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Moot on ‘Democratising S Asia in Digital Age’ today

By Our Correspondent
September 10, 2022

LAHORE:A youth-based international conference titled “Democratising South Asia in the Digital Age” will be held at the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan auditorium on Saturday (today).

The conference, jointly organised by the AGHS Legal Aid Cell, South Asians for Human Rights (SAHR), and Voicepk.net, will engage a number of human rights activists, stakeholders and young opinion-makers from the South Asian region including India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Afghanistan, Nepal and Maldives.

The speakers include Nidhi Razdan, Mandira Nayar and Sumail Singh Sidhu from India; Shreen Saroor and Damith Chandimal from Sri Lanka, Naznin Munni and Md Tajul Islam from Bangladesh, Ahmed Tholal from Maldives, Pashtana Durrani and Dr Orzala Ashraf Nemat from Afghanistan and Manzoor Pashteen, Gharidah Farooqi and Munizae Jahangir from Pakistan. The event will be hybrid and include in-person and online panels.

The purpose of the conference is to promote principles of democracy, rule of law, fundamental rights and widen the space for human rights defenders and opinion-makers in Pakistan and connect them to their counterparts in other South Asian countries facing similar barriers to freedom of expression and personal protection in digital space.

The day-long conference would feature different sessions on issues and themes relating to democratising South Asia in the digital age. The inaugural session titled 'Challenges to youth participation in politics in South Asia' will be moderated by Dr Ammar Ali Jan, President of the Haqooq-e-Khalq Movement. The speakers comprise Chairman of Pakhtun Tahaffuz Movement Manzoor Pashteen, Indian historian and director of ADARA MARCH Sumail Singh Sidhu, Sri Lankan lawyer and human rights defender Prabodha Rathnayaka and student activist Sadia Baloch.

The session on "Digital witch-hunts: who is the churail?" will be moderated by Reema Omer, legal advisor for South Asia of the International Commission of Jurists. Nidhi Razdan, consulting editor of Indian news channel NDTV, Gharidah Farooqi, anchorperson Gharidah Farooqi, Ahmed Tholal, human rights activist from Maldives, Damith Chandimal, Sri Lanka consultant of INFORM Human Rights Documentation Centre, Munizae Jahangir, and Naznin Munni, content editor of Bangladesh's Ekattor TV will speak in this session.

Saroop Ijaz, senior counsel for Asia Division of Human Rights Watch, will moderate the session on 'Role of the State in Communalism'.

Speakers in the session include Maheen Paracha, research and communications lead of HRCP, Dr Ayra Indrias Patras, assistant professor in FC College, Dev Desai, Indian human rights activist and trustee of Anhad, Shreen Saroor, co-founder of Women Action Network in Sri Lanka, and Md. Tajul Islam, a senior advocate of Supreme Court of Bangladesh.

The session on "Closed Borders, Open Websites" will feature speakers comprising Md. Saimum Reza Talukder from Bangladesh, a senior Lecturer of BRAC University School of Law, Mandira Nayar, Indian journalist and founding member of South Asia Peace Action Network, M Tahseen, Pakistan convener of Pakistan-India Forum for Peace & Democracy (PIPFPD) and Seerat Khan, programme manager of Digital Rights Foundation. The session will be moderated by Usama Khilji, digital rights activist and director of Bolo Bhi.

Munizae Jahangir will moderate the session on "Digital Education in the Age of Taliban". Pashtana Durrani, executive director of LEARN Afghanistan, Dr Orzala Ashraf Nemat from Afghanistan, a scholar and founder of Women and Youth Leadership Centre, Shad Begum, founding director of Association for Behavior and Knowledge Transformation (ABKT), Ibrash Pasha, a scholar and educational rights campaigner and Kainat Riaz, education activist and co-founder of Beydaar will speak in the session.

The last session on "Disaster Relief Through Digital Platforms" will be addressed by Bushra Mahnoor, co-founder of Mahwari Justice, Zainab Kakar, communications manager of Balochistan Rural Support Programme and Qaiser Javed, president of Progressive Students Collective.

The conference will be live streamed on the social media platforms of Voicepk.net with the hashtags #ClosedBordersOpenWebsites, #OpenSouthAsia.