APWA

The stated primary aim of APWA was the enhancement of women’s social, educational,
political and cultural status in society.

Saigol
Primary work of APWA seen in welfare terms –
• Women, who had been mobilized by the nationalist movement prior to independence,
became active in social welfare, particularly the rehabilitation of the refugees. The partition
of the sub-continent led to mass influx of refugees across the borders and they required
services and help. This task was performed by women related to Muslim League members,
and others belonging to the well to do classes who could manage the time, resources n
money

The Prime Minister’s wife, Ra’ana Liaquat Ali, was the most outstanding woman who
formed a large number of women’s organizations and attended to many different areas that
affect women, especially welfare and legal reform. ==> The relief and welfare work was
widely accepted as it was seen as an extension of the nurturing role that women were
traditionally expected to perform.
• All-Pakistan Women’s Association (APWA) which, in the context of the time, made
invaluable contributions not only to welfare but also in the arena of legal reform.

• Women were acceptable in the public sphere in so far as they conformed to a traditional
and conservative vision of housewives, mothers, welfare workers and service providers

• objectives were to be welfare organisation for Pakistani women ==> focused on creating
educational, social and cultural consciousness and improving the econ participating of
women for national development

• objectives were to be welfare organisation for Pakistani women ==> focused on creating
educational, social and cultural consciousness and improving the econ participating of
women for national development

• Urban women from well to do classes joined and it became an acceptable avenue for
women’s activities outside the home. APWA opened girls’ schools, health centers and
industrial homes, and imparted sewing and related skills for income- generation.

• Apart from welfare and development activities, APWA made forays into the political and
legal arenas. In 1953, APWA recommended ten reserved seats for women in the National
and Provincial Assemblies.
• 1955; women’s orgs ran a campaign against PM Bogra’s second marriage and this was
spearheaded by the APWA which was to later play a major role in legal reform == as a
result of the campaign the United Front for Women’s Rights was formed under leadership
of Jahanara Shahnawaz === combined pressure of APWA and United Front forced govt to
appoint - a commission headed by the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, Justice Rashid,
to examine laws of marriage, divorce, maintenance and custody of children. The Report
was formulated in 1956 with a lengthy dissenting note from Maulana Ehtashamul Haq
Thanvi. The orthodox reaction got the report shelved, but the seeds of the women’s
struggle against patriarchy and religious obscurantism were perceptible even in the absence
of an organized and coherent movement for change.

• The Muslim Family Laws Ordinance (MFLO) of 1961, which gave women a few rights
with regard to marriage, the custody of children, divorce and registration of marriages and
divorces, was passed as a result of APWA’s efforts. It was basically an attempt to
discourage polygamy as the first wife’s written permission became necessary for a
husband’s second marriage. The recommendations of Justice Rashid Commission
(mentioned above) were not all embodied nonetheless some progress was made compared
to before. Prior to this, the Child Marriages Restraint Act of 1929 recommended fourteen
years as the marriageable age for girls, and the Dissolution of Muslim Marriages Act of
1939 defined the grounds on which women could seek divorce, for example, cruelty and
non-maintenance.

• Although the MFLO of 1961 was by no means radical, and the punishment for the second
marriage was minor (an easily ignored small fine) with annulment not being an option, it
was nonetheless a small step in the direction of women’s rights. Such achievements were
possible cause APWA didn’t challenge the military dictatorship which defined itself as
benevolent, moderate and modern

Relationship with government?

 APWA was a voluntary non-political organisation open to all women over 16 yrs of
age irrespective of caste, class or creed
 APWA’s relationship with the government was one of mutual accommodation and
co-operation. It, therefore, received government funding as well as patronage. It was a
non-threatening organization because of the focus on welfare and development. Its
main work was on women’s education, development skills and income- generation. It
opened schools, colleges, industrial homes and organized meena bazaars to market the
products of needy women.

The Begum

 Legal aspects?
 Ra’ana’s contribution towards the emancipation of Pakistani women will be
remembered as a lasting and irreplaceable legacy. She played a decisive role in
securing fixed allocation of special women’s seats in the Constituent Assembly in
1956. Liaquat Ali, as the prime minister, had already granted representative seats
to women and it was now up to the women not to lose this privilege but to further
augment it.
 The suffrage history of the subcontinent in itself was a fairly recent phenomenon.
After several years of struggle, the Government of India Act 1935 had provided
special reserved seats for women. The demand had been for 10 per cent of the
total seats but only 3 per cent allocation had been granted and representation of
women had been accepted in principle for the first time. Now for the first time in
Pakistan’s first constitution of 1956, a special provision of ten reserved seats, five
from each wing, was formally granted. This was the result of the struggle and
untiring efforts of the members of APWA. During the elections of 1970, APWA
once again made a call for increasing the number of reserved seats for women and
also stressed the need to encourage women to contest for open general seats.
 In the following year, APWA decided to conduct surveys on the efficacy of the
Family Laws Ordinance and these pointed to the lacunae in the implementation of
the ordinance. APWA put forward the recommendation for setting up of special
family law courts and hence managed to secure the Family Law Courts Act in
1964.

 When Zulfikar Ali Bhutto was executed in 1979 by the government of General
Zia-ul-Haq, she spearheaded a campaign against the military government. She,
along with other women’s groups, protested against the military regime’s efforts
to ‘Islamize’ laws, many of which went against women’s legal and moral rights.
She was immensely distraught at the unravelling of all that they had collectively
achieved over the past three or four decades to get women their rights and their
place in society. She expressed her frustration without mincing any words in her
interview to Afsheen Zubair which was published in the Herald in 1984. ‘Today’s
Pakistan is an out-and-out theocracy and under that garb every vestige of personal
freedom is snatched away . . . the army is dictating political and constitutional
changes . . . would the Quaid have permitted chopping of limbs and flogging of
citizens, and that too of women? Would he have enforced covering of heads,
shrouding of women in ungainly chaddars, segregation of women in separate
universities . . . it is very sad. During our time I thought we were getting on,
making progress. Younger women were coming out and I advertised in all my
speeches that no girl should get married until she has a profession . . . now I feel
everything I worked for and believed in, is being undermined.’

 One of her most significant and landmark achievements was to persuade President
Ayub Khan to introduce necessary and far-reaching changes in the hitherto
prevalent ‘Islamic Marriage Laws’. She had been fortunate in finding an ally in
Ayub Khan, who had always viewed the conservative and rigid stance of religious
 clergy with disdain, and this had worked in her favour. The struggle and agitation
to reform these laws was started by the APWA and Women Lawyers Association
in 1952. Public pressure on this matter had continued till the time Family Law
Ordinance was announced by the government of General Ayub Khan in 1961, in
spite of angry and stiff opposition from the religious clergy.

 Welfare?

 APWA’s expansion during its first few years was phenomenal. By 1951 it already
had a well-oiled tiered system with branches extending out from the provincial
level into all its adjoining rural areas. Industrial work centres were established in
all major cities and smaller towns. Sales outlets were also set up for display and
sale of products coming out of the industrial homes.

 Ra’ana’s greatest desire still remained the education for women and to create an
adequate infrastructure for this purpose. She first helped set up the Ra’ana Liaquat
Ali Khan College of Domestic or Home Economics in Karachi and later the
APWA Home Economics College in Lahore. She had secured a substantial
funding from the Ford Foundation for these institutions.

 At the same time, in the very first decade, APWA programmes and activities
expanded by leaps and bounds. It set up a school for girls, an adult literacy centre
and the Quetta Industrial Home in Baluchistan, one of the most under-developed
provinces. By 1956 APWA also launched a large- scale adult literacy programme
which focused mainly on rural women and smaller towns. By the end of this
decade, nearly twenty industrial homes were established in all major cities. There
were over sixty-five primary and secondary schools spread throughout the
country, including ten in East Pakistan. These were all looked after by dedicated
volunteers who also ran Mother and Child Health (MCH) centres and primary
healthcare centres.

 Several overseas branches in countries such as Canada, North America and UK

were opened under its aegis. They were able to sponsor hundreds of deserving
students for advanced studies under the Maple Scholarship programme of the
Government of Canada

Dear Mother

 Ayesha Jalal argues that it was, in fact, the exclusion of women in any meaningful
number from the decision-making process that led Rana Liaquat Ali Khan to form the
All-Pakistan Women’s Association (APWA) in 1949.58 At its first session, Rana was
 sworn in as President for life and Jahanara Shahnawaz as Senior Vice-President. The
latter also partici- pated in the drafting of its constitution, which enshrined the “new
woman’s” ideals – the promotion of anti-customary Islamic reform, social work and
education

 varying relationships between indi- viduals and government even played its part in the
articulation of feminist strategies within APWA. As Jahanara writes, soon after its
founding the constitution was: considerably changed and, instead of making it a
general women’s organization . . . the annual subscription had been raised. All over
the districts, wives of officials, made Presidents just for a year or two to help organize
the Association, continued in office. Even in the Centre, with the Prime Minister’s
wife as President, it was not possible to fight the Government and secure for women
their rightful place as equal citizens.67

 Nor was Fatima uncritical of the second wives of such politicians or women in
positions of power more generally. Regarding Khaliquzzaman’s second wife, Zahida,
she cautioned Surayya, “Never go to that woman’s house . . . She belongs to a social
class which never changes its ways . . . Though she is a poet, she is not fit for
civilized people to associate with.”135 The social class to which Fatima was referring
was the same that had progressively alienated the likes of Jahanara Shahnawaz and
Fatima Begum, along with troops of others, from APWA. “Begums,” she said to
Surayya when the subject once arose, “I find them almost detestable.”136

 Read together, such conversations clarify that Fatima believed that the first reason for
women’s domesticity, nature, though “unfair,” cannot be changed, but the latter
restrictions being socially constructed can and must be overhauled by an educated,
“good woman . . . within her role as wife and mother.”
 “It is essential for women, considering the miserable state they are in, to be
economically well off.
 Her deep-seated belief in the ideals of the “new woman” also prioritized social work
and the domestic role of women as wives and mothers in her own thinking.

 And no less significantly, APWA issued no objections to the tenor of the debate, let
alone the government’s claims that women could not be head of state despite the
provisions of its own constitution.

Class session notes

• Its a voluntary non-political organisation open to all women - no discrimination - opened

many schools, many child care, health centres, imparted sewing etc for income generation
  Also lobbied for legal reforms like female represtention - lobbied for at least 10%
seats for women - also brought in Muslim Family Ordinance Law to curb second
marriages, because women the first wife would become financially insecure cause
husbands’ resources had to be divided or would cut out the first wife and his children ;
it was about surviving for women

 Its very fascinating how APWA came into being - during Pakistan Movement there
were movements fighting for women’s rights - begum used that blueprint of female
led orgs during the PM to bring Paksitani women under one umbrella, to bring women
to the forefront and participate in the public sphere - the 50s were quite progressive
when it came to women’s rights and rep and mobility in the public life; economic life,
state responsibilities, women in the markets, in the schools, in the edu sector and
health sector

 There was some criticism of APWA in Saigal’s readings — didn’t offer any pol
resistance and focused on ‘welfare work’ ==>

 It continued to have a warm relationship with Ayub’s regime and so enjoyed state
protectin - wasn’t part of any controversies and govt even used it to promote this
‘modern’ image of Pakistan which Ayub wanted — the women’s org didn’t challenge
the dictaroshi’s attitude towards FJ, a

 Also failed to question the provisions of the Islamist provisions 1973 constitution -
there was a patriarchal bargain of sorts that women were getting some rights so they
should stay quiet - when 1973 constitution cmae out it was a diff ball game and thats
where WAF comes in, WAF n APWA didn’t have the best relationship - since APWA
wasn’t politically charged, wasn’t against military dictartnships, was okay with
staying in its lane with welfare work

 Can be seen as a Begumisation of welfare - org was populated by privileged urban

women == women who had support and help could come into APWA office and give
in their time, and obv economic privilege comes into play here — but also robs you of
a nuanced perspective of including ppl from different classes, and also traps you in
this hierarchical relationship where good rich urban women are saving poor tragic
rural class women — that hierarchical relation also represents a weird power dynamic
== but fact APWA still exiss and unfortunately has been marginalised, but you have
new orgs stepping in to address the vacuum you have left behind

In Pakistan, the main vehicle for early female social activism, APWA (the All-Pakistan Women's Association), enjoyed
intimate connections with the new state: it owed its creation in 1949 in large part to the efforts of the then prime minister's
wife, Begum Ra'ana Liaquat Ali Khan (the 'dynamo in silk'6 ) , and it relied on a core membership drawn from the female
relatives of politicians and civil servants. Apart from anything else, this closeness ensured tha it threw its organisational
weight beh women and children that the new Pakistani authorities could both sanction and bless. APWA has rightly been criticised
for being an elite organisation and consequently restricted in terms of its vision and activities. According to Jalal, the
women who concerned themselves with extracting concessions from the state in the years immediately following 1947
belonged mostly to the dominant classes, and it was precisely their privileged background that ensured that APWA's
demands would be neither too radical nor too embarrassing for the authorities. In other words, APWA during this
period cooperated with the new Pakistani state in order to preserve the class privileges of its membership, and she identifies
the restricted origins of this so-called 'feminist' vanguard as a decisive factor in how women's issues came to be
articulated at the level of the state in Pakistan.7

A somewhat less critical assessment of APWA during this early period, however, might give its members more credit
than Jalal does for keeping women's issues on the political agenda during difficult nation-building years. While
the organisation may not have lobbied for radical change, and was instead prepared on the whole to work within
the system rather than to challenge it, women associated with it did help to shape policies that were controversial for
the time, certainly as far as conservative or more orthodox Pakistani opinion was concerned. Scholars in the ig6os and
1970s, such as Abbot and then Chipp, while they pointed to the possibility of disagreement among APWA members,
suggested that it was primarily APWA's lobbying that led to an official enquiry (the Rashid Commission on
Marriage and Family Laws), its 1956 report and later the passing of the Muslim Family Laws Ordinance (MFLO) in
1961.8 This interpretation of

events has subsequently been reinforced by later writers.9 But while

APWA members undoubtedly pressed for the reform of marriage laws

The close ties between APWA and the state were also reflected in its

organisational framework which developed into what was al parallel bureaucratic structure of officers and organs: that
is, na Patron, Founder Life President, Governing Body, National Chairm Chairman of the National Executive
Committee, National Exe Committee, Regional Units, Overseas APWA Units and Affi Bodies. The Patron, for
instance, had to be the wife of the of state, or the head of state himself could be invited to ass this honorary
position. Similarly, the governor of each of Pak provinces became APWA's local patron, while the wives of the chief
administrators in each district nearly always were honorary chiefs at the grass roots level.52

Thus, while APWA was not an official organisation, the extremely close links that it possessed with governments of
the day affected how it interacted with the state and what it interpreted its duties to be

however, proved to be a significant year as far as discussions about connections between women and citizenship were
concerned. The unsettled political atmosphere created by discussions over the constitution and the holding of
elections in East Pakistan in the spring raised dilemmas for APWA and its policy of distancing itself deliberately from
overt political activity. Hence, Begum Aminullah, wife of the Punjab Governor and APWA member, in her speech to
the Purdah Club in Lahore in February 1954 tried to re-assert that the Association was most definitely not a
politi

primary sphere of interest remained, improvin j

of women and children. Yet, 'though politics w

she considered it 'imperative5 that women clea

meaning of democracy and exercised their righ

She conceded that it had now become APWA's re

home to women their duties as 'good citizens',

'a real political consciousness'.6

WAF

The women’s movement reading

• Women’s Action Forum ; mobilisation against military regime of zia —— women

confronted the regime bravely and in the process foundthemselves against his allies as
well; religious parties like Jamat Islamii and the Council of Islamic Ideology

• In protest against a death sentence handed down by the courts under the zina laws, a group
of urban middle- and upper-class women formed an association called Women’s Action
Forum (WAF) in 1981. The fundamental challenge that the case raised regarding a
woman’s control over her own sexuality remains fiercely contested today

• An issue that almost split the movement was whether or not WAF would become political,
i.e. ally itself with political organisations or parties, which were mostly banned, and
thereby actively oppose the government.

• Najma Sadequa made phone call to friend - and v soon the first WAF meeting took place
to discuss the brutal sentence ===> attendees included Democratic Women’s Association,
rep of APA, journalists etc ===> all were agreed to to oppose the zina laws and stand for
rights of women

• Time was right for women from middle n upper reaches of society to mobilise cause were
already angry at the restrictions imposed on them by Zia’s islamisation and harassment it
produced in the streets and at work —-> member’s of majlis e shura even questioned
women’s right to work, teachers/police/ordinary citizens were growing more eager to
enforce the chador on women and harassing them if they didn’t comply

• Ƒzina

• WAF chapters have maintained a non-hierarchical structure with the decision making
process based on consensus ==> press statements weren’t issued w name of any WAF
member to ensure that they would be signed in an illegible hand === often journalists grew
frustrated with this and wanted one activist to be ‘leader’ or ‘president’ of WAF

• General body membership was open to everybody - but working committee was self
selected, comprising those who did most of the legwork ==> the committee began as
 endorsing orgs like APWA but withdrew when took a confrontational stance with the
regime

• WAF decided at outset not to accept any form of funding from foreign aid agencies or
otherwise beyond token contributions or occasional donation from a local supporter —->
limited its scope for activities to seminars, low-cost workshops, printing of pamphlets …..
independence still a source of pride for WAF, proof that it isn’t beholden to no foreign
donor, mnc or other org

• Initially seemed as if the new movement might be an opportunity to reverse the failing of
the left —— left hadn’t fought for women’s rights cause gender equality was second to
issues of labour relations and the working class == now zina cases had brought to light
issues of both gender n class tog ; social morality and economic inequality —— here was
an opportuniity to launch a mass-based popular front of many women’s group (which
WAF appeared to be at that time) yet would have to do without the support from the
secular pol parties since they were fighting for their survival ——> this would only be
success if WAF was able to turn itself into a mass-based org and expand into rural areas,
set own agenda than just responding to state actions and connect w the wider movement
for restoration of democratic rights and cease to call itself non-political - cause women’s
rights were indeed political

• Believed that women’s movement leaders who were educated and professional, were only
‘the tip of a huge iceberg, their sisters being for the time being submerged in an ocean of
work’.30 It was these women who had exhibited the leadership qualities and had the time
to respond to Zia’s ‘outrageous measures in the name of Islamisation’.

• Tho he warned that the movement needed to move beyond a focus on discriminatory laws
and broaden its base beyond the urban middle and lower classes.

• WAF Lahore took lead in protesting against the proposed Law of Evidence in 1982 which
sought to make a woman’s testimony half of that of a man’s for proving a crime ====
WAF held meetings to discuss if the law was truly islamic —— feb 1982 Punjab women
lawyer’s association and WAF took a protest march to Lahore High Court to present a
written memorandum against the proposed law === the protest became a turning point in
the consciousness of women activists in Pak —— Neelam Hussain had Neelam Hussain
had just returned from the UK and remembers the lawyers Hina Jilani and Asma Jahangir
suggested protestors should meet at their offices on Mall Road.34 The press was waiting.
Another WAF member from a political family had brought a group of working-class
women, including prostitutes affected by the zina laws, from the inner city of Lahore.
When she saw the numbers of police she rushed them home knowing they would be
arrested first.

• The police cordoned off the area, blocking the march, so the protestors started a sit-in.
People began to break through the cordon, surprising the police who began a lathi-charge
with bamboo sticks and tear-gassed Jalib along with the women.
• After the demonstration men from progressive pol parties began to step in with advice and
instructions — WAF came under a lot of pressure —- Tehreek-e-Istaqlal men offered
guidance and support — even men from labour unions wanted to become involved and tell
women what to do —- The attention made many WAF members wary, reluctant to trust the
politicians. After all, Zia’s policies were problematic for women because, in addition to
being undemocratic, the government was using religion to restrict their rights.

• A jamhoori or democratic committee of around 40 women was formed to take out a

demonstration on Lahore’s Mall Road —- included pol workers, women’s right activists,
members of the Punjab Women’s Lawyer Association and Democratic Women’s
Association ===> The police soon baton-charged the demonstra- tors. News rapidly spread
that the police had taken them to the Civil Lines police station.By the time Hina arrived
Asma was already there with 18 other women, and hundreds of people outside the police
station shouted anti- Zia slogans - Rubina Saigol recalls that they kept chanting anti-Zia
slogans and the frustrated army major threatened to send them each to different jails to
isolate them. Yet the women did not stop. Eventually, with the exception of Hina, they
were all packed off to Kot Lakhpat jail.

• Street demonstrations, baton-charges, arrests and imprisonment had become synonymous

with the fight for women’s rights. In 1983, one had to confront the regime first in order to
seek the restoration of civil and political rights. This reality helped to bring WAF activists
to a shared understanding of political engagement.

• And that is the contingent of women who then took WAF forward and convinced our
friends that this is the way we fight this monster and we fought that monster. Women
became the prime enemy of that regime at that time, which was a good thing for us because
earlier women’s rights never got any importance and now we were foremost important,
allied with the struggle for democracy, for progressive values. We were with the trade
unions, were there as a very progressive democratic contingent of people representing
different organizations. So that was how a movement should be. We were women from
very different backgrounds, so . . . [this is] how a movement is built.

• The young movement benefited from the growing political momentum against Zia’s
regime. Since women activists became some of his most outspoken critics and the world
had taken notice, the regime became worried.

• It wasn’t just in response to Zia’s measures but also to overcome deep social inequalities
that women felt the need to act —- with lil experience of street politics it was daring to
challenge the state during such perilous times but having done so made them feel like an
invisible barrier had been removed and they showed no hesitation to coming out to the
streets anymore ——> Women from trade unions, professional associations and other
political organisations bravely came out to protest with WAF.

• In 1987, a group of Lahore WAF activists were suddenly seized with an inspiration. Artist
Lala Rukh recalls they were fed up with Zia’s obsession with chadors (he would distribute
 them to women and girls at all school or college functions he attended). The press had
recently reported the rape of two burqa-clad (fully veiled) women in Karachi walking with
their father in broad daylight. (Although she loved chadors as a beautiful apparel, Lala had
stopped wearing them out of protest.) One activist suddenly suggested they set their
dupattas and chadors aflame. She took hers off and set it on fire, so Lala threw in her
dupatta too. The moment is captured in a photograph, later turned into a WAFposter, with
other activists and police looking aghast at this extraordinary display of rebellion.

• Zina laws served as symbolic linchpin of Zia’s Islamisation of Pakistani society —- zina
became perfect charge to level against a woman by her family if they wanted to get rid of
her - if man wanted to marry someone else he would charge his wife with zina — to
deprive a woman of her inheritance a charge of zina would land her in jail —- issue was
more complex than a demand for the vote, cause zina laws engaged gender dynamics in the
pvt sphere making public debate and legal reform hard to pursue, esp when Islam was used
to justify the laws

• 1984 — a man Akbar was harassed cause fell in love with a feudal lord woman —-> his
female relatives were dragged on the streets naked and he himself was shot in the leg and
his fingers cut off —> there was a public outcry

• WAF declared May 27 a Black Day for women cause of increase in violence and
demonstrated in Lahore with the families of the victims —> Then the government
suddenly passed an ordinance providing the death penalty or life imprisonment for
‘assaulting or using criminal force against a woman, to strip her naked and in that
condition expose her to the public’.66 WAF responded that the new law was inadequate
since it did not apply to violence within the home and called for a halt to the Law of
Evidence instead.

• The Safia Bibi case in 1985 became a landmark nadir in Pakistan’s human rights record.
Safia was 18 years of age,69 and virtually blind when her landlord and his son raped her in
Sahiwal, Punjab. She became pregnant and the child died soon after birth. Her father then
filed a case of rape with the local authorities, probably not realising that according to the
zina laws if rape was not proven, Safia would be liable to charges of extramarital sex, her
pregnancy proof of her guilt. That is exactly what happened. The judge thought he did her
a favour when he sentenced her to 15 lashes, three years in prison and a fine. He said the
sentence was lenient due to her blindness and youth.70

• WAF Lahore helped to organise a legal appeal along with PWLA, APWA and other
groups. It raised the issue internationally by inviting other women’s organisations to lobby
against the verdict. The issue WAF brought to public attention was that Safia was
sentenced for illegal sex on the basis of her own evidence. In response, the Federal Shariat
Court took suo moto action even before the appeal was filed. They found that the mere fact
of her pregnancy was insufficient to prove her guilt, and she ought to be due the same
 benefit of the doubt as the accused.71 Safia Bibi was acquitted. The alleged rapist, who
became her co-accused for illicit sex, was acquitted too.72

• The case proved a successful strategy of mobilising legal support, international and
domestic action, and WAF chapter coordination in order to achieve a better, if imperfect,
verdict in a sexual violence case. It also foretold what would become a pattern, that in
cases involving discriminatory laws the lower courts were eager to be seen as adhering to
Islamic legislation, while the higher courts were prepared to be circumspect and overturn
bad verdicts

• In 1983, Karachi WAF and other women’s groups filed a writ petition to challenge the zina
laws in the Federal Shariat Court, represented by Rashida Patel, President of PAWLA, and
Khalid Ishaq. By the time it was heard in 1985, Zia had incorporated the Hudood
Ordinances into the constitution through the 8th Amendment and the petition was of no use
technically.73 Women were disappointed, and some confusion set in about how it would
be possible to undo his discriminatory legislation.

• The first phase of the women’s movement was characterised by their ‘activism in
opposition to an adversarial state’, writes Farida Shaheed.76 It was a struggle to resist
discriminatory laws and policies and prevent further such action by the state. The
movement was reactive to issues as they came up, relying on street power, advocacy
domestically and (to some extent) internationally, influencing the powers that be, to
achieve its goals. ‘

• The strategy to demand gender equality was framed to bring women together on a
minimum shared platform. Soon, though, the demands expanded. ‘Then it became the
rights of the womens workers and the women peasants and the women students and
lawyers and intellectuals,’ explains Shahnaz, as the full extent of Zia’s clampdown became
apparent.

• By the end of this phase a return to democracy and restoration of all civil and political
rights had become integral to their agenda, although some activists always saw
confrontation with the military regime as part of the same struggle.

• During the 1980s the movement remained small and intense, focused primarily on
challenging the outcomes of martial law and, in the process, broadening their scope by
demanding the human rights of disenfranchised groups such as minorities, peasants and
labour. WAF on occasion attracted a few thousand women to its jalsas, or public meetings,
but its core membership remained a few hundred only.

• Those WAF members with ties to trade unions and political organisations would turn out
to be amongst the most dedicated activists in the following decades. WAF attempted to
broaden its base, but somehow did not coalesce into a sustained movement bringing
together broad-based women’s groups, for example, the Democratic Women’s Association,
as the women’s wing of the Communist Party brought workers to WAF meetings and
 public rallies.They remained active with WAF but the broader membership of DWA did
not sustain its engagement.

• Zohra Yusuf recalls efforts to bring in other women, like those from the Fisherwomen’s
Association, were short-lived. The core WAF activists remained a small knit community,
yet the cases they adopted affected women amongst the most vulnerable groups. ‘These
women would not have had the courage to stand up for themselves. I think whether they
were westernised or English-medium educated or secular, I don’t think that should be an
issue, it’s really what they are standing for and what they are struggling for

• APWA, with branches all over Pakistan, was the oldest women’s organisation with
members mainly from the begumaat, or well-connected elite. Its endorsement of WAF’s
position on discriminatory legislation was politically significant. APWA’s founder Begum
Ra’ana Liaquat Ali Khan, wife of the assassinated Prime Minister, was pleased a younger
generation of women was continuing the struggle for women’s welfare and protection of
their rights. — Her words, ‘We shall not surrender any of the rights already achieved,’
featured in Karachi WAF’s successful 1981 signature campaign to protest the
government’s bar on women athletes participating in international competitions, threats to
amend the MFLO and plans to segregate female education.

• As women’s dissent against Islamisation developed into open confrontation with the
regime and WAF regularly took up street demonstrations, APWA’s public
pronouncements and presence at meetings decreased.

• A number of early activists were journalists, which is why WAF managed to have an
impact that belied its numbers. Initially, editors did not take women’s issues seriously
enough to fear that the government would crack down on them —> then Zohra Yusuf
joined the weekend Star newspaper, originally an entertainment magazine —> She began
to print regular contributions from activists, including Najma Sadeque and Najma Babar
(staff at the time), Nuzrat Amin, Saneeya Hussain and Tehmina Ahmed.80 The editor of
Dawn initially refused to publish WAF statements. —> Dawn journalist Zubeida Mustafa
learned how to push the boundaries, though, becoming a pioneer in women’s journalism.81
Rukhsana Mashhadi, who was in charge of the women’s page of the paper which routinely
printed fashion and beauty articles, slowly subverted the content by printing contributions
from WAF supporters that her bosses overlooked.

• The English-speaking elite of Pakistan were soon reading about cases of women held
unjustly under the Hudood Ordinances and women’s demands to have the laws changed;
many quietly agreed. Nonetheless, Tehmina recalls that at WAF demonstrations in
Karachi, there were still so few participants they were often outnumbered by police
officers. Still, they were never arrested and they continued to write their articles and issue
press statements in English, some of which appeared in the vernacular press if they were
lucky.84 WAF printed their own documents in English and Urdu to distribute, in the form
 of newsletters containing updates on planned events, with poetry and coordinators’ contact
details.

• There was never any consensus within WAF on how to tackle Islam strategically during
the early years. Most WAF Karachi members were not interested in developing Islamic
arguments, although they internally debated whether they were isolating themselves from a
wider cross-section of society by not engaging with religion.

• Najma Sadeque, who became a vocal environmental advocate in her later years, wrote a
1986 press article discussing Qur’anic verses. She said women who believed ‘the diabolic
plotting of the peddlers of religious dogma’ thereby reducing women’s status through an
‘unrecognisable Islam’ had not been doing their homework and checking the Qur’an for
themselves. She warned them not to be circumvented by religious claims ‘based on
debatable or antiquated interpretations that themselves contradict one another or have
vastly changed over the earlier centuries.’89 Efforts like these aside, soon Karachi WAF
decided against engaging further with religious debates.90

• In this first phase, WAF Lahore and Islamabad made a more extended effort to counter the
austere and anti-women discourse of the state by building arguments that Islam does not
undermine the rights of women.

• WAF initially felt it had to lobby with influential people, in the prevailing context these
were religio-political actors. ‘If laws were being justified in the name of Islam,’ said Farida
Shaheed, ‘we would provide an alternative view, but if there was no reference to Islam we
would not make it either.’92 Lahore WAF decided to use Islamic discourse only when the
government used it. Shaheed felt that under Zia – and even later – Islamic discourse was
the only way to mobilise support; in contrast, the discourse of human rights seemed
incapable of moving people in the same way.

• A short-lived sub-committee on Islamic Research in Lahore WAF met religious scholars to

elicit their views on the rights and status of women in Islam. The main impetus was to
provide counter-arguments for the draft Law of Evidence presented by the Council of
Islamic Ideology. WAF rejected its stipulation that no financial or future obligations can be
put in writing without a male presence. They argued that ‘future obligations’ was an
ambiguous term and may not necessarily cover circumstances relating to debt or loan, as
referred to in verse 282 (Surah-al-Baqra) of the Qur’an.93 They said the verse indicated an
effort to include women in matters of financial transactions, from which previously they
were excluded, and it is the only verse out of eight related to evidence in the Qur’an that
makes a distinction between the sexes. They argued that the draft law fails to address the
situation where a literate woman may be a more reliable witness than an illiterate man,
particularly since the Qur’anic law allows for a single woman to be a witness in matters of
oral transactions. Activists were forced to conclude that this law was an effort to further
reduce women’s role in the public sphere, not to achieve justice after all.94
• Members realised that the ability to quote verses to prove that Islam does not discriminate
against women worked effectively in social situations, but ultimately the mullahs’
combination of religious and political clout was no match for scholarly readings of texts.95
The sub-committee was disbanded after the campaign against the Law of Evidence
concluded.

• Still, all WAF members did not give up on studying Islam. In 1983, Islamabad WAF
planned weekly classes in Arabic and Qur’anic studies, for ‘women must be prepared to
fight their own battles’.96 Tahira Abdullah, now one of Pakistan’s leading women and
human rights activists, looks back on those early years of intense debate and believes their
efforts were useful.97 She learned that the word ‘rape’ is not in the Qur’an and the
punishment for adultery is 100 lashes and exile out of Muslim majority lands, not death by
stoning. Khawar Mumtaz explains, ‘At that point we all felt that we have to fight it from
within Islam. Within a couple of years we discovered that is a dead end because they can
hair split and we can’t. We are not knowledgeable enough and we can get tied up in
knots.’98

• The historian Ayesha Jalal has argued that delving into Islam was a tactical decision made
by WAF and other women’s groups at the time, as ‘they were reluctantly compelled to
reiterate their fundamental loyalty to Islam and the state’ in order to make their demands
more compelling to the government.99 She argues this was part and parcel of their related
decision not to question the legitimacy of the ban on political parties and politics. She
concludes that the activists privileged the concerns of their class over their gender interests,
and challenges women to overcome the nexus between Islam and the Pakistani state by
building cross-class alliances.

• Khawar Mumtaz and Farida Shaheed acknowledged differences of opinion within WAF,
yet argued in their 1987 book it was left with no option but to use this strategy. ‘In order to
expose the proposed laws or measures for what they were and to divest them of religious
sanction it was necessary to argue from within the parameters of Islam.’100 They believed
that Islam was a cultural imperative that could not be ignored, and if the women’s
movement wanted to raise consciousness and win support amongst wider sections of
society it would risk being rejected as alien if it denied the reality of Islam in the lives of
the people.

• Hina objected to the assumption that WAF’s positions needed to be justified based on
Islamic injunctions, arguing that a new interpretation would not help. ‘This is not an
Islamic issue, it’s not a religious issue. It’s a political issue because religion is being used
for some kind of political control and power. So you fight it politically.’ In any case,
people with dissenting religious views were forced out of the country. ‘So we thought this
was a useless fight, it was going to tire us out.’

• The difference in approach towards Islam was one of the reasons for a brief split within the
Lahore chapter of WAF. One of the turning points came after Hina spoke at a function for
 International Women’s Day on 8 March, criticising military rule and WAF objected that
she had spoken against its interests by raising political issues. In 1983, about ten WAF
members, led by Hina Jilani and Asma Jahangir, registered an organisation called WAF
(Democratic).

• Hina explains there were three main differences that led to the split. First, she felt there had
to be an open membership to WAF because there needed to be a constant ‘feeding’ of the
movement, over and beyond WAF’s penchant for setting up ‘study groups’. She, Asma and
a few other members disagreed with the non-hierarchical, consensus-based decision-
making amongst the working committee.102 Second, WAF’s activism entailed a political
risk which would require more aggressive activism and reaching out to the democratic
movement that members were reluctant to engage in.103 This issue was linked with a
disagreement, or rather a misunderstanding, over whether WAF being apolitical was the
same as being non-political.

• Sheema Kermani explains there was a rationale at that time for WAF calling itself non-
political. ‘Because what would you do if you got arrested? Who would you fall back on?
So we felt that WAF could be open, calling itself a non-political organisation which would
give a cover to all these groups together.’ Some early activists understood that WAF meant
‘non-political’ in the sense of not having a political party affiliation, because if it had
declared any allegiance it would have been banned and party workers were summarily
incarcerated by the regime.104

• Third, if WAF was to use an Islamic framework to counter the government, what were the
implications for non-Muslims? Hina and Asma’s view was that all citizens had to have
equal rights based on a universal set of values. As Tahira Abdullah says today, ‘You
cannot win against the mullah on his wicket. Therefore we must not play on that wicket.
The only wicket we can afford to play on is the universality of human rights, the equality
of humankind and justice for all humankind – women and men of Pakistan no matter what
their religion.’107

• Nighat Said Khan agreed with Hina’s stance on the use of Islam, and also agreed WAF
should become more politically engaged, but wanted to resolve these differences
internally.108 After the 1983 demonstration many newcomers wanted to join WAF, but its
organisational structure did not have the capacity to involve everyone. WAF (Democratic)
was also frustrated with the slow consensus-based decision-making process of the original
group and WAF’s unelected working committees. They felt WAF needed strong leadership
to develop as an organisation.

• From the early days of APWA activism, which did not challenge existing structures and
systems, now a small group of women had come into conflict with the government for the
first time. They were demanding their rights from the state, as well as challenging martial
law and demanding a return to democracy at the same time. The drawback, as Shahla Zia
put it, was that ‘it moved from welfare to rights without talking about movements, or
 people or women’s participation’. Without other social movements to join up with, over
time the nascent women’s movement was bound to lose some of its momentum.1

• Since the movement in its first decade was shaped by discriminatory laws it was initially
led by lawyers and dominated by the discourse of rights. Some activists see this as a
drawback because it prevented WAF from using the momentum of the early years to
broaden its scope and deepen its own stance as a feminist organisation.11

• Instead, they retained what Saigol criticises as a mainly ‘reactive’ agenda until the 1990s,
determined by what legislation the government was planning and dominated by lawyer
activists. This held WAF back from evolving beyond its status as a liberal lobby, failing to
develop a broader vision on issues such as globalisation and imperialism, and certainly in
the first phase unable to produce substantial positions on a range of important issues.

• For the period 1981–91 WAF selectively ‘built up an effective counter-hegemony’113 to

the increasingly harsh discourse served out by the state and its ideological drivers, but it
could not undo the damage. Scholar Fauzia Gardezi believes that WAF ‘did not directly
confront the increasing problem of state involvement in enforcing a particular type of
religious ideology’,114 which grew with the increasing role of JI and military in the
institutions of the state.

• I suggest, though, that WAF and much of the public did not understand the full extent of
political and financial backing behind the religious ideology until it was so deeply
entrenched that even elected governments post-Zia could do little to reverse it. ‘

• A 1984 WAF statement reads: ‘[T]hese past years have threatened women’s participation
in all spheres of national activity and in some cases have actually curtailed women’s
participation such as in the field of sports, culture, the media and the administration. When
we add to this the atmosphere of vilification against women; the increasing sexual violence
and the encouragement of viewing women only as sexual objects we can only say again
that these 7 12 years are years for which the Nation must be ashamed.’116 WAF was to
issue hundreds of statements against excesses by the state against women in the decades to
come.

• As long as Zia was alive it was hard to measure the success of women’s efforts, legally or
otherwise. Even after his death, it became more difficult to undo the damage, rather than
less. Part of the challenge women faced was to maintain clarity – of purpose and priority.
Protests, press statements and advocacy had achieved limited successes, one of which was
that maximum punishments under the zina laws were regularly overturned in the higher
courts. Activism had also delayed or amended some discriminatory legislation and put
women’s issues on the national and political agenda.1

• When open elections took place in 1988 after Zia died, every political party including
Jamaat-i-Islami had some mention of women’s rights in their manifestos. ‘We put women
on the political agenda in Pakistan,’ says Hina. ‘This is WAF’s contribution, bringing
 women into this whole question of democracy, Pakistan’s politics, and Pakistan’s foreign
policies, because from here only a movement of women generates.’119 In spite of the
growing threats to women’s status, WAF did not build new allies within the middle and
upper classes where there were none naturally. It did little to win men over to the cause of
women’s rights, although it did enjoy quiet support from those already engaged with other
human rights issues. In fact, activists became more isolated within their class ranks as time
went by when they could not claim obvious gains from the regime. WAF never became a
chic or acceptable organisation in social circles, and to this day its most passionate critics
are drawn from the upper classes.

• WAF’s existence posed a challenge to other educated women who did not engage in
protests against the military government. Amidst their general acquiescence to the
suppression of political and democratic rights, and the growing discrimination against
women and religious minorities, the protests of just a few activists managed to be heard
internationally and within Pakistan, with an impact that belied their numbers. If activists
had thrown their lot in with organised political movements, it is possible that more women
would have been jailed and for longer, or their demands subsumed within broader political
demands for a return to democracy. Eventually WAF managed to insert the language of
women’s rights into contemporary political discourse, despite conditions of extreme
oppression, to disproportionate effect and mostly without ending up behind bars.

When General Zia-ul Haq overthrew the government of Bhutto in July 1977 and imposed martial law he brought in the
so called 'Islamization' programme. Whatever little women had gained from the previous governments was taken away
under Zia's Islamization programme initiated in 1979. There were protests from women against the policies of Zia, and
women's resistance finally resulted in the formation of Women Action Forum (WAF) in 1981. WAF or Khawateen- e-Amal
is a counciousness-raising organization aimed at enabling women to fight for their rights at a time when the
retrogressive Islamization policies of the military dictator General Zia-ul-Haq were beginning to have a very adverse impact
on Pakistani women. Initially, WAF functioned as an umbrella organization encompassing a range of women's
organizations, groups and individuals. It organized several major countrywide movements, deploying a side variety of
resistance techniques: street agitations, press campaigns, pamphlet warfare, dharna and non-cooperation. The leadership of WAF
came from educated, elite wotfren who saw the imposition of Shari'at laws as a pretext for subjugating women. The WAF
played a central role in exposing the abuse of religion under the Zia regime, and presented progressive, women-centered
interpretations of Islam, as alternatives to Zia-ul-Haq 's interpretations. Its members led public protests in the mid- 1 980s against the
law of evidence. The WAF launched public protest against martial law and the Islamization programme of Zia-ul-Haq and
campaigned against the Hudood Ordinance, the law of Evidence and the Qisas and Diyat Laws. WAF became one of the
main forums of women's struggle against Zia-ul-Haq 's Islamization politics.4 The oppression of women was a^part of the
overall political strategy of the regime, which wished to perpetuate the rule of the orthodox sections of society. Indeed, as
has been argued, the imposition of the Shari'at laws and the accompanying marginalization of women were politically
expedient measures, and had little to do with religious beliefs

6 Women Action Form was intended to serve as a platform and forum for women and women's organizations. These women
came mainly from urban elitist background; and there were several politically-motivated wom from the left-wing political
groups and trade unions, as well. The movement spread widely to include women from different professions and
classes;lawyers, teachers, nurses, medical professionals, and even ordinary illiterate women.

The debate on the role and status of women was triggered in March 1982 with directives to wear chadar. It was around this time that a
major controversy occurred over the pronouncements of Dr. Israr Ahmad (who in an interview with the Urdu language daily
Jang,) expressed the opinion that all working women should be retired and pensioned off. 7 Although many Maulvis 8
had expressed similar reactionary views, this statement provoked an angry outcry from women. Women in WAF took up
cudgels against the Maulvis and the state, and campaigned against efforts to confine women to domestic spaces.
While women suffered gross iniquities through such measures, the most obvious, and publicized, discrimination against
women became evident in the application of zina (the Hudood Ordinance). After 1 979, the year that this law was promulgated,
prisons, which have traditionally had a small number of female inmates, were crowded with women
charged or sentenced under zina ordinance.9 The ordinance was misused
by men, mostly women's husbands and other family members.10

The emphasis in General Zia's Islamization policies on depriving women of their rights was due to several reasons. Firstly,
women's issues tend to evoke a strongly emotional response in the public since they are connected to the notion of izzat
(honour); secondly, it is much easier to place restrictions on women in order to be able to claim the Islamization of society
than to make substantial changes in the social structure; and thirdly, women are a weaker section of society. 11

It was against the backdrop of violent state measures against women that WAF was born in 1 98 1 . It was largely due to WAF that the
women's question was brought to the national level. It is true that the number of active supporters willing to take to the streets under
martial law was limited, but few other organizations or lobbies have managed to even equal the record of WAF, and
certainly none has taken to the streets as frequently as WAF. The women supported the WAF in other ways or forms such as
the jalsas and meetings and signature campaigns. Larger rumber of women and men sympathized with the women's struggle
but their support, cannot be easily quantified.12

test.13 By its charter, WAF defined itself as being a non-political, non-hierarchical lobby-cum-pressure group, whose main
objective was to raise consciousness and to promote and protect the rights of women in Pakistan. It sought to overcome the
weakness resulting from the disunity among women that made them victims of the Islamization process. WAF also aimed to
raise consciousness, primarily among women, about their rights, status and the discriminatory laws, instituted to weaken
them further legally and sociaííly. The methods by which these aims were realized included consciousness-raising,
workshops, meetings, seminars, media publicity and lobbying with policy-making bodies. Like any other organization, WAF
has been moulded by the activists who formed and developed it, which in turn has affected both its methods of work and
outreach capacity. WAF was initiated by urban professional women generally belonging to the middle-and-upper class.
Since most of WAF 's activists were professional working women, younger women who have as yet to enter the urban working
force were excluded.

Until February, 1983, when WAF, Lahore, made considerable

changes in its strategies, WAF used the press to its full advantage. Its
definition of itself as a non-political body meant that the restrictions in
the press which applied to political parties did not apply to WAF. Its
statements and resolutions on all issues were printed in the press and
given due prominence. Thus press was used by WAF both as a consciousness raising device and a mobilization
technique. Other methods used by WAF included meetings, seminars and panel discussions on wide-ranging topics. But after
February 1983, WAF radically changed its mobilization tactics. By this time, both evidence and the Qisas and Diyat bill
were there threatening to further the rights of women. In February 12, 1983, the PWLA for a demonstration; its aim was to
walk down the Mall Road in to the High Court to present a petition of protest to the chief The WAF rallied its forces in
response to the call from PWLA formidable demonstration was brutally suppressed by the state gave WAF national and
international publicity. From this tim Lahore regularly took to the streets; holdings protest marche picketing the Governor's
House.16 During 1983 and 1984, WA up a steady barrage of activism to maintain pressure o

WAF opposed the Hudood ordinance and the Law of Evidence. These women activists faced Martial Law authorities on the
streets, were tear-gassed and lathi-charged by the police. Through picketing demonstrations, letters, telegrammes and print-
media campaigns, WAF carried on a sustained campaign against the state's discriminatory laws, and took up the issue of
women's right to participate in spectator sports, work, stand for public office and have equality in all spheres of public and private
life.

WAF 's impact can be judged by the fact that it has provid mode for other women's organizations. It has brought various w
organizations under one umbrella on issues concerning women. T the joint effort of WAF and other women's organizations other
sec of society, such as trade unions and professional groups, acknowledging the rights of women. While WAF might
have failed in reversing the Islamization of the state, and the accompan marginalization of women, it has played a
hugely significant bringing issues concerning women, and the civil and political rights of women, to the Centre of national
politics