Heinrich Böll Stiftung and Shirkat Gah- Women’s Resource Centre
 “Women, Religion and Politics in Pakistan”

Lahore, 21-22 May, 2010, Heinrich Böll Stiftung and Shirkat Gah- Women’s Resource Centre held a national conference on “Women, Religion and Politics in Pakistan” at Holiday Inn Hotel, Lahore.

The sessions discussed challenges pertaining to women’s participation in politics in Pakistan and also linked it with religion. Different dimensions of the use and abuse of religion were highlighted as most of the papers were researched based so it gave very solid ground for discussions.

Distinguished speakers and session chairpersons included Khawar Mumtaz - CEO Shirkat Gah, Sherry Rehman – Former Federal Minister for Information, and Bushra Gohar – Member National Assembly and vice president of Awami National party and Farida Shaheed.

About 200 participants from all provinces of the country included academics, current and former government representatives, national and provincial parliamentarians, civil society representatives, media personnel and human rights activists participated. There were also a good number of students from different institutions.

The conference started with Gregor Enste, Resident Director, of Heinrich- Boll- Stiftung introducing the organization and its commitment to continue working in Pakistan for sustainable development and the process of democratization by supporting research.

Khawar Mumtaz, CEO, Shirkat Gah welcomed the guests and acknowledged HBS partnership with Shirkat Gah for research and capacity building. She introduced Shirkat Gah and highlighted key achievements in a challenging environment.

Khalid Ahmed shared the history of the rise of religious right in Pakistan highlighting the current use of fear to spread an orthodox, militant Islam. He gave his analysis from historical perspective and talked about how state has shrunk, and how in different parts of Pakistan the writ of the government is not observed and is challenged and the non state actors have made their hegemony in spite of its small numbers. He also referred to that Islam has always been used in the past for vested interests, but new phenomena of using Islamic narratives have a strong element of fear.

He provided an example of Friday sermons at many mosques in Pakistan currently using fear to promote their version of Islam. He also discussed the myth spread by Islamists that Islam discourages democracy and freedom of women and shared that in such an orthodox environment, women get marginalized.   He outlined Pakistan’s path towards becoming an ideological state and the move towards revisionist nationalism which required the use of non state actors.

Farida Shaheed from Shirkat Gah examined at length how a revisionist Islam has displaced a more tolerant, pluralist attitude. She discussed citizenship and the social dimension of movement building in Pakistan. She said that unless the challenge of providing women adequate space is addressed, great revolts and small rebellions are not possible in Pakistan. But she also referred that we have to develop the small rebellions where women’s agency is addressed and make those small rebellions in to a big revolt.

Mr. Faruq Ahmed Khan and Razia Malik gave the presentation on Cholistan.  They shared their experience and the difficulties specially related to the cultural violence linked with the religion. They quoted many examples and explained how religion and Custom is used interchangeably.

Sherry Rehman chaired a session on militancy and retreat in women’s rights.  She said it was wrong to put the responsibility of fighting oppressive policies and legislation on women parliamentarians alone and men should be urged to play a stronger role. She also urged members of civil society to provide spaces for women to reflect on discriminatory laws and cultural practices in order to fight religious militancy in Pakistan and be a part of the national discourse. It is with great difficulty that women claim their spaces in the parliament therefore she stressed that women should not voluntarily rezine from politics weather they are elected or selected. Miss Sana Haroon gave an excellent presentation on “Amr bil Maruf wa Nahi Anal munkir (preventing vice promoting Virtue) and the public lives of women in the surrounds of swat.

Samar Minallah presented a documentary highlighting the need for religious tolerance; it showed how religious extremism and the military operations were impacting local women. She reflected upon two sides of religion, one through her case study she showed how a women who was alone and distressed got strength from Religion especially from Quran whom she kept close to her heart. She was glad that while she has to flee her house everything was lost, but she did not lose Quran, which gave a lot of strength. On the other side Samar reflected through case studies that how Islam was used by the Taliban’s and how schools and colleges were banned and women’s mobility was totally paralyzed. But women still had their agency.

Dr Sarfraz khan gave examples how Taliban’s made their way in swat and how the local administration submitted to it. How the writ of that place was absolutely challenged and taken over.

The last session of the day first was on politics of sexuality. Hooria khan presented a paper on Moral panic, the criminalization of sexuality in Pakistan which was then commented by Maleeha Zia. They were very well researched papers and many examples were given of moral policing which is then reflected in everyday life of women.

Dr Rubina Saigol talked on Religious values and beliefs in women’s Education in Pakistan. It was a fascinating presentation and she gave examples which were very alarming and it is very sad that many girls and women themselves submit to this subjugation. Dr Fareeha Zafar also being an Educationist and gender expert gave her perspective how religion is super imposed in the text books and also control behavior of an individuals.

The second day’s proceedings were chaired by Bushra Gohar where Dr. Farzana Bari talked about the impact of terrorism in Pakistan. She shared her research findings in terms of women’s limited mobility during the talibanization process which also impacted men in completing day to day tasks at home and businesses. It was really interesting to note how patriarchy was at play and in conflict. Men at Home were really upset as their women had to forcefully follow the instructions of the Taliban’s and due to that many chores which were women’s prerogative had to be taken up by men. She concluded with a concern that women suffered the impact of terrorism disproportionately.

Neelum Hussian talked about women’s spaces in a patriarchal context. She made references to her research on the philosophy of “Dars” and the “Mazaar” culture and how both provide public spaces and authority to women in different ways. Through a collage of pictures she projected her point of view.  She concluded by saying that in spite of Mazar also being part of the patriarchal discourse still allows women little more space and is more pluralistic than Dars culture which is more rigid and monolithic.

Humeira Iqtidar examined two basic questions viz: why do women join Islamist parties and what is the impact on women’s life when they join Islamist parties. She gave instances of some women’s personal choice to observe “Purda” (veil) and how that had affected their home lives and their relationships with the men of their family. She further spoke about her interaction with the women think tanks in Jammat –e- Islami and Jamaat-ud- Dawa as part of her research.  She concluded by saying that  while secularization has so far been viewed as measuring the increase or decrease in religion, it is important to analyze the changes in the quality of religious belief.

The two-day conference ended with a round table discussion on women’s experiences in politics moderated by Ayesha Tammy Haq. In this session, personal experiences of women in mainstream politics and the challenges they face to engage other women in policy making platforms was discussed at length. Shaheen Attiq ur Rehman appreciated the independent and collective work that NGO’s  like Shirkat Gah are doing and stressed that women’s issues need to be highlighted more publically. She urged participants to pressure political parties to fix at least 10% seats for women.

In response to questions from the audience, Amar Sindhu from Women’s Action Forum – Sindh shared that that some women activists forget about promoting women’s issues once in public office. Aqeela Naz from Anjuman e Mazareen Pakistan demanded that political parties support women to get elected rather than selected and urged for inclusion of women from a diverse background to ensure adequate representation for addressing women’s issues. Shaheen asked the forum to galvanize youth to get into politics and social work. Bushra Gohar urged women in politics and in public spaces to use every opportunity to introduce women’s perspective and requested women to join hands in cross party alliances on women’s issues.

There was a great stress at the end of the conference that  women need  to support each other in every position they occupy.
Khawar Mumtaz concluded by thanking participants and speakers for a very productive conference.

The detailed report of the National Conference would be available in two weeks time.

COMPLETE REPORT: TWO DAYS NATIONAL CONFERENCE ON ‘WOMEN, RELIGION AND POLITICS IN PAKISTAN’

Media Coverage of the Conference on "Women, Religion and Politics in Pakistan" (English)

Media Coverage of the Conference on "Women, Religion and Politics in Pakistan" (Urdu)