Talaq Given By Man On Internet Is Valid Only After Verification: Theologians
New
Age Islam News Bureau
18
January 2021
• Shabera Ansari, Woman DSP, A Role Model For Youngsters From Muslim Families
• Mumbai:
Shabana Shaikh Becomes First Muslim Lady In-Charge Officer Of Dongri Police
Station
• Decade
After Revolution, Tunisia’s Women Face Uphill Battle
• Female
UAE Cop's Inventions Bag Three Gold Medals
Compiled
by New Age Islam News Bureau
URL: https://www.newageislam.com/islam-women-feminism/talaq-given-man-internet-valid/d/124094
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Talaq given by man on Internet is valid only after verification: Theologians
Jan
17, 2021
Hyderabad:
Woman theologians attending a workshop of Jamiat-ul-Mominath, the Deeni Madrasa
for women, opined that divorce given by a husband over the mobile phone or
WhatsApp or through email is valid only after verification. If the husband
denies it, such divorce is invalid.
They
said that the wife has the right to seek dissolution of nikah in case the
husband contracts a dangerous disease like AIDS. In case the wife is suffering
from such a disease, the husband can marry another woman but he should not discontinue
paying maintenance to his first wife. It is better that he refrains from
divorcing the stricken wife, the scholars said.
More
than 200 female Muftis and Aalim participated in the deliberations over 150
theological issues in the light of Sharia. The Jamiat-ul-Mominath holds
workshops every year to discuss contemporary issues confronted by the community
in which female scholars participate.
Dr
Rizwana Zarreen, principal, said one of the purposes of the nikah is the
fulfilment of natural sexual desires. In cases where dangerous diseases can be
transmitted to the partner, the wife can ask for a separation. However, it is
not fair for a husband to divorce the wife for the same reason, as a husband
can fulfil his sexual urge by marrying another woman. In Islam, men are
caretakers of women.
The
scholars opined that gender transitioning is prohibited (haram) for women and
men as per the Sharia as it is interference in the creation of the Almighty.
However, there is an exemption for transgender. A transgender can choose the
gender based on dominated sexual traits.
They
also opined that depositing breast milk in mother milk banks for Muslim women
and feeding children with milk procured from such banks is not permissible in
Islam as it impacts fosterage and terms of nikah. Nikah is prohibited among the
children who are fed on milk of the same woman.
The
scholars said that there is no disadvantage for Muslims in taking the
Coronavirus vaccine even if it contains a few ingredients which are haram as
the character of these ingredients has been changed. As per the Sharia,
injecting any ingredient which is not permitted but used in changed form is
permissible to save human life.
https://www.deccanchronicle.com/nation/in-other-news/160121/talaq-given-by-man-on-internet-is-valid-only-after-verification-theol.html
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Shabera
Ansari, Woman DSP, A Role Model For Youngsters From Muslim Families
Jan
17, 2021
Parents
in middle-class Muslim families generally believe that their children would
hardly get a government job, hence, they find it better to engage them in some
work rather than letting them pursuing studies. But a young woman from a
middle-class family has busted such myths by becoming the Deputy Superintendent
of Police.
Shabera
Ansari, a resident of Indore, is posted as DSP (Women's Cell) at Dewas in
Madhya Pradesh and her father is posted as a Sub-Inspector at a police station
in Indore.
Shabera
said she had a normal childhood and there were never big dreams to pursue. When
she went to college, at the age of 19, marriage proposals started coming in but
fire in the belly to do something egged her on.
Finally,
she joined the police forces and became a DSP. Currently, she said, she is
preparing for civil services exams.
The
young woman said that soon after passing her out of a government school in
Indore, she enrolled in a college and started preparing for Union Public
Service Commission examinations along with her regular studies.
She
was selected as Sub-Inspector in 2013, and in 2018 posted as Trainee DSP in Sidhi.
Shabera's
family originally hails from Ballia in Uttar Pradesh, but settled down in
Indore about 30 years ago due to his father's job in state police.
"I
was an average student in school and also failed in mathematics once," she
told IANS with a chuckle.
"A
marriage proposal came when I was just 19. I was scared and decided to do
something. I started my journey and never looked back. I started preparation
for the state government services during college and tasted success in the
first attempt... I have continued studying ever since," she said with
confidence.
Shabera
further added: "My mother always supported me. Initially, it was not clear
if I will opt to join the police, though there was always an interest since my
father is in police service."
Surprisingly,
Shabera is the first woman in her family to crack state civil service exam and
has now become an inspiration for her community.
Many
times, she was honoured as chief guest in various functions, including school
programmes where she interacted with children who are always curious to know
about her journey.
"I
always try to encourage children and motivate them to do something in
life," Shabera said.
"Little
children seem very fond of taking selfies with me," she smiled.
She
said: "I often do counselling of children of Muslim families, especially
boys. I tell everyone to trust themselves and study seriously; hardwork will
definitely change things." Shabera said she also got to learn a lot from
her father. It could be a coincidence that Shabera was incharge of a police
station during lockdown where her father was posted.
In
fact, her father had gone for some work to Uttar Pradesh when the lockdown was
imposed, and he got stuck. Shabera tried to somehow bring her father back but
to no avail. Eventually, the police authorities issued direction that he could
do duty from wherever he was stuck.
She
said that she had many times gone out on patrol duty at night with her father.
However, once back home, she used to cook for him.
She
said that her father respects her as an officer but Shabera has to many times
remind him that she is an officer at office not at home. — IANS
https://www.tribuneindia.com/news/nation/woman-dsp-a-role-model-for-youngsters-from-muslim-families-199730
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Mumbai:
Shabana Shaikh Becomes First Muslim Lady In-Charge Officer Of Dongri Police
Station
JANUARY
15, 2021
Shabana
Shaikh, who joined the Maharashtra police in 1992, has now become the first
Muslim woman in-charge officer in the history of Dongri police station. Her
success is inspirational to women in uniform as it breaks many stereotypes.
She
was also the first Muslim woman from her district to become a police officer.
Shaikh has been serving as an inspector in the special branch (SB-I) in the
Mumbai police. “I was born into a large joint family in Akole taluka of
Ahmadnagar district. We were seven sisters and two brothers. Educating girls
was almost a taboo in my village. However, although my father was little
educated, he made it a point to send all of us to school,” she told Hindustan
Times.
Shaikh
moved to Pune to complete her Masters and said that she always wanted to do
something different. “Police service became a natural choice,” she claimed.
Adding that she failed to qualify for the direct Maharashtra Public Service
Commission (MPSC) examination for the post of Deputy Superintendent of Police.
However, she cracked the sub-inspector exam in her first attempt and completed
her MA during training. She wants her two daughters to join the IPS as well.
In
2018, Mumbai Police achieved a pathbreaking feat when became the first city in
the country to have as many as eight women officers as police station
in-charge. These officers also appointed as senior inspectors which is the
highest post at police station level in the commissionerate. Taking to Twitter,
Mumbai Police had then written, “Eight women police station in-charges a first
in any city in the country, protecting the good and destroying the evil, with a
smile each day.”
Mumbai’s
Matunga Central Railway station became the first all-women station in India.
https://www.shethepeople.tv/news/mumbai-shabana-shaikh-dongri-police-station-becomes-first-muslim-lady-in-charge-officer-of/
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Decade
After Revolution, Tunisia’s Women Face Uphill Battle
By
Constantin Gouvy and constantine
17
Jan 2021
Tunis,
Tunisia – Ten years ago, Tunisian women poured onto the streets to help
overthrow autocratic leader Zine El Abidine Ben Ali after nearly 20 years in
power, and, for some, to denounce the patriarchal nature of Tunisia’s political
sphere.
“During
the 2011 uprising, we dreamt big,” longtime women’s rights activist Neila
Zoghlami recalled with nostalgia.
“We
dreamt of equal representation. We dreamt we would become full citizens, not
just burdened with men’s duties, but also endowed with their rights … we dreamt
we would finally be able to carve out a genuine space for women in politics.”
Now
secretary-general of the feminist Tunisian Association of Democratic Women,
Zoghlami says, despite big strides in the right direction, her dream remains
unfulfilled, as women’s political engagement and representation have started to
erode.
On
the eve of Tunisia’s revolution, despite several decades of “state feminism”
initiated by former President Habib Bourguiba upon independence from France in
1956 and perpetuated by Ben Ali’s repressive rule, politics unmistakably
remained a man’s world.
On
the face of it, Tunisia’s parliament comprised a large number of women. After
the introduction of gender quotas on electoral lists, women secured 28 percent
of the seats in the 2009 legislative election – a larger share than in the
United States House of Representatives in 2021.
But
under the guise of increasing representation, Ben Ali had instrumentalised
women for political gains, said 34-year-old Hela Omrane, a former member of
parliament elected in 2014.
“It
was only a PR exercise for the regime,” she told Al Jazeera.
For
Omrane, the revolution was the opportunity for women to genuinely become
involved in politics, not just to be used as “ornaments”.
Mixed
fortunes
To be
sure, 10 years on, women have some successes to celebrate.
“After
the uprising, a tremendous number of women who had never been engaged
politically, never even been on social media because they were afraid of Ben
Ali’s regime, found themselves mobilising politically, involving themselves in
civil society, and encouraging others to vote in a spontaneous movement
throughout the country,” recalled Bochra Belhaj Hmida, a lawyer, politician,
and leading Tunisian feminist who spearheaded legislation for women’s rights in
parliament between 2014 and 2019.
Since
then, political mobilisation has landed women several historic victories.
As
voters, women demonstrated their political influence most clearly in the 2014
presidential election, when one million women voted for Beji Caid Essebsi, from
the newly formed secular and centrist party Nidaa Tounes, helping him to
victory.
In
2012, women parliamentarians defeated an attempt by members of Islamist party
Ennahdha to enshrine women’s “complementarity” to men, instead of “equality”,
in the country’s new constitution.
In
2017, landmark legislation on violence against women included provisions
against the prevention of women entering politics.
Women
secured an unprecedented 47 percent of the seats in local elections in 2018.
Yet,
in recent years, women’s political involvement and representation have been on
the wane in Tunisia.
The
trend was especially clear in the 2019 legislative elections, in which only 36
percent of registered Tunisian women voted – 10 percent fewer than men – and
only 22 percent of the seats were won by women, some 10 percent fewer than in
2014.
“From
2011 up until 2014, even in rural areas, women entertained an unprecedented
interest for politics, closely following debates on the TV,” Dorra Mahfoudh, a
sociologist and longtime feminist activist who was part of the transitional
authority after the uprising, told Al Jazeera.
“But
as the years went by, and as the promises of the revolution went unfulfilled,
their political engagement eroded.”
Shunning
elections
For
Belhaj Hmida, many older women felt betrayed when the government elected in
2014 failed to comprehensively defeat Ennahdha.
Many
younger women, she added, do not see themselves as being represented by any of
the parties in parliament today.
“No
one really speaks to them, in their language, about the issues they care about
– so they shun the elections,” she said.
Sonia
Ben Miled, a 28-year-old activist and head of communications for the feminist
NGO Aswat Nissa, said in rural areas this disengagement is compounded by
recurring obstacles, such as women struggling to access transport and often
lacking the required identification papers to vote.
The
2019 election also saw a significant drop in the representation of women in
parliament; with only 5 percent of women on the electoral lists, they lost some
30 seats.
“There
might have been more women in parliament in 2009, but at least now these women
are democratically elected, they are legitimate,” Mahfoudh said.
Beyond
the reluctance of political parties to include women on their electoral lists,
Ben Miled said the disappointing figures were also in part the result of the
enduring patriarchal and misogynistic nature of Tunisia’s political sphere.
“There
is still a glass ceiling for Tunisian women in politics today. It’s prompting
some to call it quits,” lamented Ben Miled.
“One
just has to look at the composition of the party’s political offices, the
parliament’s commissions, or even the government to see that women are heavily
underrepresented in decision-making positions.”
The
allocation of ministries also adheres to outdated gender stereotypes, she
added.
“You’ll
never see a woman heading the interior or the defence ministries – these are
still the preserve of men. Women virtually only ever end up with the ministry
for women’s affairs.”
Verbal
abuse
Verbal
violence has also increasingly become a dissuading factor for women who
consider entering politics.
“In
2014, there was a genuine drive for inclusivity – we were trying to set up a
democracy,” Zoghlami said.
“But
today, women’s participation in politics is met with increasingly violent
rhetoric.”
Many
have denounced the verbal abuse they have received on social media, often
targeted at their personal lives and families.
“At
first, it wasn’t easy for me to accept the violent backlash each of my media
appearances would draw simply because I am a woman working in politics. But I
think it was even harder for my family,” Omrane said.
According
to Belhaj Hmida, as a result of these trends, “there is no feminism in
parliament today, no progressive voices”.
Meanwhile,
she said the links between parliament and women’s rights civil society
organisations have started eroding, and all that is left in parliament are
“retrograde views” on the role of women in politics.
Notably,
last December, parliamentarian Mohamed Afess, from the conservative coalition
al-Karama, lambasted women’s rights in parliament.
In an
infamous speech that has drawn the ire of civil society, he claimed the
progress achieved in the field of women’s rights has tainted women’s honour,
and that what people call women’s freedom is in fact libertinism and a lack of
virtue.
After
Afess’s speech, Zoghlami confessed she lost all confidence in parliamentarians’
ability to safeguard the rights women have fought for since the revolution.
“With
this new parliament, women have gone back to square one”, echoed Omrane, who
had joined politics in 2012 in reaction to Ennahda’s push for women’s
“complementarity”.
In
stark contrast, Belhaj Hmida said she was happy Afess’s views were aired.
“Look
at the uproar it caused – it was encouraging,” she said, referring to the
lawsuits several civil society organisations have filed against the
parliamentarian.
“Call
me a naive optimist, but I think it is a good thing we are having this
conversation out loud: muzzling this kind of speech wouldn’t allow us to
overcome it as a society.”
‘The
fight continues’
Many
said reducing the issue to a dichotomy between feminist progressives and
patriarchal Islamists is unhelpful and even misleading.
One
of Zoghlami’s main causes for concern today is the continued
instrumentalisation of women in politics by parties across the ideological
spectrum.
“The
situation hasn’t changed much compared to Ben Ali’s regime,” she said.
For
Belhaj Hmida, “so-called progressive parties only take a stand for women’s rights
when it suits them. They’re instrumentalising women and women’s rights just
like everyone else.”
Even
before the revolution, progressives and opposition parties always told her:
“women’s rights isn’t the priority, it’s not the time for it”, she said.
“Today,
when ‘progressive’ political parties want to pick a fight with the Islamists
and the conservatives, they suddenly become more feminist than the feminists
themselves. But that’s just for the show,” she added.
“The
rest of the time, they try and divide us by pushing us into a constant state of
competition for a small number of positions, instead of fighting with us for
more parity.”
As a
result, there is only a little cooperation across party lines among women in
parliament.
“Women
and their political rights are a pawn on the political chessboard. It’s
disheartening”, said Ben Miled.
To
upend this logic, in 2012, her NGO Aswat Nissa launched the Women’s Political
Academy, which has trained more than 200 sitting or aspiring women politicians
and community leaders below 35 on how to integrate gender issues in public
policies and work across party lines to advance women’s rights.
Meanwhile,
looking back at her dream a decade since the revolution, Zoghlami said, despite
the difficulties, she is not ready yet to throw in the towel.
“We
are still far from equal representation today, but we have won some battles
since the revolution, and the fight for securing women’s place in politics
continues,” she said.
“We
believe in a better Tunisia, and a better tomorrow.”
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/1/17/a-decade-after-revolution-tunisias-women-face-an-uphill-battle
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Female
UAE Cop's Inventions Bag Three Gold Medals
January
17, 2021
Major
Wafa Ali Al Tayari invented a smart DNA fingerprinting system and a child
protection solution against car accidents.
The
Abu Dhabi Police have won three gold medals, thanks to the inventions of female
police officer Major Wafa Ali Al Tayari.
The
DNA expert’s smart DNA fingerprinting system won multiple awards, including gold
medals at the Kuwait International Invention Fair and the Korea International
Women’s Invention Exposition.
Al
Tayari was the only Arab woman to receive a gold medal.
Her
other invention was a child protection solution against car accidents.
https://www.khaleejtimes.com/news/female-uae-cops-inventions-bag-three-gold-medals
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