related culture. Young men could not choose their professions but
had to conform to what their fathers decided, nor could they or their sisters
marry out of their clan or caste structures.
More often than not, they
married within the extended family, with marriages being arranged by the
elders. Interaction between the genders before marriage was rare, and even
after marriage, it was limited to being between the spouses and their extended
families.
In keeping with the
mainstream interpretation of the Hadith and Islamic scholars’ preachings, women
could not leave the house alone or meet men, including friends of their
husbands. It was because of women not being allowed to go out of the house
alone that most women of that time had never visited other places outside of
Karachi. Even in Karachi, many had never been out of their neighbourhoods or
even seen the ocean; this holds true today as well for many — and, as a result,
men are better acquainted with the landscape of the city and the country as a
whole.
However, there was a class
which was the product of colonial education and had acquired a veneer of
Western culture. This was a pre-Partition class, to which post-Partition
convent-educated young men and women were added. Much of the bureaucracy that
governed Karachi came from this class, and there was a class both above and
below them which tried to emulate their culture and their use of the English
language.
These classes were
responsible for the image that is portrayed of post-Independence Karachi: an
image of bars and nightclubs (some of which also catered to the working and
middle classes), numerous bookshops, and a liberal society that tolerated
diversity and dissent. It was this class that not only dominated but ruled the
city as well, as populist politics of votes and constituencies, that challenged
its power, had not yet emerged.
In society, there are always
generational differences, and it is generally agreed that these are a result of
the difference between the values and ethos of the parents on the one hand, and
on the other, the aspirations of the younger generation and the larger
socio-political context in which it grows up. In a more liberal environment,
these differences can be accommodated through discussion and understanding.
However, where they are at loggerheads, it often leads to verbal and/or
physical violence.
The parents of the ‘90s grew
up in Gen Zia ul Haq’s Pakistan, governed by a reactionary political
interpretation of Islam. In schools, the teaching of global history and
geography was discontinued and the teaching of Islamiat was reduced to that of
rituals. Classical dancing and music was discontinued on radio and television,
and so was the presence of progressive Pakistani poets and thinkers. Attempts
at introducing the chopping of hands for theft and stoning for ‘adultery’ were
made and blasphemy and Hudood laws were formulated. Every attempt was made to
take society back and fossilise it, but change can never be fully arrested.
This challenging of societal
attitudes is also supported by the emergence of social media as an outlet of
women’s expression. Women are increasingly taking to social media groups,
including many all-women Facebook groups, with tens of thousands of members
each, to express their thoughts and feelings
Many of the traditional
roles which women were expected to play, both in society and at home, are now
increasingly being questioned and scrutinised | The Citizens Archive of
Pakistan
For one, since the 1970s, there
was a mass migration of Pakistanis to the Gulf and they sent back money to
their extended families — as a result of which, disputes and conflicts on the
use and ownership of the money arose. In addition, the better-off families
migrated to locations of new public and commercial housing schemes.
Due to a shortage of
housing, settlements also densified and, for these reasons, they became
multi-ethnic, with new families having to befriend and socialise with each
other. Clan-based marriages slowly came to be replaced by marriages between
neighbouring families, irrespective of caste. This also led to the women of the
new nuclear families demanding a separate kitchen for themselves.
There is sufficient evidence
to show that the break-up of the extended family had at least two major
repercussions. One was that close family friendships, in which cousins shared
their problems and secrets with each other, ended, resulting in loneliness and
a desire for new friendships.
It also led to the creation
of an ambience where the education of women became relatively easier.
Consequently, while only 48.8 percent of the women in Karachi were literate in
1981, 62.9 percent of them were literate in 1998, and the figure further
increased to 71 percent in 2017, as per the population census.
This was aided by the fact
that, in the market, the need for writing and reading skills became a
requirement for even low grade jobs. Education became an important factor in
choosing a spouse, for both men and women, especially for the lower-middle
class. All this changed the culture of marriage, and the custom of the to-be
bride and groom meeting before a decision could be taken became acceptable in
certain quarters.
This change was accompanied
by an increase in women’s employment in the industrial sector, in garment,
pharmaceutical and packaging factories. This meant an interaction between the
sexes at work and during transportation, although men insisted, as many still
do, that the woman’s journey should be specifically to work and back home. In
the process, the rules of segregation softened, and at marriages where
segregation was enforced, it often disappeared towards the end of the function,
even in working class areas.
Apart from the emergence of
marriage out of the clan or extended family, the concept of free-will marriage
also emerged, and with it the reported increase in karokari [so-called ‘honour
killing’].
Music was also frowned upon
and forbidden in many cases, as it still is in many households. As a result,
aspiring musicians and singers practised their craft secretly, without
informing their parents. Along with that, many women in hijab at public sector
universities took it off for evening functions. Meanwhile, young men started
asserting their right to choose their subject of education and many qualifying
in engineering or medicine went on to choose the subject of their
specialisation and financed their own education by part-time work.
This period also saw the emergence
of private sector universities, which charged exorbitant fees that only the
rich could afford. Those who could not afford it took on part-time jobs and
their parents struggled to raise the required funds. Costs at public sector
universities also increased but the creation of private sector universities
created a new division in society, with two different cultures — with the
private universities having a fairly heavy Western orientation in lifestyles
and behavioural patterns.
Those becoming parents today
are the product of a very different culture and have been moulded by
globalisation, social media, and the state attempts to balance itself between
traditional values and emerging global trends.
One of the important factors
in this struggle has been the Pakistani electronic media and its contents,
which continues in its television dramas to reinforce the stereotypical world
of a woman, consisting mainly of her mother-in-law, love triangles, and the
father and sister-in-law. However, previously taboo subjects, such as ‘illicit’
love affairs, children born out of marriage, and the expression of emotions in
a more open manner, have been added to many dramas. The public reaction to
these has been mixed.
Regardless of the presence
of modern ideas in these dramas, though, it is the traditional values that
eventually emerge victorious. In contrast, on YouTube, celebrities openly
discuss their personal lives, including their love life, marriages, divorces,
body image issues, health complications and, sometimes, also their affairs. All
this material is viewed and discussed by the Pakistani younger generation. It
is noteworthy that a few television advertisements are also beginning to
promote values that reflect the changing nature of society, especially related to
women.
There are shows on Pakistani
media such as Geo’s Hasna Mana Hai, where the host questions the audience about
their personal lives in a thinly veiled flirtatious manner. It is something
that the audience, consisting primarily of young men and women, participate in
happily and enjoy immensely (although it is true that much of this audience is
invited by the programme producers themselves).
In addition, there are also
other shows, such as Rewind by Samina Peerzada, where well-known personalities
discuss their love lives with the anchor. There are also YouTube shows in which
a wandering host discusses the marriage preferences and other personal matters
of random people in a bazaar — mainly working class men and women.
It can also be safely said
that Netflix and YouTube have normalised, or at least made acceptable to a
large section of the population, non-marital love stories, platonic
relationships between men and women, and humanised sexualities and gender
identities that fall outside of mainstream consciousness. This has, however,
further antagonised the conservative sections of the population.
Social media platforms have
also helped enormously in developing and promoting local musicians and artists,
who are to be found in every working class and lower middle class
neighbourhood.
Post-Zia era parents have
seen the emergence of the Pakistan women’s cricket team, women mountaineers,
female bureaucrats, and a substantial increase of women in the police force, as
well as a women’s hockey team whose uniform came under severe attack from
conservatives because it exposed the knees of the hockey players. However, the
uniform has stayed.
It is important to note here
that, in a survey of schools and colleges in the katchiabadi [informal
settlement] of Sultanabad (carried out by the Department of Architecture at
Dawood University), women were asked as to what they would want in a park. To
the surprise of the persons who had initiated the survey, they wanted a space
to play cricket, gym machines, a space for yoga, and an open air library — very
different from earlier surveys.
Anthropological discussions
and observations show that the difference is not only between generations but
also within them. In many cases, older siblings were required to cover their
heads and not meet with men, but these restrictions were withdrawn for the
younger ones.
In the above processes,
self-willed marriages have been reluctantly accepted by an increasing number of
parents, along with the meeting of the bride and groom before the marriage. The
concept of “girlfriend”/“boyfriend” has also been accepted by the younger
generation, even in the working class, and so has the concept of “dating” and
getting married through a dating application.
This is despite the
Pakistani state’s and religious right-wing’s attempts at curbing the mingling
of men and women, such as the government’s ban on five dating apps (including
the globally renowned Tinder) in 2020 and the Jamaat-e-Islami’s rebranding of
Valentine’s Day as ‘Haya Day.’
Prior to the aforementioned
ban on these apps, they had a sizable market in the country, which is reflected
by the fact that Tinder had been downloaded 440,000 times in Pakistan during
the one year before being banned. Even after this ban, other apps have been
quick to fill the gap — such as Bumble, Muzz, and DilKaRishta.
Some of them (such as
Bumble) come with safety features that exclusively allow women to send the
first message to any ‘match’, to ward off cyberharassment from unknown men.
Muzz, which was previously called ‘MuzMatch’, is marketed as an app for Muslims
and has additional privacy features in place; as of June 2022, it had 400,000
members in Pakistan and had led to 4,000 marriages, according to its
British-Pakistani CEO.
Similarly, the relatively
new DilKaRishta app reached 100,000 users within just the first two weeks of
its launch in late 2022. These are major and irreversible trends, which will
continue to transform Pakistani society’s relationship with romance, both
inside and outside of marriage.
Bike-riding is emerging as a
means of transport for women due to the absence of an efficient public
transportation system | White Star
Twenty years ago, it was not
possible for a single girl to rent an independent accommodation for herself,
and the same was true for unmarried couples. However, because of increasing
demand, things are changing.
Many university-going girls
and formally employed women are choosing to live in hostels or shared
accommodation, with other similar people in the city. Organisations and apps
such as ‘MyGhar’ and ‘Hostayl’ as well as social media groups dedicated to this
cause have also sprung up to cater to this demand for independent living.
More women are also doing
paid work, which gives them greater autonomy to have a say in decisions about
their lives, including the option to part ways from their spouse if they so
wish, or to move out of their parental home without being married. Young
migrant workers who earlier lived with senior members of their clan in Karachi
now get together and rent accommodation, giving them the freedom for recreation
and entertainment.
Mobility and walkability are
major points of concern for women, and bike-riding is emerging as a means of
transport for them in the absence of an efficient public transportation system.
Pink Riders Pakistan is an organisation that provides bike-riding training to
women across the country and, as more women are appearing on the roads driving
motor vehicles, societal perceptions of what is respectable for people of
certain genders to do is also being challenged. During the five years of its
existence, the organisation has trained 9,500 women all over the country, and
the numbers are increasing rapidly.
his challenging of societal
attitudes is also supported by the emergence of social media as an outlet of
women’s expression. Women are increasingly taking to social media groups,
including many all-women Facebook groups, with tens of thousands of members
each, to express their thoughts and feelings — from the mundane details of
their everyday life to commenting on politics and world affairs.
Such platforms are also
opening up avenues for women to dance and sing in front of the public. Many
things written here are class-specific and difficult to generalise, but there
is a constant exchange of ideas and lifestyle aspirations between all the
classes. These aspirations include the education of children, a healthy
physical environment, and prospects of upward mobility.
These requirements cannot be
fulfilled, as a result of which an increasing number of young people want to
leave Pakistan for greener pastures abroad, often illegally, and a whole system
to provide such a facility illegally has also developed. Just during the first
two months of 2023, data from the Bureau of Emigration and Overseas Employment shows
that a whopping 127,400 Pakistanis moved abroad.
A culture of gymming has
also developed in urban areas, including mixed gender gyms, where people —
young and old — come for physical training at the cost of a few thousand rupees
every month. Along with this, personal grooming has also become important, and
that explains the proliferation of beauty parlours, even in low-income
settlements and katchiabadis. The women who operate them have learnt their
craft through Indian and Pakistani TV programmes. Increasingly, the maids
working in middle income and elite homes are starting to look like their
employers.
Another aspect is the change
in people’s eating habits and its connection with society. Any area where an
international fast food outlet such as McDonald’s, KFC or Pizza Hut opens up,
changes. The public space surrounding it commercialises, with the opening up of
other mid-to-high end food outlets. Over time, it also comes to influence the
culture of the city it is located in as a whole.
For example, young people
prefer to dine at these outlets with their friends rather than invite them to
their homes to get together, even if it is affordable only once or twice a
month. Similarly, families — including joint ones — also dine in or get food
delivered from there every once in a while.
For a society where certain
sections used to look down upon the practice of eating food from outside the
home until a few years ago, this is a sign of social change. The expansion of
these fast food franchises to all corners of Pakistan also shows an increasing
tilt towards urbanisation and upward mobility, which links in with the younger
generation’s desire for a different lifestyle than what has been the tradition.
In the absence of the
possibility of acquiring a house, the unaffordability of education for their
children, the absence of transport and culture, and the high cost of
entertainment, health and recreation, the aspirations of the Pakistani emerging
lower middle and working classes cannot be fulfilled.
There is a fundamental
conflict between these aspirations and thinking processes behind them on the
one hand, and the lived reality on the other. Given the political and economic
uncertainty, and the existence of an uncaring elite, it is unlikely that this
can be resolved without a major conflict, which has already begun between and
within the institutions of the state.
One of the ways to avoid
this conflict is the development and effective management of physical and
social infrastructure. An important part of this infrastructure is sports
facilities, which the state has developed but which are inaccessible to young
men and women. The design of parks, schools, public toilets and public spaces
is being neglected and, where these spaces do exist, they do not cater to the
needs of the younger generation, especially women.
Laws and notifications
restricting the use of social media by the state increase this conflict and
show how afraid the state is of the emancipation of the younger generation.
This fear is also expressed in politics, especially with the enactment of the
Pakistan Army (Amendment) Act, 2023, and amendments to the Official Secrets
Act, 1923. A sympathetic embrace by the state of the aspirations of the younger
generation is essential for peace, stability and prosperity.
Source: Dawn
https://www.dawn.com/news/1769913
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URL: https://newageislam.com/islam-women-feminism/bjp-muslim-sana-hindu/d/130439