Sesston 13 Pakistan: Wornen in a Changing Society Author(s: Hamza Alavi Source: Economie and Political Weekly. Vol. 23. No. 26 (Tun, 25, 1988), pp. 1326-1330 Published by: Econamie and Political Weekly Stable URL: hup:/ivww.jstor ony stable4A78673 Accessed: 24/01/2009 21:41 Your use 1 une JSTOR archive indicates your accepiiince nf JSTOR's Tenis and Conditions of Use, available at upidivws: jst. org/page/inforabout/poticiestrms jsp. JSTOR's Terms snl Conditions of Use provides. in part. hat unless You have obtained prior permission, you may not downluad an entice ssc ula joural or multiple copies of articles, and yeu ‘may use content In the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use. Please contact the publisher regarding any further use ofthis work. Publisher contact information may be oblained at up. fivwwsjstor.o/action’showPublisher?publisherCode=eps. 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We work with the Scholarly community to preserve their work and the materials they rely upon, and to build a common research platform that promotes the discovery and use of these eesources, For more information about JSTOR, please contact support @ stor org, Economic and Political Week is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize. preserve and extend access to Economic and Political Weel hnp:/wure jstor orgPakistan: Women in a Changing Society Hamza Alavi Iwas the decision of the Zia regime 10 embark upon a whole series of measures designed to undermine what tle already existed by way of women's legal rights in the name of Islamisation shat galvanised the women of Pakistan into militcnt action in defence of their rights and, indeed, for a just extension of these rights, This article looks briefly at rhe changing place of women in Pakistan society which forms the background o the women's ‘movement in the country. THE decade of the 1980 has truly been 3 decade of the women of Pakisian. A power ful women's movement made 3 dramatic pact on Pakistan's political scene, all he more so in the light of the toal failure of political partis co injet ans fein che move: Tent for restoration of democracy in Pakistan to bring an end to its oppressive rillzay regime. The concreve achiewements Of the women's movement in ite struggle agains: the policies of the military resins, directea. against women inthe name of Islamisation, have not been inconsidera A number of women’s organisations in the country came cogether inthis sttugele which include the Women's Action Forum, the leading and most effective ofthese organisa tions the Democratic Women's Associaton, the SindhianiTehrik and the Women’s Fron, a well as APWA the oldest of these which ‘was once closely linked with the establish ‘ment but had a reformist often patronising Te'was the decision of the Zia regime 10 embark upon a whole series of measures Gesigned to undermine what litle already tasted by way of women's legal rights, in fhe name of Islamisation (which, as the women's organisations have convincingly Gemonstrated, have no sanction in (lam) that finally galvanisea the women of the countey into miltant action in defence of theie rights and, :adeed, fora just extension fof theie rights. The military regime's actions fnetorie and propaganda generated an atmosphere inthe country which seemed 19 ve licence to individual self-appointed fuardians of public morality, to take the Naw" into their own hands and harass women. Thete was an unprecedented in se in attacks on women in all kinds of Situations by all and sundry. Ths lawlessness fon the part of bigots, male chauvinists and Just plain ‘goondas’ was allowed by the Authonities to go on with impunity. Women hhad to defend themselves not only vias the state but also against hostile mischer makers in society at large. The momen fought back A. brief account of the “Women's Movement in Pakistan was pro vided by Shahnaz Ahmad in Pokiston Pro- agressive of Spring 1983 (Vol 5, Nol). A history of the movement (focusing mainly fon WAF) which offers a detailed account of the issues that the movement asa whole dealt with, is contained in a book entitled Women of Pakiston by Khavat Mumtaz and Farida Shaheed, (wo of the leading activists fof the WAF In this article | propose ta hook brieMy ar the changing place of women in Pakistan society, which forms the back 1328 ground to chis movement. Tin the Tour decades since independence far-reaching changes have taken place in Pakistan society that affect women's place init, both inthe rural society and the urban, isthe later with which we shall be most ried here In the rural areas the place fof women sn society and their role in the division of labour in production differs very ‘widely from region o region and also as bet tween different classes. And there have been fareaching changes everywhere. To give only two instances, in the Polwar atea of north west Punjab, for example, which is 8 region of fragmented and bankrupt farms. massive numbers of men of working ag¢ have lef the villages for jobs in the army, in factories all over Pakistan and, no eas, «4s migrants iniilly 0 work in Britain and Tater in the Middle East. This has caused an ‘extraordinary situation in villages of the region, many of which are inhabited by old men, who afe past working age, young Children and women, The consequences of his change in the demographic profile of such villages have yet to be studied syste rmatcally and their effects on women and the family and the working of the farm economy properly assessed. By contrast, in the rich canal colony areas of the Punjab, In the wake of the Green Revolution many ‘omen have been withdrawn from the agr cultural labour force. Until thea, with the exception of women of landlord families and Some rich peasants, women Rave always had fan active role in agricultural production and, accordingly, moved about freely. In part ular the picking of cotton was regerded fxclsively'as a woman's job for which she was paid in kind, \e. oneswentieth of the cotton that she had picked. This cotion was regarded to be the women’s exclusive pro- erty ntually sacrosanct. Men could not lay ands on i. This gave the women a private resource and an axtra degree of freedom, [After the cotton harvest fone saw a woman walking along the canal bank, witha bundle of cotton perched on her head. one woul now that she is off to town to do some shopping. She would barter the cotton for Something for herself or her children, without having 10 ask her husband for money of permission. ft was a kind of freedom that was much prized by the ‘women. But after the ‘Green Revolution’ of the 1970s, many ‘middle peasants’ who had prospered, withdrew their women folk from fhe labour force and confined them to their homes behind the purdah, as mark oftheir higher social status to go with their new found wealth. Researching in a Punjab Economic and Political Weekly village in 1968-69 my wife and I found that far from welcoming this partial relief from the burdens of work, the women resented the change. Many of them described itas being Tocked up in prison; as well as their freedom ‘of movernent thes had als fos their much prized economic freedom, however small their control aver some disposable resource which they could use as they themselves wished. This change suggests that a concep: {wal distinction be made between exploit tion of 2 woman's labour and woman's ‘oppression, In ins case although the burden Of labour was alice eased, the burdens of ‘oppression had inereased enormous. There ate many changes inthe rural economy, dif ferent in different parts of Pakistan, which have yet a be researched systematically and thele significance assessed, especialy with reference to their impact on women. isin the urban context that changes in ‘women's contribution to the family economy have been the most far-reaching. Here we havea whole number of issues which go far deepe: than the measutes against women that were initiated by the Zia regime inthe ame of Islamisation, which triggered off ‘hemalrant women’s movement inthe 1980s. “The social and economic changes presage 2 restructuration of family life and redivsion ‘of domestic labour in the home and a re definition of social value and norms that might accord better with "ie new economic role that women now play. That has yet 10 be realised. This applies particularly co middleclass and lower middle class fares Basically there isa two-fold division here, namely, between those families whose Women’ are educated and can take up salaried jobs and those whose women are not educated and, not being able to take up salaried jobs, who contribute othe family economy by taking in home-based work Under 2 putting out system set up by entre- preneurs to exploit this extremely cheap Source of labour. In the case ofthe urban working class and “urban marginals’ the situation varies, for many women of these categories would prefer better paid waged work. either Somestic or in factories, although one gathers that some women from this back ground 00, from families that have some pretense of respectability, also engage in home based work rather than go out for waged employment. They have been less in- volved in the women's movement as such because the measures under the programme “Islamisation’ hat were undertaken by the Zia regime civeatened them less directly, alchough they mere not entirely unaffected June 25, 1988The whole prolen arses from the ctsis of the middle class and lower middle clase household economy: Forty yeats ago, atthe lime of independence, st wis the normal ex pectation in households of these classes that The maa was the provider for the family. Joint families were favoured because of ‘economies of sale inthe domestic economy. A patriarch and his sons, possibly with his brothers and nephews, would all goto work and bringin the money to keep the family Women of these classes, while nat 'esono- smically active (apart, of course, Irom the burden of domestic labour) were probably the most oppressed of all women, Being £00. Fined to tRe home In villages even women women or close kin within the intimate settings of the region's homes about matters concerning the running of everyday family life (although the role that personal choice should play in the making of marriage matches is a recurring theme of the dliscussions I explore here). Rather, some of them talk about and present themselves as having the capacity to inform public opinion about hotly contested religious and moral matters. These include, for example, the role that shar’ law should play in regulating the personal lives of Chitral’s Muslims, and the authenticity or otherwise of the Islamizing statements of the region’s dashmanan, There are, of course, several high-profile campaigners for women’s rights in Pakistan who are widely known in the West because they are interviewed and quoted in the international media coverage of sensitive shari'a law cases, especially those involving sexual violence and adultery charges. In contrast, the women discussed here are from low or at best middle status Chitrali backgrounds who live in a region that lies on the peripheries of the Pakistan nation state. They are often educated as far as higher secondary level and some of them have Bachelor degrees,WOMEN, POLITICS AND ISLAMISM 409) yet they have undertaken degree courses in the region’s government colleges or have been correspondent students in Pakistan's Open University. There is a lingering assumption in some anthropological writing on Islam that people who express views that are critical of reform-minded forms of Ishin are either privileged and liberal, or, alternatively, immersed in un-reflexive forms of local or ‘traditional’ Islam (c.g Ahmad ¥oo4). Yet the critical views expressed by Chitrali women J Know cannot be dismissed as those uf an atypical and privileged elite oF “traditional Musliins who are ‘resisting’ reform-minded forms, of doctrinal Islam. What is important about these women, rather, is that their approaches to being Muslim defy the relevance of such categories for understanding Chitrali Muslim life, Much of what they say simultaneously builds upon and challenges the idcas of veform- ininded Islam. At the same time, they also think deeply and critically about local conceptions of Islamic virtuosity in ways that reflect their own diverse personal experiences of life within and beyond Chitral’s villages and small towns.* In spite of the powerful political role occupied by Istamist parties in the region's political life, the difficulties for ‘a singular Islamic discourse to prevail or remain uncontested’ (Soares and Otayek forthcoming 2007) characterize above. all else being Muslim in Chitral today. Women who challenge the teaching and activities of Ghitral’s dastmanan are active contributors to this ongoing process of contestation. At the same time, there is also much more to the thinking and behaviour of Chitral’s madrasa-trained mullahs who might easily be assumed to be true founts.of Islamic reformism than we might expect. Chitrali ‘bearded ones’ do seek to project themselves in their speeches as being ‘heavy’ men of religion ~ it is they who often accuse women who dare to shop in the bazaar of being ‘little prostitutes’. These men and their moralizing attacks, moreover, are not simply dismissed by Chitral Muslims: mullahs are often described by Chitralis as being buzurgs, oF saint-like men of ascetic renunciation who are so pure, for example, that they are able to discern if someone has partaken in illicit sexual relations, or been immoral enough not to wash after sexual intercourse, Yet piety does not even define these met in any simple sense. Some, for example, are said to be ‘beautiful sheti ancl playful (cheruti) men, who love smart clothes, slick haiscuts, See Haeri 2002 and Minnauit 19984 for anthropological and historical accounts of tie lives of elite South Asian Muslim women. Compare Osanlao 2006 fora discussion of urban Iranian’'s women's interaction with shari'a courts410 MAGNUS MARSDEN expensive perfames, and Like visible pleasure in telling sexual jokes during the course of their masque addresses Tn uther words, whilst all the Chitrali Muslims I know are ennecrned by questions regarding what it means to be a ‘proper’ Muslim in rekininnship to the teachings uf the region’s dashmanan as well as the Ishamizing messages of Islamist parties and movements active in the asider relevant when regintl, these are not the only questions they e1 setting to the task of ‘bring Muslin’ and presenting themselves as Muslims to other Khowar-speaking people. By exploring the way in which Muslin in the region address a complex nexus of questions and debates voncerning interactive modes of personal morality, comportment and self-presentation, I emphasis the ways in which Chitralis not only fashion but also project themselves as Muslims at multiple and varying levels and in relationship to diverse concerns, during the course of their daily lives. Islam and Social Transformation in Chitral Chitral is the northernmost administrative district of the North West Frontier Province of Pakistan. It is a relatively remote region: in winter all roads to the region are blocked by snow and ice. Chitral s different in many ways from other regions of the Frontier. The Frontier is dominated politically and numerically by Pashto-speaking Pukhtuns, who have been the focus of sustained anthropological study (Ahmed 1983; Banerjee 2000; Barth 1965; Lindholm 1982). Yet most if not all Chitral people, who call themselves Chitrali or Kh6, are proud to assert that they are different in profoundly important ways from their Pashtun neighbours (O’Brien 1895; Robertson 1899). The main language spoken in Chitral is Khowar ~ an Indo-Aryan language unintelligible to both Pashto and Urdu speakers (Bashir 1996).+ Khowar-speaking Chitralis identify themselves as being either Shi'a Ismaili or Sunni Muslims. There have been episodes of violent conflict, between these communities, yet they continue to live together largely peacefully in many of the region’s villages. Many Sunni Chitrali young, men are students (talib-e itm) at ‘down country’ reformist Deobandi + Many Chitralis do understand and speak Urdu, those edueated beyond the age of 16 are often alse competent in English, many alsa speak Dari which they learned From che mans Alghan refugees who lived in the region, Chitral people who have lived inother 1e Frontier are often fluent Pashto speakers.+ gions ofWOMEN. POLITICS AND ISLAMISM ww madrasas (e.g. Malik 19y6). Such peuple often claim that Ismai'lis tuslims; they also seek to enforce strict veiling standards on the region's Sunni womens Returnee madrasa students, lor example, olten ley to persuade their sisters who work as murses send health visitors iv the region’s hospitals and basic health centres that they should 10 longer go towork. Women, they say, should not eveu leave their homes, let alone be permitivl 1o visit the houses of men t whom they are tit related, of, worse, work on night shifts with male doctors and patients Such advice (nastiut) is often politely ignored by both these women id heir fathers. Nevertheless, disputes over a father’s decision to allow his mature daughters to leave their homes in orcler to work or study ‘we an important dynamic of life in the region’s homes Chitralis, thus, are knowledgeable and well-informed about a variety of Islamic normative standards of belief and behaviour. Yet, rather than being either automatically deferential to or simply resistant 10 the figures of authority ~ the Taliban, mullehs and the representatives of ‘Islamist parties’ - who want to prescribe this kind of Islamic standard for all, they are active, reflective and thoughtful about haw and whether to embrace these norms, Those who have embraced ‘reform-minded! forms of Muslim identity occupy only one part of a much broader spectrum of Muslim thought and identity in the region.® Despite the anti-music strictures of the region's largely Deobandi-trained dashmanan, for instance, musicians play at all= night concerts, and Chitralis vocally express the attitudes they have regarding contentious issues, such as the status of Ismai'lis as Muslims and the influence of Taliban forms of Islam on Chitrali life. The region's women too hold a very diverse range of ideas regarding what constitutes the living of a good Muslim life. Over the past 16 years increasing numbers of Sunni Chitrali women have actively participated in women-only preaching tours organized by the Tabligh- cJama’at. At the same time, many women claim that the pious women who come to Chitral from ‘down Pakistan’ to preach are ‘hypocrites: > On the expansion of madvares in Pakistan see Malik 1996) "In both academic und popular literature, reform-minded Muslims of many different doctrinal traditions are widely referred tas fundamentalists and Islamists While it ig important not co homogenize or oversimplify; Iwill employ the term reformist to describe the wide range of “bearded ones" (rigiswen)) whom Chitral villagers and townspeople see as adherents of strict, reform-minded Quranic forins of Islam. Such people are also celerred to as hardened ah), preachers’ (abligh?) and ‘extremists [imhoi poeand)aie MAUNUD MARSDEN they visit Chitral not to share their knowledge of Islam, but, vather, to inclulgently escape from the sunmmer heat of Pakistan's dusty cities ‘The focus uf this paper is Marka, a small town with a population of lout 20,000, It is historiealiy a Sunni settlement, the popukation of which is ethically diverse. There are significant numbers of Pakhtuns who work as traclers, shopkeepers and hawkers. Whilst Dari-speaking Afghan relugres, who settled in the town’s bazaar after the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, work as labourers for the region's Chitrali families and own thriving business, especially butchers and teaslops. This region of Pakistan, then, is deeply’ influenced by political instability in Pakistan and in a range of neighbouring countries, most notably, Afghanistan. Chitrali society has also undergone rapid social and economic transformations aver the past generation. At one level, the social estates of the region's landowning families have gradually broken down- leading to complex transformations of local values concerning the social responsibilities expected of wealthy Chitrali families 10 their poorer neighbours. At another level, Chitralis have seen the emergence of new types of well-paid professional employment in Pakistan's civil service and a range of international ‘development NGOs (cf. Parkes 1996; Staley 1982: 259-65). At the same time, rising levels of education in Chitral have also had significant implications for the diversity of women’s life experiences in the region According to provincial government surveys, literacy rates and levels, of school attendance in Chitral are now the highest for both and women in the Frontier province.’ The experience of education for young Chitrali men and women, moreover, does not cease with the completion of their school or college education within Chitral. Many of them now stucly in both academic and skill-based vocational courses in Pakistan's major cities, especially Peshawar and Karachi. Young men From Markaz pursue, in particular, social science degree courses in the town’s government degree college as well as in Peshawar University rising numbers of young town women also now embark on such forms of university education, Finally, growing numbers of young women also leave their villages in order to train as nurses and health workers 1n hospitals in Pakistan's major cities. The educated women whose lives I discuss here are not city professionals or the children of elite Pakistani families for whom hipyisewe dawn, conv'2009/02/06/na136.htiWOMEN, POLITICS AND ISLAMISAE 113 Western education is a normal feature of life, Rather, they are the first generation of women to have received a forunal scisool and higher education, At the same time, the experience nf agricultural work and urban migrant labour is an important dimension of the experiences uf all Chitralis, eveu those whu now work in as managers in the region’s NGOs. Many if nor all of the region’s well educared men financed their graduate and postgraduate studies in Pakistan's cities by working as factory labourers, shop attendants and domestic servants. What it is significant to note is that a majority of young Chitralis are now educated to higher secondary level and beyond, and they are either employed or seeking employinent in non-manual professions, such as teaching, development work and the medical sector. Thus, the types bl life experiences that characterize many of the young and relatively well educated people explored in this paper are not contined only to the viewpoints of a small bubble of young and educated ‘moderns’ in a world otherwise dominated by agricultural work or factory labour. Levels of literacy, rather, are high in Chitral, and the experience of education over the past 20 years has transformed social life in this region of Pakistan where it is now the norm for the region’s youth to have experienced modern, school- and university-based farms of educat The ‘Contractors of Islam’ As many anthropologists have noted, the expansion of both secular and religious forms of education alongside the importance of new types of print and electronic media in the Muslim world have broadened the spectrum of people able and willing to take part in debate about Islam, Much of this work facuses on well-known and mostly male Muslim media personalities and suggests that such ‘new Muslims’ have contributed to the fragmentation of political and religious authority in the Muslim world and the emergence of alternative forms of public Islam (e.g. Eickelman and Anderson 1999; Soares 2005; 255) Fewer studies, however, relate these concerns to small town and relatively remote Muslim societies such as Chitral or ask how far women in such settings contribute to debates about public Islam. I now focus on the life of one Chitrali woman who in recent years has actively sought to play a vocal and public part in Chitrali debates about what it means to be Muslim, most notably by challenging the pronouncements of Chitral’s Islamizing dastmanan. The things she44 MAGNUS MARSDEN wrys and does do not represent those of Chitrali women generally, yet the conteoversia! public statements she makes about the corruption of the region’s mullahs have sarneced considerable attention in Chitral since Hirst niet her in August 2003. More broadly, Fhave ens onutered many women i Chitral who aetively, although less publicly, clue Chitrali understandings uf the types of speech and cumportment cousidered suitable for the region’s women ag well as the dictates of the region’s ‘bearded oues’. ‘Phe critical assertions these women, make about the messages of the region's dashmanan point to ways of being Maslin that cannot simply be understood as the product of Islamic reform’, Instead, they involve individual Mustim women exploring what it means to live a virtuous Muslim life in a world where the pressure to comport oneself according to the moralizing clictates ol the region's dashmanan has heightened in recent years. and led to a growing disenchantment with ‘Islamist’ polities as being about petty moralizing and corzuption, In August 2003 I made the twelve hour journey between Chitral and Peshawar in a shared taxi with a Chitrali man who worked as a clerk in a government office in Markaz and his sister who was married in Peshawar, and going home to visit her relatives. The other traveller was woman called Amina, from Markaz, in her early forties, and employed as a health advisor with an internationally financed ‘development’ NGO working in Chitral - she was travelling alone and. had been in Peshawar for a medical check-up. Thad first met this oman earlier in the day at the airport after the cancellation of our Chitral bound flight: fully veiled, she had approached me in the airport waiting room, in itself a daring and unusual move.” Afier a short time in the car, Amina told me that she was working for the rights of women (auratano hagg) in Chitral. In recent days she had issued a number of statements to the press and also made several speeches ‘against’ the region's religious authorities, or dashmanan. In the small car that we had hired Amina announced that Chitral’s dasimanan were nothing more than tsar zhibak, or the ‘eaters of funeral feasts’, They were interested in Islam, she said only because they wanted to fill their stomachs: in reality they cared Mon ate rarelvif ever approached by unrelated Chiteali semen in public sctings, within or outside Chitral. During the course of my class in Chitral, Td speak 1 4 ssidle range of oleer and younger women [rom a varirty of religious and socio-economic backgrounds = Ihave known theie families for the past 10 vears, bave Lsuight their daughters English and social science courses at the request of their Fathers and amy ‘considered a brotherWOMEN, POLITICS AND ISLAMISM 415 little about either helping Uae region’s people or encouraging them (o understand in greater depth the ‘true? meanings of Islam, Amina moreover, did not make what could be interpreted as deeply offensive remarks about Ghitral’s dashmanan to me alone: the Chitrali inan and his sister were also taking a full part iu (hr enaversation. The critical remarks Amina made about the davmasca were articulated in a semi-public setting and in the presence of Sunni people 1 whom she was not related. Amina also goes to considerable lengths to have her views heard in wider circles within and even beyond Chitrali society. In the car she showed me a pliotocopy of a newspaper paper she liad written for the Chitval Times an Urdu-languaye local newspaper that is printed in the region's district headquarters. In this paper, she accused the mudlahs, of being ‘Islam's contractors’ (islamo tikadaran): they were, she wrote, prepared to do anything so long as there was a financial benefit in it for them, In addition to her writing, she had also given speeches at a conference in Peshawar organized by the Aurat Foundation —a major Pakistani NGO established in 1986 and concerned with women’s empowerment in the country. In her address, she told me, Amina had once again publicly called the mullats ‘Islam's contractors’, and demanded that they should tell people the real meaning of Islam — that it conferred ‘rights’ on women ~ rather than just using their positions of religious and now also political authority for their own benefit. Amina did not merely use safe, intimate or nameless arenas Co express her outspoken views, she was, rather, a named contributor to public and contentious debates about Islam Given Amina’s widespread notoriety for expressing independent views in Chitral and elsewhere, it was, therefore, not a surprise to hear that her comments.had invoked critical responses from the region's daskmanan, Chitral’s dastmanan, as elsewhere in Pakistan, often legally pursue people they consider to be committing blasphemy, a criminal offence punishable by death in Pakistan's legal system.” Amina’s male colleagues had, indeed, been so worried about the ferocity of her speeches anc writings that they had pleaded with " Many Chitrali pocts and musicians compose ancl perform music, for instance, in Ue Face of vialent threats made by the dashmonan. The dashinanan claim in particulae thar the images the region's Khawa-language love poets deploy in their poctry ~ most insportantly ches compare the beauty ofthe ‘angels of paradise’ vo the boil Forms of Ucir beloved ones~are not merely‘un-Tslamic’, but also blasphemous: Allah's angels, according 1o most of Chitral’s Deobandi-traincd religious scholars, should never be represented as having a human form,416 MAGNUS MARSDEN her (o be more moderate. ‘They theught that the possibility uf their orgasization coming under attack from the dashanan anuleheie tongh and ‘emotional’ (jezbati) supporters was «real possibility, Yet Amina wats not prepared to change either what she said or weave: ifthe mellahs wanted ty meet her, she told her colleagues, then they knew where her home was Amite inakes critical reanarks about Chitral’s mulls in. public spaces assuciaied with the dangerous world of all-male pulities, such as mevtings organized by controversial NGOs and political parties. Moreover, she uses the print and electronic media to further her criticisms of the region's daskmanan. Plaving an active role in public and verbal debates about Islam and Muslim life in Chitral is also something that she sces as having earned her a name in Chitral and the wier region. If making critical pronouncements concerning the status of the region's Sunni authorities is one way in which many Chitrali men display their masculine bravado, then Amina’s remarks demonstrate the ways in which publicly voicing critical and even controversial views, in public about contentious issues is not something that is confined to male forms of speech and behaviour alone. Chitrali women rather also seek to cultivate and earn reputations for being intelligent (kabil), bold and powerful (takatwar), and doing so is also widely considered an important marker of their own moral self-worth. Telephones, marriages and mulloks The ability to act in an assertive, confident and fearless way in the face of criticism from the dashmanan is, then, critical co Amina’s everyday mode of self-projection. Amina, of course, shares a dislike of Chitral’s daskmanan with many others in the region — notably ‘new Muslisns’ (Eickelman and Anderson 1999) who are educated, often support movements of Islamic reform that are critical of the authority held by Islam's ulama, and may also be active members of ‘Islamist’ parties such as the Jama‘at-e Islami. It would also be easy to imagine that Amina belonged to a very different category of Chitral: Muslim: a wealthy and high status woman from a local family who hold political power and have a stake in weakening the influence of the region’s politically active mullahs. [aim now, however o show that Amina’s criticism of the wlama arises neither from her having embraced reform-minded forms of Muslim thought, nor from her class or status subjectivity, but from the complexity of her personalWOMEN YOLITIGS AND ISLAMISM | a7 experiences of life asa woman in northern Pakistin. More broaelly, her story points toward the degree to which uch of being Muslim in Chitral today invalves inulividuals selectively incorporating very different and sometimes seemingly contradictory forms of Muslim thought and identity In our subsequent meetin not Fear the mulls, but, rather, they fear her, Ow ane occasion, she from a nearby village had arrived at ni with a young woman ~ he proclaimed to Amina that he wished to marry the girl, but that neither of their sets of parents had agreed 1 the match. The two lovers (‘ashegan) told Amina that they had searched for a mullak to undertake the Amina has often told me that she does tokl me, a young male rela her house in the midst of ni marriage ceremony (nikeh). Yet no trained men of religious learning from their village would agree to conduct the rites — they were afraid, supposedly, because the girl belonged to one of Chitral’s gentry (adamzeda) families, that was also wealthy, whilst the boy was from a ‘low’ (fst) village family, possibly of one-time bonded labourers. The village mullahs feared, therefore, that the girl's influential father could make legal objections to the marriage. There was the possibility that the mullak who conducted the marriage ceremony would find himself the ‘enemy’ (dushman) not only of this powerful family, but also with the region’s police and local judiciary. So, an unmarried couple were in Amina’s house, they had tun away from their homes without the permission of their parents, and had thus far not found a mulloh willing to carry out their marriage ceremony. As a result, they faced th very real possibility of legal action initiated by the girl's parents on the basis of Pakistan’s Islamic personal laws (hudood). Tt was after having faced the possibility of forcible separation either by the state or their parents that they had turned to Amina for support Amina’s response to this situation hightlights the complex ways in which different categories of loval people ~in this case a ‘new Muslim woman ~ interact with Chitral’s dashmenan. Having confirmed with the girl that the boy had not ‘forcibly’ taken her with him, but that she had ‘fed with him as a result of ‘her own choice’, Amina told me that she picked up the telephone and called one of Chitral’s most influential dashmanan: the ‘alim who is the chief judge in the district sharia court, She had thought carefully about approaching this particular dashmanan: if she could persuade tim to carry out the nikat rites then the couple would face no future legal problems. He was the Qazi (Islamic judge) in the region’s shari’a court ~ the man, in other words, who ratified all Chittal’s marriage certificates (nikak namah). At418 MAGNUS MARSHES first. he refused to undertake the marriage ceremony, claiming that he did nut want to condone elopement ass proper from uf marriage. In response to the Qazi’s refusal toner help, Amina did not acqiesee to his judgement, but instead asked him another direct question: what. exactly, was un-Islamic about the mnarri the Qazi had been rendered ‘without an 1? According to her acceunnt nswver” (la jaivah). and agreed the nikot e, the to come ta her house immediately ta per tien two young lovers were married, and Amina ordered them ta return to their homes. Amina narrated the story in front of our travelling companious, saying th were seared of her and, moreover. were compelled to behave in exactly the way she told them: In her account of this event, Amina did not merely telephone the ‘mullak in order to ask for his advice regarding the most Islamic course of action she should take about the couple in her home. Rather, she depicts herself as having engaged in an interactive debate with this high-ranking Qazi. It was she who advanced the steps that he should take in order to legally ratify the young couple’s love for one another Many scholars of the Muslim world have documented the ways in which asking for religious advice from mullahs and trained Iskumic authorities is a normal feature of everyday women’s experiences (notably Peletz 2002). At the same time, scholars working in more urban contexts have shown how attending courts is another ‘key arena in which they (women) express their grievances and express differential aspects of patriarchal authority’ (Osanloo 2006: 200) Few accounts of Pakistan’s Frontier suggest, however, that women 1 it was elear proof that the region's madfahs engage in active debates and discussions with trained men of piety In other words. the complex negotiations and interactions that took place between Amina and the Qazi in their telephone conversation highlight both the ways in which ‘new Muslims’ actively challenge and contest the authority of Islam's men of piety, and the possibility that wounen also play an active role in these discursive processes. There are, however, also more conventional anthropological models that would allow us to explain the sequence of events discussed above Firstly, and most obviously, it could be seen as a clash between Islamic teformism, on the one hand, and older local traditions of status hierarchy, on the other, The married couple included the daughter of a landowning family of one-time gentry elites and the son of a low-status family, Distinctions between the local elite of gentry-like landholding families, and a class of landless labourers who were once the serfs of Chitral’s self-proclaimed lords, remain important in Chitral todayWOMEN, POLITICS AND ISLAMISM 419 The ongoing importance of status distinctions to Chitral life has come under attack frou huth many of Chitral’s Islamizing dashmanan (who say they are un-Islamic) and from young and educated men and woinen fiom a diverse range of backgrounds (who say that talk about the region’s hierarchically nested status groups (yawn) is gandah, or dirty, and a sign of being animal-like and uneducated), Yet what it is important co recognize is shit the Qazi did nos enthusiastically endorse the couple’s decision tw elupe in marriage, or talk about it in positive terms as reflecting the weakening of traditional types of marriage practice and the growing ascendancy of Islamic doctrinal standards, for organizing family life in-the region, At the same tine, interpreting this event as an example of a reform-minded mafleh playing an active role in the weakening of un-Islamic forms of status distinction also overlooks the active initiative played by a woman-in securing the eventual realization of the lovers’ marital union. . Secondly, was Amina only able to persuade the mullah because she was the relative of a powerful man in the region, the type of person the mullak was either indebted to or actively seeking out as an influential patron? Amina, however, is from a mid-ranking family of ordinary town people ~ her family are not wealthy by local standards, and nor did they occupy positions of power and authority either in the old Chitral state or the region’s local bureaucracy today. This woman, moreover, is a divorcee: she was married to a Punjabi man at the-age of sixteen, whom she divorced after a marriage that lasted about ten years. Amina ‘s the type of woman that-South Asia specialists often depict as being marginalized from social life and matters of intimate decision-making, let alone the making of public forms of religious and political life A third way of understanding. the significance of the telephone conversation between Amina and the muliah would be to see it as structuced around the very different types of education they had experienced and the influence of this on their status in Chitrali society. Did the influence that Amina held over the mullah reflect the deference of a traditional man who had undergone religious training in Pakistan's madrasa network to a modern and educated person? Yet Amina is not comparable to Pakistan's elite human rights lawyers and activists. Nor, indeed, is she well educated even in comparison to other Chitrali village women, many of whom have attended English- medium fee-paying schools in the region and undertaken BA and Masters courses at Peshawar University. Amina, in contrast, ‘educated herself only after having sought a divorce from her Punjabi husband by420 MAGNUS ALVESDEN following a distance-learning BA course run by Pakistan’s Allin Iqbal Open University. The notion, moreover, that this particular wulfad Felt threatened by Amina'y superior education is unlikely because: le was no ardiniry, low-status, or poor village wuflah, but the man in-charge of Chitral’ district sheri’s courts, The Quvi earns a high government salary by local standards, occupies ome of tite region's most powerful givos authority sud is also an influential gure in the local wing of the Jama’ate Iskuni party = the patty of wil Chiteal’s eurent Meniber of National Assembly is a member. This positions af re story points to more complex dynamics than that of a politically savvy mullah seeking to ingratiate himselt with i powerful local Family ov 3 traditional man of religious piety delerring to the power of a modern and educated woman Amina’s interactive exchange with the Qazi shows that women in Chitral’s small towns do not inevitably passively submit to ‘traditional’ men of religious authority. Discussions involving women and rained dashmanan can play a critical role, rather, in shaping the thought process of the region’s Mustims. They also influence the nature of the moral judgements Chitralis make about sensitive dimensions of people's intimate lives. Far from simply being an antagonistic debate between a small town woman and an influential mullah, this event evoked an interactive process of mindful engagement between a new Muslim and a trained man of piety in a way that allowed both parties lo present themselves as being able to think and act in sensitive ways concerning the matter befor: them There isa final level of complexity that needs to be considered if the social and intellectual dynamics behind this telephone conversation are to be understood in their full complexity. Over the past 10 years this Qazi has assiduously cultivated a reputation in Chitral for deliv= ering especially ‘hard! (satkt) speeches about the standards of Islamic comportment he expects from the region’s men, but especially women. Tn the winter of 2001, for instance, he gave a sermon at which he argued that if woman appeared in the bazaar she would automatically invalidate her marriage and could, therefore, be legitimately forcibly martied by any man present. Marriage, according to the Qazi, is undone by an act ot un-Islamic public indecency — in this case a woman's decision to go shopping in the bazaar renders hera prostitute worthy of public sexual humiliation. It would be easy to assume that the Qazi would think in similar terms about elopement marriage -love marriages are proof that secret, amorous and even sexual liaisons take place between Chitrali men and women, something that illustratesWOSIEX. POLITICS AND ISLAMISM et Ube wider moval dexcadation of an ideally sexvally segvegeateel Muslin soviety.and causes the urgeat need for the enforcement of even stricter practives of purdak and fornis of sara law." At the same time, there is more to the Qazi’s reputation than firebrand speeches alone. .\s in many other South Asian Muslim socictirs. Chitralis often poke fun at dastimanan for being aut nf date and overly traditional. The childlike ‘simplicity’ of these men is both a swurce uf humour and admiration." In contrast, the Qazi is known as man who cures deeply about his appearance, Chitrahis do not merely distinguish between different types of deshmanan in relationship to the b which they are associated, or schools of Sunni Islamic thought w the political parties with which they are affiliated. Rather, the ways in which these men present themselves and their bodies to the region's public ure also important in determining the ways in which they are categorized, judged and evaluated. My friends often told me that the Qazi meticulously prepares himself cach day before he walks through the bazaar to attend his office in the district shari’a court and, later, to Jead the prayers in the bazaar’s main mosque. He dons an immaculate white shalwar kamiz, a tailor made jacket, a cream-coloured Chitrali hat, and sprays himself with sweet smelling and alcohol-free perfume brought to him by his Chitrali friends working as labourers in Dubai — all dimensions of his personal appearance that lead Chitralis to describe him as being a ‘playful’ dastmanan. He is known, moreover, to enjoy taking great pleasure by surprising his mosque audiences by making jokes about matters of sexual desire and attraction during the courses of his speeches. On one occasion he told men gathered that it is not only they who are pestered by the town’s fashion conscious girls ~ he too receives sey telephone calls and that is why he carries a cordless telephone wherever he goes. !? The Quzi hasalso given frequent specehes condesning the decision of Pakistan’ President. General Musharaf, to support the American-led war on terror in Afghanistan and later Iraq, as well as the publication of eartoons depicting Prophet Muhammad in a Danish newspaper. "One of the region’s dashmanan, elected as the region's representative in the Peshawurbaved Frontier Assembly in October 2002, lor instance, was said ta have arrived in Peshawar wearing plastic sanclals of the type that were not even fit (o weat in Chitra’s village bazaars. let alone the provincial assembly building. The now elected mutins simplicity was evaluated in multidimensional wass by Chitralis. lor some it heralded a new era of corruption-free politics, whilst others asked how such 3 simple man could express the needs of his region's people in the Frontier asseinbly “In the expanding body of literature on the content of mosque addresses and religious sermons, and the listening practices of those whe ollow them, litle attention,jee MAGNUS MARSDEN |, The Qazi works hard to earn x reputation for being aman of wlio holds exceptional stict views regarding the forms of personal morality the Muslims shoul enibody during the course uf their daily lives. At the same tint. Lue presents himsell as somebody whe has the capacity tw make risqué jukes about love, sex and desire. Yer the Qazi is mot uly ‘one thing on the surfage and antler said 10 be a hypocrite” who doe: underneath’ by the region’s people, although many people do think and talk about him in these terms. Instead, he is often described as attractive (shefi), playful and ‘fully human’ (pura inson). Thus, even men who might be assumed to be the archetypal fouuts of reform-minded Isham in Chitral are Resible and choice-making in their persons ind public lives, and, as du many other Chitrali Muslims, frequently switch between different registers of self-presentation during the course of their daily lives, Similarly, Amina’s distinctive mode of engagement provokes much discussion in Chitral, yet she is not universally condemned for being, un-lslamic. Many women from a diverse range of backgrounds who live in Markaz talk about Amina in very positive terms. Farida, is an Ismaili woman who is not formally educated, has four children and is married to a man who works as an administrator in an international NGO in Markaz, When I mentioned to Farida that Thad met Amina she said she was an ‘excellent daughter’ (cabardast zhour). Many other women and men also told me that Amina’s response to the difficult and even dangerous situation in which she had found herself showed that she was a good (jam) woman capable of speaking her “ind (tan fuan dik} and ‘living a life of her choice’ (tan cindagi o chit). They contrasted her to other town dwellers who they described as being unhappy, weak and unable to live life according to their own choice. Amina says and does things ‘in the open’ (wereigha) and this makes her different in positive ways from ather Markaz women and men Her fearlessness, lack of hypocrisy and ability to bring things out to the surface that other people kept hidden in the domain of the ‘secret’ (Lhoasht) are what they value in particular. Amina, indeed, also often expresses her views regarding the role that a woman’s personal choice should play in the making of marriage matches. She had heen telling girls that they should ignore the views of their parents and elope in marriage with the boys they liked. If they found a boy whe was honest and polite, suitable for marriage and who also held some hhas thus far been invested in exploring the role phased by humour. See eg, Gaffney 1994 and Hirsehkind 2001WOMEN, POLITICS AND ISLAMI 423 Forarofensployment (avi), they should have no reservations about cloping with the boy in marriage if their parents apposed the union, IV they sat in their home waiting Sor their parents’ choice (uan-taatan chit), they risked being macried off by force to an old, fat and ugly Punjabi ian, and spending the rest of their lives filling their busband’s hookahs with foul smelling smoking tobacco, Amina openly challenges traditional ideas about marriage, and there are significant parallels between her thinking abou these mattersand what have been termed ay both inexlernizing and refarm-minded forms of South Asian Muslim thought Yet Amina has not embraced the teachings of reform-minded farms of Islnic thought and clisputation in any simple sense. She is not an active participant in the women’s wing of any Islamic reform movements important in the region and she works with NGOs ¢ are criticized both by the region's Islamists and wlama, including, for example, the Aurat Foundation. At the same time, she has also played an active role in establishing and running low-finance NGOs established by Chitralis with the specific purpose of addressing issues regarding the treatment of the region’s women. These organizations were established in response to accusations made by many people in the region that some Chitrali men form a part of well-organized ‘groups’ that systematically search for poor parents who are willing to give their daughters in marriage to Punjabi men in return for @ significant bride price. These Chitrali ‘middlemen’ (dallal) are said to take a cut of the bride price. There are also pervasive rumours which suggest that such marriages are a front for powerful ‘mafia’ groups to procure fair and beautiful Chitrali girls to work in Pakistan’s sex trade. It is also widely suspected that marriages between young Chiteali girls and Punjabi men are encouraged by the first wives of these men as a cheap way of procuring a household servant in the guise ofa second wife, The frequency of all these types of marriage is widely said to have brought a ‘bad name’ (badnaam) to Chiteal’s people. Many Chitrali young men often tell me how ashamed they feel when their friends in ‘down Pakistan’ ask them ifit is true that Chitralis ‘sell their daughters. Amina, thus, is involved in a range of collaborative interactions with other Chitrali Muslims. These collaborations seek to acldress sensitive moral problems faced by Muslims in the region today; they use a discourse of reformed Islam in order to emphasize the right that young Chitrali women have to refuse marriage offers advanced by their parents. Yet they also reformulate local understandings of Islam according to a model that differs significantly from the notionea MAGNUS MARSDEN of Islamic revival. In goog, for instance, a ‘Legal Aid Forma” was established in Morkaz with the aint of protecting the ‘rights" of Chitral women, Its menhers cheek vehicles raving Chitral on their wity to ‘down Pakistan’ for Chitrali women who appear to be travelling with nou-Chitrali sien and even assist in arvauging marriages for voung Chiteali brides who have divorced their down country husbands. Amina is nat the only Chivali women en ged in this type of activity Suraya, for example, has earned a naine for being an especially swtive participant in debates about the ‘sale’ of Chitral daughters 10 “down country’ husbands. She is in her early thieties, fiom a Sunni Chitral village, and is the daughter of a village ‘bearded one’. She completed 4 Master’s degree in sociology at Peshawar University, before gaining I development nnders of the employment as a ‘Social Organizer’ in an internation NGO working in Chitral ~ she is also one of the co. Legal Aid Forum. Many Chitral men and women talk about Suraya as being especially ‘educated! (‘alimi yafial), but also ‘advanced’ in her thoughts and behaviour, In particular, she is said tobe modern’ (tajdid) and ‘fast’ (fez), in matters of dress, speech and comportment in a way that other Chitrali women are not: she wears fashionable Pakistani clothes usually associated with the county's cities, and sometimes even Western-style trousers (pantaloon).'® Some Markaz men and women, indeed, did tell me that there has been much ‘propaganda’ about Suraya’s lifestyle: as is the case with other ‘bold’ Chitrali women, she was open to accusations of being morally lax and even sexually lose. Y- + stich ‘bold? women are not simply dismissed as being either immoral and of bad reputation or as embodying manlike qualities that render them acceptable although unmarriageable. Boldness, rather, is widely conceptualized by Chitralis as having an attractive and feminine dimension, especially by the region’s educated young people. It is not, however. only in relationship to matters of dress, bodily comportment and extra-marital relationships that Suraya is said to be ‘fast’ and an active contributor to life in the region: she, like Amina, is known as being capable of challenging the Islamizing dictates of the region’s dashmanan by speaking her mind, After being told by the region's MMA representatives that women working in offices should wear the Afghan durga J was tokl by many men and women in the region © Chiurati women never wear Westermstsle trousers in public and even young Chitral women studving in Pakistan's major cities onl: sear trousers within the cunfines of their allawomen hostels: being known as it gitl who ‘wears trousers’ in (Chitral mas become a focus for widespread yossip aud erticise,WOMEN, POLITICS AND ISLAMISM 425 ‘heat Suray had conveyed a messaye to Chiteal’s representative in the National Assembly. In hee message. she had apparetly tolel the MMA, Mavwlana that on the day he went to Iskamabad and persuaded all the women who worked in the assembly building that they should wear the burga, then she would also put on bers. Yet as long as he sat next to rich aud glamorous women Senaturs then why should she be expected to wear the hinge and not them? Saraya was said to bring the attention of hwr fellow Chitral peaple to double standards set by the region's dashoranan, One Ismai’li woman ~ elu is in her early thir ies, originally from a village about forty miles trom Chitral, but currently warking as a teacher in Markaz - told mic. lor instance, that she had always dhought that Sunni women lived more confined and purdah-conscious lives than the region’s Ismai'lis. Having met Suraya, however, she had come to realize that many Sunni women were far more ‘advanced’ than she had previously thought. Suraya and Amina are amongst some of the New: Muslim women. who are now playing an active and increasingly public role in the intellectual and political life of their region. Their lives demonstrate the assertiveness of women in a region whose political culture is currently dominated by a coalition of Islamist political parties and in a small town setting within which rigid forms of sexual segregation are pervasive features of everyday Muslim life, Additionally, they point towards the many layers at which the region’s Muslims seek to fashion and project themselves to their fellow Chitralis as good Muslims, the diverse types of religious and political influences on which they draw as they do so, and the increasingly wide range of opinion forming public figures who are currently intervening in the moral debates moral thought in the region today mating Conclusion This paper has focused on the lives of women who live in rural and small town settings and are often critical in vocal ways of ‘political Islam’. At the same time, these women also seek to contribute to debates about Islam’s place in their society and assert their own forms of moralizing standards in relationship to those advanced by other influcutial figures uf veligivus authority in dhe region. Such women are not an atypical feature of Muslim life in Chitral - they do, rather, playa critical role in the ceaseless discussions concerning the place of Islam in Chitrali society today. Some of the things that such women saype6 MAGNUS MARSDEN snd do point senvard important tensio' advanced by ‘New Muslin’ movalizers who have benefited from raising levels of higher eclucation and other approaches to Mustin life thitt r+ on’s nndrasa-trained inen of piety. Yet the modes etwren ways of being Muslint advocated by the + of selpreseatation deployed by Chivval’s madrasasedueated mulledhs rarely straightlorwardly fit into the straightjackets af ‘reformist’ or, indeed, ‘Islamism In similar terms to Simpson’s paper in this vulume, the dehates and diverse modes of public sell-preseatittion important in Chitral today are a clear veminder of the inherent ambiguity and inconsistency of all social lil. They also emphasize the degree t which for many Chitralis the expression of controversial and often decidedly individual opinions, beliefs and attitudes is an important Feature of everyday Muslim life in a world where there is little day day cunsensus. In this complex multi-vocal setting, work contrasting ‘expressed beliefs and opinions’ to more fundamental and underlying common substrates of religious dispositions’ (Hirschkind 2001 638), risks privileging an emphasis on understanding how Muslims seek to enact and embody coherent subjectivities in relationship to Islamic traditions of self-discipline, at the expense of recognizing the complexity and significance of the multiply-layered ways at which Muslims project themselves during the course of their daily lives. Women like Amina and trained daskmanan such as the Qazi elucidate the diversity of these modes of self-presentation. More importantly, they point towards the importarrs of these for understanding the continuingly multi-dimensional nature of moral life and “being Maslim’ in a region of South Asia that has been deeply influenced by profoundly purifying forms of Islam, especially over the past 30 years. Being Muslim in such a setting is a simple task neither for the region's Islamizers or their detractors. On the one hand. there is a pervasive sense of popular disenchantment with the authenticity of public expressions of Islamic piety in Chitral today, both as they are enacted by ordinary Chitrali Muslims as well as by the region's powerful Islamizers. This feeling of disenchantment and often cynicism is now also shaping the ways in which even the region’s apparently most ultra-orthodox Islamists set to the task of projecting themselves to the region’s people: if the Qazi presents himself as a fount of untainted piety he is as likely to be accused of hypocrisy as much as being as a saintlike buzwrg Thus, he tempers his public piety inconsistencies: sevy jokes and his ‘playful’ appearance are some of the publicly expressing his ownWOMEN, POLITICS AND ISLAMISAL 427 wis in which public piety antl locally acceptable farms of impropriety are conibined in the Qazi's personage. Amina projects herselfas hei \l straight-talking: she leads a controversial life of evitieal open engagement with everyday normative conventions, by breaking purdah and making statements concerning the centrality of women's choice und emstional feel Hpen tw being targeted by Chitrali Islamizers as a source of corrupting and uneMuslim immorality. Yer her risky strategy of open straight talking positiuns her within ongoing Chitrali moral debates about the pervasiveness of immoral hypocrisy, corruption and the politicization of religion, thereby adding her voice to public debates about being a Chitvali Muslim This paper opened with a brief description of some of the ways in which Chitral’s madrasa-educated dashmanan have sought to Islamize daily life in the Frontier since their election to provincial government in 2002. The following pages have then sought to illuminate the ways in which these Islamizing policies have resulted in complex responses from the region’s Muslims, In an already deeply ‘Islamized world, thinking of Chitrali Muslims as reformers and traditionalists, or as Islamists and neo-fundamentalists, conceals the-complex and inherently unfinished nature of their responses to ongoing Islamizing processes, a pervasive disenchantment with the authenticity of public expressions of personal piety that is expressed by many of th ‘Muslims, and, in this contest, the continuing emergence of new wavs of being Muslim, modes of personal self-prese:ation and categories of Islamic public opinion forming figures. gs to marriage. Asa young divorcee, this leads hers Bibliography AbuLughoud, L.1ygo. The romance of resistance: Tracing trausforenations of pase Urough Bedouin wornen,lmeican Eubnologil 17 (1), 41=3 (988. lil! Sentiments How ond Purr in @ Bedouin Saety. 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Paper Presented at Conlereuce ‘oy “Isturmie refarm in South Asia” at the Lonalon School of African and Oriental Stuling, May 2t-2sth song,Session [4% SS Economic 8Political WEEKLY Pakistan: Women in a Changing Society Author(s): Hamza Alavi Source: Economie and Political Weekly, Vol. 23, No. 26 (Jun. 25, 1988), pp. 1328-1330 Published by: Economic and Political Weekly Stable URL: hup:/www jstor.org/stable/4378673 Accessed: 24/01/2009 21:41 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at hhup:www jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms,jsp. JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unless ‘you have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and you may use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use. Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. 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For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org, Economie and Political Weekly is colaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Ezonomic and Political Weekly . cama hup:/hvww jstor.orgPakistan: Women in a Changing Society Hamza Alavi Iwas the decision of the Zia regime 10 embark upon a whole series of measures designed to undermine what little already existed by way of women's legal rights in the.name of Islamisation that galvanised the women of Pakistan into militant action in defence of their rights and, indeed, for a just extension of these rights. This article looks briefly at the changing place of women in Pakistan society which forms the background 10 the women's ‘movement in the country. ‘THE decade of the 1980s has truly been a decade ofthe women of Pakistan, A power: Tul women's movement made a dramaticim- pact on Pakistan's political scene, all the ‘moze so in the ight of the totl failure of political pares to inject any life inthe move ‘ment for restoration of democracy in Pakistan to bring an end to its oppressive altar regime. The concrete achievements Of the women's: movement in its strugsle against the policies of the military regime, Girected against women inthe name of Tslamisation, have not been inconsiderable. ‘A number of women's organisations in the country came together in this struggle which include the Women's Action Forum, the leading and most effective of these organisa: tions, the Democratic Women's Association, the SindhianiTehnk and the Women's Front, fas well as APWA the oldest of these which ‘Was once closely linked with the establish: ‘ment but had a reformist often patronising Tr was the decision of the Zia regime 10 embark upon a whole series of measures Sesigned to undermine what litle already existed by way of women’s legal rights, in the name of Islamisation (which, as the ‘women's organisations have convincingly ‘demonstrated, have no sanction in Islam) that finally galvanised the women of the country into militant action in defence of their rights and, indeed, for a just extension of thei rights. The military regime's actions, thetorie and propaganda generated an atmosphere in the country which seemed 10 Bive licence to individual. self-appointed guardians of public morality, to take the Naw" into their own hands and harass women, There was an unprecedented in crease in attacks on wornen in all kinds of ‘itvatons by all and sundry. This lawlessness fon the part of bigois, male chauviniss and Just plain ‘goondas' was allowed by the Authorities t gon with impunity. Women hag to defend themselves not only vis-a-vis the state but also against hostile mischief makers in society at large. The women yught back. A” brief account of the "Women's Movement in Pakistan” was pro- vided by Shahnaz Ahmad in Pakistan Pro- aressive of Spring 1983 (Vol 5, No I). A. history of the movement (focusing mainly on WAF) which offers a detailed account of the issuer that the movement asa whole dealt with, is contained in a book entitled Women of Pakisian by Khawar Mumiaz and Farida Shaheed, two of the leading activists of the WAF. In this article I propose to ook briefly atthe changing place of women in Pakistan society, which forms the back 1328 ground to this movement Tn the four decades since independence far-reaching changes have taken place in Pakistan society that affect women's place ini, both in the rural society and the urban isthe latter with which we shall be most concerned here In the rural ares the place fof women in society and their role in the vision of labour in production differs very ‘widely fom region to region and also as bei~ ‘ween different classes. And there have been far-reaching changes everywhere. To give only two instances, in the Potwar area of north west Punjab, for example, which is a region of fragmented and bankrupt farms, massive numbers of men of working age have left the villages for jobs in the army, in factories all over Pakistan and, not least, as migrants initially to work in Britain and Tater inthe Middle East This has eaused an extraordinary situation in villages of the region, many of which are inhabited by old men, who are past working. age, young Children and women. The consequences of this change in the demographie profile of such villages have yet to be studied syste- ‘matically and their effects on women and the family and the working of the farm economy properly assessed. By contrast in the rich canal colony areas of the Punjab, Inthe wake of the Green Revolution many ‘women have een withdrawn from the agri- cultural labour force. Until then, with the texception of womes of landlord families and some rich peasants, women have always had an active role in agricultural production and, accordingly, moved about freely. In parti= ular the picking of cotton was regarded ‘iclusvely as a woman's job for which she was paid in kind, i ¢, one-twentieth of the cotton that she had picked. This cotton was regarded to be the women’s exclusive pro Deny, ritually sacrosanct. Men could not lay hhands on it. This gave the women a private resource and an extra degree of freedom, ‘ter the cotton harvest fone saw a woman walking along the canal bank, witha bundle of cotton perched on her head, one would Know that she is off 0 town to do some shopping. She would barter the cotton for Something for herseif or her children, Without having to ask her husband Tor money of permission. It was a kind of freedom that was much prized by the women, But after the ‘Green Revolution’ of ‘the 1970s, many ‘middle peasants’ who had prospered, withdrew their women folk from the labour force and confined them to theit homes behind the purdah, ase mark of their higher socal status to go with their new: found wealth. Researching in a Punjab Economic and Political Weekly village in 1968-69 my wife and { found that far from weleoming this partial reli from the burdens of work, the women resented the change. Many of them described it as being locked upin prison; as well as their freedom ‘of movement they had also Tost their much prized economic freedom, however small; their control aver some disposable resource which they could use as they themselves Wished. This change suggests that a concep: tual distinction be made between exploita- tion of a woman's labour and woman's ‘oppression. In this case although the burden ‘of fabour was a litle eased, the burdens of ‘oppression had increased enormously. There fae many changes inthe rural economy, di ferent in different parts of Pakistan, which have yet be researched systematically and their significance assessed, especially with reference to their impact on women. Its in the urban context that changes in women's contribution to the family economy have been the most far-reaching. Here we havea whole numiber of issues which go far deeper than the measures against women that Were initiated by the Zia regime in the ‘name of Isamisation, which tiggere¥ off ‘the militant. women’s movement inthe 19805, ‘The social and economic changes presage 8 restructuration of family life and redivision ‘of domestic labour in the home and a re- ‘definition of socal values and norms that might accord better with the new economic role that women now play. That has yet to be realised. This applies particularly to middle lass and lower middle class familie, Basically there isa two-fold division her, namely, between those families whose women are educated and can take up Salaried jobs and those whose women are ot educated and, not being able to take up salaried jobs, who contribute tothe family ‘economy by’ taking in home-based work Under a putting out system set up by entre preneurs to exploit this extremely cheap fouree of labour Tn the case of the urban working class and ‘urben masginals’ the situstion varies, for many women of these categories would prefer better paid waged work, either Somestic or in factories, although one fathers that some women from this back- round too, from families that have some pretense of respectability, also engage in hhome based work rather than go out for waged employment, They have been less in volved in the women’s movement as such because the measures under the programme "Islamisation’ that were undertaken by the Zia regime threatened them less directly, although they were not entirely unaffected. June 25, 1988The whole problem arises from the crisis of the middle class and lower middle class household economy. Forty years ago, at the time of independence, it was the normal ex- peciation in households of these classes that the man was the provider Tor the family Joint families were favoured because of ‘economies of scale inthe domestic economy, ‘A pairiarch and his sons, possibly with his brothers and nephews, would all goto work and bring in the money to keep the family. Women of these classes, while not ‘evono: mically active’ (apart, of course, from the burden of domestic labour) were probably ‘he mast oppressed of all women, being c00- fined to the home, In villages even women confined tothe purdah have relatively easy access (0 a society of other women of the Village. Ip the city women of the lower middle classes especially, are virtually brisoners in the confined spaces of the diminutive homes, for going visiting would entail an elaborate logistic operation to be Lndertaken only on special occasions. But this style of Ife, in which some men took pride, nthe name of respectability, became less and less viable, and women must now {0 out lo work and contribute their earn- Ings to keep up the family economy. “The continuous inflation in the cost of living in Pakistan over the last four decades has Brought about a situation where a man's wage is no longer sufficient 10 keep the family. There was therefore & continuous pressure to broaden the basis ofthe fami economy. Gradually but steadily, more and ‘more women found their way into the urban labour force For anyone who visited Pakistan after intervals of time this was @ sible and striking process of social change Middle classes and the lower middle classes are notorious everywhere for theit sell ‘oppression, in pursuit of “respectability Not all’ available ‘oceupations were initially acceptable to them and itis only with the accumulating pressure of time that the con Cept of a “espectable occupation” for thelr women was progressively broadened to rake in a greater range of jobs. Initaly, apart fom professional work, notably a doctor (shat better?) jobs in the teaching profes- sion, especialy'in girs’ schools and colleges, were respectable enough. Gradually this ‘xtended to the acceptance of clerical jobs in open plan offices where women could ‘work in public view. The ole of a personal Secretary was initially suspect because it en- lalled a Cose relationship with the boss. But this has changed. Today one finds women lana lunge variety of uccupations including laboratory assistams, oF ticket clerks at railway stations and clerks at post office counters and so on. With more and more ‘women taking up salaried jobs, having a job and career are valved for theit own sake, ‘While the majority of women no doubt go to work out of economic necessity, an in- creasing number of women from well-off families take up jobs as a matter of sef- fulfilment and not for reasons of economic necessity alone Education is the key so acceptable and respectable jobs. Lower middle clas families Exonomic and Political Weekly would find it degrading to let their women {ake up jobs as domestic servants or to work fon the factory Moor for which education is rota pre-requisite Families who expect theit ‘women to take up jobs as teachers or office clerks (or bette) tend therefore to put a igh ‘alue on women's education which, at one time, was thought to be mere indulgence and ‘wasteful of money spent on it. Today any theeat to women's education or women's ‘mobility that would undermine their capa city 10 take up such jobs, is seen as a threat to the family economy. These are therefore the ‘modernists who interpeet Islam in & liberal way, who are sceptical of dogmatic interpretations of Islam by mullahs whom they consider 10 be obscurantists even though they avail of their services for ritual purposes. This s the growing social base of Secularism in Pakistan's potitial life. Per- Sons in this eategory were hostile 10 Zia's attempts to exploit Islam to legitimise his Fegime, that threatened to bring in measures that would undermine their own life styles fand livelihood, But thee are many households in Pakistan where women have been given no education that could prepare them for ‘espectable’ salaried jobs. Frustrated by their ow in creasingly straitened circumstances, they tended 0 militate against women's employ ‘ment on the grounds that it reduced pro spects for male employment and undercut their salaries and that in any care i was shameless ana ut-lslamic for women to go about the city and to work in offices with men But gradually (and with increasing rapidity) opportunities Tor exploiting women's labour opened up fer this second category of the lower middle classes 100, ‘This was by way of an extension of the put- ting out system, mainly inthe clothing wade but aso in many gther areas of production [Now the labour of these lower middle class {and upper working class) women could be ‘exploited, notwithstanding the fac that they remain. confined to. theit homes. The ‘materials andthe orders ae brought to them and the finished goods collected, for which they are paid a pittance for thei long hours of work. In their own minds and inthe eves ff the men who dominate the households, there is @ compensation nevertheless, a gain in respectability, for these women do not go out in public and work with other men. ‘We find two patterns in the second case In one iti the patriarch of the family who controls the operation; he mediates with the fnuepreneurs, brings ome he materials fang the work orders, delivers the finished products, and most imporant ofall, pockets the money paid by the entrepreneur In ef feet the women of his household are his slaves and he jealously guards ther subordi- nation by a constant invocation of Islamic Nalues, as interpreted by himself, and his concept of the good and pure! Muslim ‘woman, unsullied by the eyes of strange ‘men. A fundamentalist ideology reinforces bis command over the enslaved women in his domestic workshop. It seems that these ‘women too invoke the ame values and com June 25, 1988 pensate for their enslaved status by a self- Image of their moral superiority over the ‘other category of women. However, there is also another pattern of the putting out system. In this case the entrepreneurs employ women agents who £0 around houses (especially in kachi basts or Shanty towns) distributing the materials and ders, collecting the finished products and ‘making payments, presumably inthis case Girecly fo the women, In the absence of research, one can only speculate whether in this ease the balance of power inthe house- hhold is shifted (even if only partially) im favour of women. In an interesting study of Muslim women "beed’ makers in Allahabad, Zarina Bhaty found that a a result of eon. tributing substantially (over 45 per cent) to the household income, the women acquired a “eater importance in household decision making process. [ie] an increased say In Spending money” (Bhatt, 198145). It would be hazardous to exiend such a conelusion éravn from a study of a community of Muslim rural labourers in India to urban lower middle class families in Pakistan, But there are a large number of issues located hhere which invite systematic investigation, ‘The women’s movement in Pakistan revolves around educated women both pro- fessionals and those who take up salaried jobs, Its hardly surprising that the main body of activists in the movement comet from relatively well-off and mainly profes- sional women in thet thirties. Offical pro. Dagande directed against the women's move- ‘ment has tried to cisereditit by caricatur- ing it as 2 movement of English educated Lupper class women whose neads are filed with foreign, imported ideas, and who have no roots among the true Pakistani women, In fact the vast majority of activist in the women's movement ae in closer touch with working women of all clases than ether the Dureauerats in government or their wives and, may one add, many male revolu- tionaries. Like all broad based movements, the women's movement inevitably has its share of supercilious members especially from upper class homes, who are filled with an ecesive sense of selfimporiance and see themselves (0 be & cut above the majority of Pakistani women whom they think itis thee mission 10 educate, to make them avare of the injustices done to them! They think tha tis for them to raise the consciousness of their dumb sisters. Bur, such paternalistic attitudes are rare amongst activists and leaders ofthe movement. Most of them were few to the tasks. that they t0ok upon ‘themselves, of leading such a movement. In taking up these unfamiliar tasks, they have demonstrated quite temarkable leadership ualities—not only ingenuity and flexibility Dut also great humility. This last quality is reflected. in the commitment of WAF members, for example, to non-hierarchical organisation, Nevertheless, the fact remains that a large majority of women who turn out to participate in activities and demonstra: tions of the movernent are_ professional women and those from relatively well off hhomes. Only a relatively small proportion 139fof women in salaried jobs, whose circum- stances are more modest, are able 10 turn fut. Is that because of a lack of con sciousness on their part? Anyone who thinks So understands very litle about the material ‘Srcumstances of these working women, “The working woman's day stats eal) for ‘she must feed her husband and children and Send them off to school before she rushes ff to work herself. Going to work and get ting home again is itself quite battle given {he slate of public transport in the country, especially in Karachi, Many large companies ‘maintain Meets of minibuses pick up theit ‘women employees and take them home afier \work- Bur ia that case a woman whois the firs to be picked up oF last to be dropped home can heve a couple of houts or more added to the long day spent at work itself ‘As soon as she comes home she rushes into the kitchen to prepare the family evening meal. And there are umpteen little chores to attend to. Many of them such as washing Clothes and cleaning the house, ete, are reserved for the weekend. Given this des- perate race against time, only a very few ‘working women who happen to have pat ularly helpful relatives (eg, mother inlaw) fr 2 co-operative husband, a rare com: ‘odity, willing 10 take over some of their hores during their absence, can afford the time to go to meetings and demonstrations Those who can turn up without difficulty lend fo have servants to take care of the domestic ront. Indeed, inthe circumstances Wat is needed is 2 re-division of domestic labour, which all to0 slowly, is already making its appearance amongst younger, nuclear families—older people are more set In their ways, even revolutionaries of the Left This does not mean thatthe vas majority fof working women who are not blessed with Such help lack consciousness of their sub- ‘ordination or are unaware of the issues that confront women in Pakistan, One has only {20110 g0 ang talk to them to get a measure DF the depth of thet feelings, and the clarity ‘vith which they se the issues before them. The activists and the leadership of the women’s movement who articulate their fel Ings are therefore, like the tip of a huge iceberg, their sisters being submerged forthe time being in an ocean of work. The roots fof the women’s movement in Pakistan there: fore go much deeper in effet than what i visible on the surface and it would be outrageous for anyone to suggest that it tepresents only the women of the upper Classes. Quite the contrary, few women from the well heeled upper classes are at all con- cerned withthe movement, for they are not ‘much affected by problems faced by the working woman, "The Zia regime and Right wing politial parties, not least the religious fundamentalist, partes, have attacked the women's move ment and, notably WAF, its most effective and militant component, as a past time of alMuent western educated women, The above account should show that nothing ould be further from the truth, Rather less expected and much more regrettable isthe 1330 attitude of some components of Pakistan's ‘uch fragmented, confused and disorganis fd Left, The older generation of Left leader. Ship and intellectuals (amongst whom the present author would count himself) took, the rather simplistic view that the women’s movement is merely a diversion from the primary strugele, the struggle fora socialist, Pakistan. Once socialism comes, they would say, all these problems will disappear naive view. But atleast most of them were Somewhat tolerant of the women's move: iment. Rather more difficult to grasp is the altitude of younger Left activists and inel- Tectuals who only echo the propaganda of the Zia Peyime when. they’ condemn the ‘women's movement as 2 boUTbeois eis ‘movement and. mock the courage of its (especially WAFS) activists who have faced police brutality: Babar Ali's "Elst View of Women's Struggle in Pakistan’ (EPH, May 14) typifies this. I is an extraordinary outburst in its unqualified attack on WAF Jn particular, which is difficult to under stand, and all the more painful coming as itdoes from a respected Left intelectual. But i he has written echoes the thoughts and Ideas of many ofthe Left who read Marxist, classics but are unable to read the society lng social changes that are going on around them. This is only one of the many issues that the Pakistani Let must poncer over and fesolve creatively ‘The problems confronting women in Pakistan have. been accumulating. over several decades. The eason wy the women’s movement erupted into action, virtually overnight, Is the series of ‘outrageous measures actually undertaken or contem- ated by the Zia regime, inthe name of ‘slamisation’, which were. designed. to degrade the place of women in Pakistan society. Indeed, as intellectuals associated with the women's movement and some Scholars of Islam whom the movement (in this case WAF) mobilised into action have shown, these measures were profoundly con trary to Islamic values and injunctions, ‘An outrageous aspect of these new laws, some enacted and others proposed, was that ‘women's egal status was reduced to half that ‘of men. For example, the new Law of Evi- ence provided that (wo male witnesses oF inthe absence of two males, one male and two female witnesses would be required to prove the crime. But besides these discrimi natory acts of legislation which reduced a ‘woman's humanity by half, there were pro- posals to segrezale women into (Second lass) women's universes (which ‘ese (2 be based on colleges of Home Economics). ‘That would remove opportunities for educe tion for women on the strength of which they could embark on careers and secure jobs as they are doing. Although the militant Activities and demonstrations ofthe womens ‘movement were in the fist instance directed against the new laws, it seems that far more ‘weighty were the underlying concerns about prospects for women's education and threats fo ther freedom of movement which threa: ened women hoping to get salaried employ- ment The women's movement cid not fail 10 Ezonomic and Political Weekly ‘make an impact and the government retrea- ted, partially at least, on some ofthe issues fon which the women had agitated, marched inthe strets, or beaten up by police baton charges, got arrested and_ gone lo prison, ‘By 1988 the Zia regime discovered that is “Islamisttion’ programme was being counter broductive. On that the people of Pakistan Fave given their definitive verdict by virtue Of the complete rout of the two main reli sious fundamentalist parties, the Jamaat-e- Islami and the Jamiat-e-Ulema-e-Pakistan in the 1985 election to Zia. National Assembly and, again, in the local bodies election of January’ 1988. Because the “islamisation’ laws were the main target of _the_women’s agitation, there has been some cheetah shicomngeactee theemnte sephora REL EEE et cess Seeemicieaeitionts wt Tena reat Sear a meet Sclp ier atet aoe SUS te Rla ae SHAR vo References ‘Abmad, Shahnaz, 1983: ‘Women's Movement in Pakisan Pakistan Progressive, Vel 3, No Bhatt, Zaria, ISAT The Economie Role and ‘Status of Women inthe Beedt Industry in Allahabad, India, 4 study prepare forthe ILO, “World” Employment Programme Vol 65 Mumtaz, Khawar and Farida Shaheed, 1987 Women of Pakistan, Zed Press, London and New Jersey June 25, 1988f 2