Hindu women among few female candidates in Pakistan elections

AFP spoke to three candidates pushing for change in their communities.

Islamabad:

Nearly 6,500 candidates from 150 political parties are running in Pakistan’s elections this week, but only about 5% of them are women.

The constitution reserves seats for women in provincial and national parliaments, but political parties rarely allow women to run outside quotas.

AFP spoke to three candidates pushing for change in their communities.

islamic influencers

YouTuber Zeba Waqar has a loyal following of hundreds of thousands of women online, but this week will be the first time she tests her popularity in an election.

The first-time national candidate from a suburb of Lahore, Pakistan’s second-largest city, is a member of the Jamaat-e-Islami, a religious-centered right-wing party.

Every week, women listen to her broadcasts, where she teaches them about their rights under Islam and shares stories about Islamic history.

She told AFP: “My favorites are the live broadcasts I do on Facebook and YouTube. They feel like one-on-one meetings. Sometimes I answer questions people ask during the live broadcast. I do it sitting in my study These things.” from her home.

Many of the people she preaches to are middle-class, elite women who turn to social media for educational content, including absorbing small posts on Instagram.

“We hope that the teaching of the Quran should not be restricted… We use Insta, Facebook, Twitter and WhatsApp groups very effectively,” she said.

A doctor by trade who provides free home care to low-income women, she attributes her large following to her education.

“Unfortunately, with education, some arrogance creeps in. If you’re a CPA, you’re not going to listen to a lecture from an uneducated person,” she explains.

The grandmother, who covers her face with a veil, also runs a residential academy where young women, including top university graduates, can study the Quran.

If elected, she wants to address the economic disadvantages women face, improve their professional training and create stronger laws to reduce harassment.

from tragedy to triumph

Samar Haroon Bilour was the only woman in the room as she told dozens of men about her party’s plans to increase employment among young people.

Still, it’s a far cry from the 2018 election, when banners didn’t even feature her name or photo for fear it would look inappropriate in the socially conservative region.

“Men don’t like young, energetic, outspoken, Westernized Pashtun women,” she explained to AFP.

Bilour entered politics under tragic circumstances, taking over her husband’s campaign after he was shot dead by militants shortly before the last election.

Election campaigns in Pakistan are often marred by violence, and two candidates were shot dead in January in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.

She said the attack on her husband, Haroon, was claimed by the Pakistani Taliban, the most active group in the region that once controlled some border areas.

“I took over from him after he was murdered – it was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done and I wasn’t mentally prepared for it,” she said, with a photo of him next to her.

She became the first female MLA in Peshawar, the provincial capital. Peshawar, a city of nearly 5 million people located along the ancient Silk Road near the Afghan border, is also home to the Pashtuns, many of whom follow customs that restrict women’s movement in public.

When she stepped forward to continue her husband’s anti-austerity PWP campaign, she faced immediate backlash from her rivals, but persisted as a form of “revenge” against her husband’s killers.

“If they see me smile, they’ll say, ‘Oh, she’s glad her husband is dead,'” she said.

But after five years as an elected official, she thinks attitudes are softening: “People want someone who can give their constituents time, no matter what their gender is.”

Looking for religious harmony

Saveera Parkash, 25, rarely mentions her rare profile in Pakistani politics as a young Hindu woman living in a deeply conservative part of the country.

Swara, who recently graduated as a doctor, said she chose religion for herself — a decision her Sikh father and Christian mother respected in the Muslim-majority country.

“No religion in the world teaches people to do bad things; every religion teaches people to do good things,” she said in a country rife with religious tensions and largely skeptical of feminism.

She told AFP that while her constituency in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province had a long history of religious harmony, gender-based discrimination persisted.

“So my intention in getting into mainstream politics is to combat this prejudice and promote inclusivity,” she said as she was mobbed by young voters as she walked through the city of Buna.

She was never elected but continued to lead the women’s wing of the province’s Bhutto dynasty’s Pakistan People’s Party.

“Unless women play a role in society, there can be no stability for the country or the family,” she said.

“I may have to become a feminist because in Buna most women are denied basic rights like education and health.”

Part of her father’s private hospital had been converted into an election office, and young men and women flocked to air their grievances and hear her solutions.

“Choose the corridors of power just to serve the people. Without authority, you cannot serve the people in any way,” she said.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)