Every August, the flags go up. Green and white bunting stretches across markets in Lahore, Multan, Rawalpindi, Quetta. Children wave paper flags on rooftops. The national anthem plays on loop. We call it Azaadi — freedom, independence, the day we stopped answering to anyone else. But ask a woman what freedom feels like, and the […]
Azaadi? Independence… Is It for Everyone? Read More »
منشیات کا مسئلہ آج پاکستان، خصوصاً سندھ، کا سب سے سنگین سماجی مسئلہ بنتا جا رہا ہے۔ میرے نزدیک یہ صرف صحت کا مسئلہ نہیں بلکہ تعلیم، معیشت، خاندانی نظام، امن و امان اور ملک کے مستقبل سے جڑا ہوا ایک قومی بحران ہے۔ منشیات کی لپیٹ میں صرف ایک فرد نہیں آتا بلکہ اس
!منشیات کے قبضے میں نسلیں Read More »
There is a particular kind of neglect that South Punjab knows intimately. It is the neglect of a region whose language is spoken by millions but rarely heard in policy rooms. It is the neglect of a land that floods again and again, whose people rebuild again and again, and whose women are asked to
SAAH RISE and Baithak Bring Menstrual Health into the Climate Conversation in Khan Garh Read More »
Pakistan and Bangladesh share more than geography and history; they share the daily, lived struggle of women trying to claim space in patriarchal systems, in classrooms, in policy rooms, and in the stories that get told about them. This collaboration is an invitation to learn from each other, to compare notes on what has worked
SAAH RISE Partners with RISY Foundation Bangladesh Read More »
Some conversations end when the call disconnects, and there are conversations that stay with you long after reshaping the way you see your own work. Yesterday’s exchange with our Bangladeshi activist friends from RISE Foundation was the second kind. For one hour, two countries, two histories, and two generations of women’s movements sat in the
Humanity Before Borders – A Cross-Border Conversation with Our Friends in Bangladesh Read More »
The mountains of Lower Dir keep their secrets close. In 2001, one of those secrets was an agreement — quiet, unanimous, and absolute. Every community leader, every political party, every man who held any power in the district had come to the same conclusion: no woman would vote. No woman would campaign. No woman would
Shad Begum: The Hidden Leader Who Changed the Political Landscape of Dir Read More »
In the sun-scorched villages of Tharparkar, where sand dunes stretch further than opportunity ever did for women of the scheduled castes, Kamla Bheel decided that “no” was not an answer she would accept. Today, she holds a title no woman before her ever held. But her story didn’t begin with power. It began with resistance
Kamla Bheel: The First Bheel Woman to Break Tharparkar’s Political Ceiling Read More »
There is a particular kind of courage that doesn’t announce itself. It doesn’t come with a manifesto or a movement behind it. Sometimes it looks like a ten-year-old girl refusing to eat for two days because she wants to stay in school. Sometimes it looks like a grown woman standing up in a council meeting,
They make fun of Saraiki people. But look at the people of South Punjab especially the women of South Punjab, in a region still labeled “underdeveloped” by the rest of the country. Look at Mukhtaran Mai. This is a woman who stood against injustice, who worked for her country, and who worked, above all, for
Grassroots Courage: The Story of Mukhtaran Mai Read More »
I am an MPhil scholar in Gender Studies. I have read Wollstonecraft and de Beauvoir, bell hooks and Judith Butler. I can trace the so-called “waves” of Western feminism in my sleep. And yet, until a few weeks ago, I did not know the name Begum Shaista Ikramullah. I found out about her the way
Why Do We Only Study Feminism From a Western Lens? Read More »
