The UN Women Pakistan have done something laudable. They have launched a campaign against violence against women by naming the devil and spelling out that men beat women, pretty often and pretty viciously. When the Council of Islamic Ideology (CII), a body better left to...
If someone told me that life is going to be tough for a man who insulted, debased and demeaned women; that a man with who had sexual assault charges against him would pay through his teeth, I’d be very confused right now. With Donald Trump...
A few years ago, I went to a restaurant where the waiter turned the deepest beetroot shade of red when I requested for a grilled chicken breast. I’d said the word breast and this had sent him shuddering. Unluckily for many chicken around this country...
They say justice delayed is justice denied. In Asia Bibi’s case perhaps delaying of a sentence may turn out to be a better deal for her. She was arrested for her faith. We all know the story by now — how she stood her ground...
Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt have split and made front line news amongst the UNGA and the India-Pakistan tiff. They were a power couple; no financial woes; a joint love for adopting babies and helping the less fortunate and no shortage of phenotypic symmetry called...
I am not ashamed of taking some of my inspiration from Facebook memes. They are no New Yorker Magazine cartoons, granted, but they sometimes can be pretty astute. This particular one said: Women belong in the kitchen; men belong in the kitchen, we all belong...
Remember that dream where you wake up in a cold sweat because you are naked in public? It is just as horrific when someone is trying to cloak you with so many clothes that you are invisible. You are so sexualized that the mere show...
In Taliban-controlled Afghanistan, women’s fingers were cut off if they wore nail colour. There was a ban on women riding motorbikes. They were publicly whipped if anyone could spot their ankles. In Pakistan, most Jumma khutbas (Friday sermons) may not outright call for women’s public...
The murder of Samia Shahid, a Bradford resident who had a second marriage against her family’s will, is like being in a repetitive nightmare. It seems so familiarly eerie and without escape. Punjab Police, lead by a watchful committee summoned by the Chief Minister, now...
I feel the same way about Pakistani society failing its women as I feel about land mines – someone is bound to get maimed, pretty regularly. When Qandeel Balooch was drugged and strangled by her brother, I was abroad. What is worse than Pakistan failing...