Where are the women?

Alliance Francaise hosts discussion on place of women in Pakistani society

A highly animated panel discussion was held at the Alliance Francaise in Karachi on Wednesday evening regarding the place of women in society and making their presence more “visible”.

All the panel discussants concurred that the lot of the women left much to be desired.

The panel comprised neuro-surgeon Dr Anila Darbar; Ziad Bashir, Director, Gul Ahmed Textile Mills; journalist Mubashir Zaidi; Severine Minot, a visiting academic from Canada teaching at the Habib University; and Sadaffe Abid, founder and CEO of Circle, sponsors of the programme, all of whom agreed that women’s potentialities and talents were under-utilised.

Bina Shah said that the visibility of women in public life was not what it should be and she thought that while the visibility of women was essential for a country’s progress, still lots had to be done. She blamed that on traditional cultural constraints. 

In this context, she narrated her own childhood years when, she said, while entering her adolescent years she was reminded of all the restrictions she was supposed to observe on account of being a woman.

She said that in Pakistan, only 14 percent of the women worked as board members.

Neuro-surgeon Dr Anila Darbar said that many women were forced into the medical profession and they got rid of it the moment they got married as they couldn’t cope with the exacting nature of the profession and the demands of home-building.

She said people had to be sensitised about women’s potential and gender equality.

Saddafe Abid cited the case of the only university exclusively for women, The Jinnah University for Women, yet it added only five percent to the women’s workforce in the country.

Severine Minot from Canada called for objectively assessing the potentialities of women. “Why constrict the child’s potentialities on account of cultural factors?” she queried.

Later, the topic was thrown open to the floor and, as most questioners came with complaints of discrimination against women, a healthy debate followed on ways to redress the situation.