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Islamisation and Women: the experience of Pakistan

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 February 2024

Farida Shaheed  and
Khawar Mumtaz
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During General Zia-ul-Haq’s tenure, the escalating conflict in neighbouring Afghanistan brought Pakistan to the centre stage of international politics. However, at the popular level, it was Zia’s Islamisation campaign, particularly its more brutal manifestations, that drew shocked world attention. Following hard on the heels of the Iranian revolution, it raised fears of another Muslim fundamentalist sweep in the region. These fears were unfounded. Comparisons between the outcome of a mass movement and the impact of state-imposed measures introduced by a military dictator are unwarranted and one needs to remember that the religiously defined political parties (Islam-pasand) in Pakistan have consistently failed to mobilise wide-spread popular support. Furthermore, the current use of the term ‘fundamentalism’ is so loose that it obscures important differences between various religious political forces.

Described by some as the high point of fundamentalism in Pakistan, the last decade should be seen as one which witnessed the convergence of interests between the military rulers and the Jamaat-e-Islami. The former needed political support for credibility; the latter saw in the situation the possibility of access to power, otherwise remote. Thus the slogan of Islamisation became the meeting point. If viewed in terms of social configuration this was the opportunity for the emerging class of traders and entrepreneurs to attain political power.

Type
Research Article
Information
New Blackfriars , Volume 71 , Issue 835 , February 1990 , pp. 67 - 80
Copyright
Copyright © 1990 Provincial Council of the English Province of the Order of Preachers

References

1 JI's Shariat Bill stated that any law challenged for being in conflict with Islam would stand suspended until the final decision of the Shariah Court. It further defined the main source of Shariah as Quran and Sunnah (Practice of the Prophet). The Ninth Amendment on the other hand stated that ‘the injunctions of Islam as laid down in the Holy Quran and Sunnah shall be the supreme law and source guidance for legislation through laws enacted by the parliament and provincial assemblies and for policy making by the government.’

2 Mernissi, Fatima Beyond the Veil, Male‐Female Dynamics in Modern Muslim Society. Revised Edition, Indiana University Press Bloomington and Indianapolis, 1987 Google Scholar.

3 Deniz Kandioyti: ‘Women, Islam and the State–A Proposal for a Comparative Framework’, mimeographed‐undated.

4 Mumtaz, Khawar and Shaheed, Farida: Women of Pakistan: Two Steps Forward One Step Back?, Zed Books, London 1987, p. 8Google Scholar.

5 Maududi, S. Abdul A'la, Purdah and the Status of Women in Islam, Islamic Publications Ltd, Ninth Edition, 1987Google Scholar. Lahore. (First published in 1939 in Urdu and translated into English in 1972.)

6 We owe this point to Tazeen Faridi in her background Paper on ‘Strategies, Policies and Programmes to Integrate Women in Development at all Levels’, International Seminar on Women's Participation in Development: Building Leadership from the Grass Roots, 10–15 November, 1965, Islamabad.

7 Interview of a home‐based piece‐worker for a Study of Piece‐work Amongst Women in a Lahore Neighbourhood by Farida Shaheed and Khawar Mumtaz, quoted by F. Shaheed in ‘Purdah and Poverty in Pakistan’, in Poverty, Women and Ideology, eds. Bina Agarwal and Haleh Afshar, forthcoming.

8 Mumtaz and Shaheed, op. cit. p. 72.

9 According to the Repeal of Hudood Ordinance Committee, Karachi, there are currently 1500 women in prison under the Hudood Ordinance alone as opposed to the total of 70 women in prison in 1980.

10 The Muslim, 10.01.83.

11 Khawar Mumtaz: ‘The “Other” Side’, She, February 1987 p. 42.

12 Ibid.

13 Daily Jang, Women's Edition, 18.07.1988.