Pakistani National Seema Haider, Who Illegally Entered India With Her Four Children, Hails PM Modi for CAA
New Age Islam News
Bureau
12 March 2024
·
Pakistani
National Seema Haider, Who Illegally Entered India With Her Four Children,
Hails PM Modi for CAA
·
Aseefa
Bhutto-Zardari Daughter of President Zardari, Likely To Become First Lady
·
World
Customs Organization Appoints, Munerah Al-Rasheed, First Arab Woman To Top Post
·
UNESCO:
75% of Afghan Girls Denied Education, Facing Bleak Future
·
Women
Against Fascism: Activist Shabnam Hashmi Speaks On The Rani Chennamma Campaign
Compiled by New Age Islam News Bureau
URL: https://newageislam.com/islam-women-feminism/pakistan-seema-haider-caa-india/d/131899
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Pakistani National Seema
Haider, Who Illegally Entered India With Her Four Children, Hails PM Modi for
CAA
Pakistani
national Seema Haider
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11th March 2024
Noida: Pakistani national
Seema Haider, who illegally entered India with her four children last year and
now lives in Greater Noida, on Monday lauded the Centre’s move to notify the
rules of implementation of the Citizenship (Amendment) Act.
Haider, who claims to have
adopted Hinduism and married Greater Noida resident Sachin Meena, also hailed
Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the decision and claimed that the CAA would
help her get Indian citizenship.
However, Haider will not be a
direct beneficiary of the CAA, which was passed by Parliament to fast-track
citizenship for undocumented non-Muslim migrants from Pakistan, Bangladesh and
Afghanistan who came to India before December 31, 2014.
“The Indian government has
implemented the Citizenship (Amendment) Act today in our country. We are very
happy about it and congratulate the government for it. Truly, what Modi ji has
done what he had promised. I will be indebted to them throughout my life and
keep thanking them,” Haider said in a video message where she stood along with
Sachin and three of her four children.
“On this happy occasion, I
congratulate my brother advocate A P Singh for his work as now my
citizenship-related obstacles would also be removed with this law,” the
Pakistani national said, before signing off with salutations of “Jai Shri Ram”,
“Radhe Radhe” and “Bharat Mata ki Jai”.
Advocate Singh also hailed
the Centre’s announcement and said the decision would help people of different
religions from Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan who were facing
citizenship-related problems in India.
“It’s a big day for the
people who were persecuted in these countries and somehow managed a living here
(India),” Singh said.
Notably, last month Haider’s
Pakistani husband Ghulam Haider hired an Indian lawyer to seek the custody of
their four children.
Seema, who hails from
Jacobabad in Pakistan’s Sindh province, in May last year took her children and
left her home in Karachi to travel to India via Nepal. She captured the
headlines in July when Indian authorities found her living with Indian national
(now her husband) Sachin Meena in Greater Noida.
The Centre on Monday
implemented the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019, notifying the rules four
years after the contentious law was passed by Parliament to fast-track
citizenship for undocumented non-Muslim migrants from Pakistan, Bangladesh and
Afghanistan who came to India before December 31, 2014.
With the unveiling of the
rules that came days ahead of the announcement of the Lok Sabha elections, the
Modi government will now start granting Indian nationality to persecuted
non-Muslim migrants — Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, Buddhists, Parsis and Christians —
from the three countries. The rules comes into force with immediate effect,
according to a Gazette notification.
Source: siasat.com
https://www.siasat.com/pakistans-seema-haider-hails-pm-modi-for-caa-2990668/
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Aseefa Bhutto-Zardari
Daughter of President Zardari, Likely To Become First Lady
Aseefa
Bhutto Zardari is Asif Ali Zardari's youngest child
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2024-03-12
ISLAMABAD: President Asif
Zardari is likely to announce the formal recognition of his daughter, Aseefa
Bhutto-Zardari, as the First Lady of the country.
Aseefa,31-year-old, is the
youngest daughter of Pakistan’s first female former prime minister Benazir
Bhutto and the two-time president of the country, Zardari. President Zardari
has decided to formally recognise his daughter Aseefa as the First Lady of the
country in a historic decision, according to the sources.
The status of the First Lady
goes to the wife of the President of the country in general. But Zardari became
a widower after his wife and former prime minister Benazir Bhutto was
assassinated in 2007.
Notably, this will be the
first time that a Pakistani president has announced his daughter for the
position of First Lady, as normally the title is given to the President’s wife.
This landmark move elevates
Aseefa to the prestigious position of First Lady, marking a significant chapter
in the nation’s political history. After the official declaration, Aseefa will
be given the protocol and privileges befitting the First Lady.
On Sunday, Pakistan Peoples
Party (PPP) co-chairman Asif Zardari was sworn in as the 14th President of
Pakistan, officially taking over as the head of the state for a historic second
time.
After Benazir Bhutto was
assassinated during an election rally in 2007, the position of the First Lady
remained empty during Zardari’s first tenure as President from 2008 to 2013.
Source: brecorder.com
https://www.brecorder.com/news/40293152/aseefa-bhutto-likely-to-become-first-lady
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World Customs Organization
Appoints, Munerah Al-Rasheed, First Arab Woman To Top Post
March 12, 2024
RIYADH: The World Customs
Organization has elected the first Arab woman to head up its Regional
Intelligence Liaison Offices for 2025 and 2026, the Saudi Press Agency reported
on Tuesday.
Munerah Al-Rasheed’s
appointment was made during the 31st Global Meeting of the RILO, which was held
at the WCO headquarters in Brussels, Belgium from Jan. 30 to Feb. 1.
With nearly 20 years of
experience, Al-Rasheed served as vice president and director of the RILO for
the Middle East at the Saudi Zakat, Tax and Customs Authority.
She also represented 11 local
Saudi Arabia offices in the Middle East region at various meetings, conferences
and workshops.
Source: arabnews.com
https://www.arabnews.com/node/2475311/saudi-arabia
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UNESCO: 75% of Afghan Girls
Denied Education, Facing Bleak Future
2024-03-12
UNESCO, in its report, has
stated that Afghanistan is among the ten countries where the majority of girls
are deprived of going to schools and 75% of them are deprived of education.
The United Nations
Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) has published a
report stating that girls in Afghanistan and some African countries are facing
significant educational setbacks.
"Among these ten
countries, nine from Africa and Afghanistan have the highest rate of girls'
lack of access to schools. Afghanistan ranks tenth in this list. At least 50%
of girls cannot go to school, and in Afghanistan, 75% of girls do not have the
opportunity to attend school." Reads part of the report.
"If the Islamic Emirate
does not allow our sisters to go to school this year as well, we will face a
very difficult year ahead and the future of Afghanistan will be dark and in
ignorance," said Zakiullah Muhammadi, a university professor.
Zahra and Maryam, who are
eighth-grade students, have turned to painting since the schools' doors have
been closed to girls from the sixth grade onwards.
They say that art can never
replace education and the doors of schools must be reopened for girls.
"Education has its
value, I want our school to start again so we can return to our lessons,"
said Zahra
"I should have been in the eleventh grade
by now, but since the schools were closed, I am still in the eighth
grade," said Maryam.
Meanwhile, several other
students also request the caretaker government to facilitate their return to
schools in the educational year 1403.
"My request from the
Islamic Emirate is to open the doors of schools for girls above sixth grade in
the solar year 1403, so we can enjoy our rights," said Rabia, Student.
"The schools for girls
should be opened as soon as possible so we can continue our education like
boys," said Sana, another student.
Despite it being more than
nine hundred days since the closure of schools for girls above the sixth grade
and less than ten days left until the start of the new educational year, the
caretaker government has not said anything about reopening the schools for
these girls.
Source: tolonews.com
https://tolonews.com/afghanistan-187792
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Women Against Fascism:
Activist Shabnam Hashmi Speaks On The Rani Chennamma Campaign
Lakshmi Priya
11 Mar 2024
Seated on a stage at the
Kesari Hall in Thiruvananthapuram, Shabnam Hashmi engages with the guests on
stage, welcomes a speaker who arrives late, picks up a dropped paper, and hands
out the scores of pamphlets she brought with her from Delhi. A social activist
and human rights campaigner for so long – more than four decades if you count
the years – Shabnam continues to work like the volunteer she started out as,
even as she heads an organisation like ANHAD and leads many movements of
resistance across the country. On Saturday, March 9, she was in Kerala as part
of a new campaign, ‘I too am Rani Chennamma’, to call upon women from across
the country to fight the fascist forces ruling it. ANHAD along with 71 other
organisations put the campaign together.
On the stage is a banner
carrying a painting of Rani Chennamma, the queen of Kittur who led an armed
struggle against the British 200 years ago, in her iconic pose of weaving a
sword, ready to fight. It is that fearlessness that Shabnam and her team at
ANHAD (Act Now for Harmony and Democracy), an organisation that began as a
response to the 2002 Gujarat riots, wish to invoke through the campaign, she
tells TNM. On February 21, the campaign was launched in Kittur in Karnataka
where 3,500 women turned up, and pledged that they too were Rani Chennammas.
“If she could fight the
British, who were a lot more powerful, then why can’t we, as women, fight the
fascist forces within the country. This is a call to women across India, to
rise and fight against this regime and defeat them in the coming elections,”
Shabnam says.
Seventy-two organisations in
Kittur came together to make this happen, Shabnam says. "Especially
Karnataka Rajya Mahila Dourjanya Virodhi Okkuta who immediately responded to
the idea. Without them and a large number of activists, writers, and academics
from Karnataka this wouldn’t have been possible."
Bringing women together
In Thiruvananthapuram on
March 9, a Malayalam version of the Kittur declaration was released, which
began with “We the women of India pledge to reclaim India.” A few women
activists and orators joined the cause — Radhamani of Kerala Sasthra Sahithya
Parishad, a 23-year-old block panchayat member from Palakkad named Sneha, Dalit
activist Vineetha Vijayan, filmmaker activist Vidhu Vincent, Communist Party of
India (CPI) leader Geetha Nazeer, and Jyothi Vijayakumar of the Congress. They
all spoke of the need to come together to fight the fascist forces, shared
their angst of where the country was headed, and called on women to join the
cause.
“The idea [for the campaign]
came after the Bharatiya Janata Party won three states (in the recent Assembly
elections) and there was a feeling of despair all around. I have never given
into being low. And I think it’s very important that activists don't let that
happen, because a lot of people look up to them for what they’re doing. So we
were thinking of what to do, and I thought we must do something centred around
women,” Shabnam says.
She joined hands with Annie
Raja, a CPI leader she has often collaborated with in the past, and together
they came up with the plan to invoke the memory of Rani Chennamma, who fought
the British years before the more popular Rani of Jhansi. Annie, however, had
to take leave when she was nominated as the Left’s candidate from Wayanad for
the Lok Sabha elections.
The task at hand was not
easy. But Shabnam and her team came up with simple and straightforward methods
to change people's prejudices about other communities, such as by getting them
to visit each other and letting them see the reality for themselves.
How perspectives are changed
On August 15, ANHAD had
launched a campaign (Mere Ghar Aa Ke To Dekho) along with other organisations
across India for people to visit a family which is not of their respective
religion, caste, region, ethnicity, or sexual orientation. “We were able to get
50,000 people to visit each other on August 15, and then another 50,000 more
later on. As part of this program, we took 25 people to Kashmir. It was an
experience that changed their perspectives. Just being together did that,”
Shabnam says.
Another time, they got about
20 Patel women to go to Juhapura (a Muslim ghetto) in Ahmedabad and visit
Muslim families. They spent a few hours there and came back and discussed how
they did not find families with more than two children or with one husband and
four wives, as is the narrative spread by communal forces. “The moment they go
to the ground and see things for themselves, they realise that this is sheer
propaganda,” Shabnam says.
For the Chennamma campaign,
they decided to emulate an event that ANHAD had led in honour of Mahatma Gandhi
in Porbandar, where they produced posters that people carried back with them
and pasted across the districts of Gujarat. “We thought something like that
could be done, calling upon women from across India to give out this message to
defeat the communal forces. Getting permission for a program like this itself
is an issue in India now. So we thought of focusing on opposition (non
BJP-ruled) states,” Shabnam says.
That is how they came to
Kittur in Karnataka and decided to commemorate Chennamma. Posters, exhibitions,
audio visuals, and songs were all put together. Women from all walks of life,
from 15 states, showed up. Like in the Porbandar program, the women were
encouraged to take the posters and messages back to their districts.
Taking it forward
The event was replicated in
Delhi in March. Thiruvananthapuram is the third venue. Shabnam also plans to
take it to Allahabad, Rohtak, Ahmedabad, Hyderabad, Lucknow, Kolkata, and
Mumbai in the coming days. “This is my list but it might not happen, because
ANHAD, for years now, has been surviving on personal donations. We don't have
money to travel. If we are able to raise resources, it can happen or else have
groups within the respective states take it forward,” she says.
Shabnam wants to make it
clear that even though it is led by women, this is not a woman-oriented
campaign. “This is about democracy, about secularism, about the rights of the
farmers, of the workers, of women as well. It is also about scientific temper,
about the universities, how the education system is being undermined and everything
they've been trying to suppress. It is against authoritarianism and
dictatorship and fascism.”
The campaign invokes
fearlessness, since it is fear that the regime has been using to silence
dissent — labels of anti-nationalism, arrests, court cases, jail sentences, and
deaths. Shabnam says that the fascist forces they fight also feel intimidated
in turn, when they realise that “we are not going to be intimidated no matter
what they do.”
As she talks to me, women
stop by with words of solidarity and sharing memories of her brother Safdar
Hashmi, the Communist playwright who was murdered during a street performance
in Uttar Pradesh in 1989. Many still know her as the sister of Safdar,
especially in Kerala, but she is used to that, she says. “He has become a
symbol, and although it was a very cruel death, his martyrdom didn't go to
waste. People do a lot of things in his memory,” she says.
Source: thenewsminute.com
https://www.thenewsminute.com/andhra-pradesh/andhra-woman-dies-by-suicide-ysrcp-alleges-harassment-by-tdp-jsp
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URL: https://newageislam.com/islam-women-feminism/pakistan-seema-haider-caa-india/d/131899