Courtesy: Dawn News
Editorial

THE majoritarian view has once again prevailed in the matter of bringing about legislation against forced conversion in the country. At a meeting on Wednesday of the parliamentary committee concerned, spurious reasoning and outright disinformation was employed to ride roughshod over the fears of non-Muslims for the future of their communities because of what they claim is an increasing incidence of such conversions.

Moreover, it seemed the outcome had already been decided elsewhere. For, when the members demanded a vote on the bill after a heated two-hour debate on its contents, the chairman of the ironically named Parliamentary Committee to Protect Minorities from Forced Conversion in an extraordinary move read out a printed statement that the draft was against the public interest. Consider the institutionalised prejudice that non-Muslims have to contend with in their struggle for a fair hearing on the issue. As mentioned by Human Rights Minister Shireen Mazari herself at the meeting, the Council of Islamic Ideology invited no less than Mian Mithu, the cleric widely accused of being the main perpetrator of forced conversions in Sindh, for a briefing.

Ask the right-wing lobby and they will all largely agree that forced conversions are wrong from a religious point of view. But they refuse to countenance any practical measures that will stop this reprehensible practice. For instance, one of the objections raised is to the stipulation that the conversion statement must be made in front of a magistrate — which would minimise the chance of force being involved. Further, conservative elements base their arguments on a deliberately narrow understanding of the term ‘forced conversion’.

Changing one’s religion voluntarily does not only mean doing so without intimidation and fear of harm; even monetary blandishments are an indirect form of coercion. A voluntary decision to convert is based on an understanding of Islam and an appreciation of the far-reaching consequences such a decision will entail. On it hinge relationships with immediate family, the fate of matrimonial ties, standing within the community, inheritance rights, and so on. That is why there is such opposition in particular to a minimum age for conversion.

Considering there is a minimum age for marriage, there is no substantive argument in opposing one for changing one’s religion — except that young females are the main demographic allegedly singled out for forced conversion. The state’s failure to honestly address an issue that has engendered such insecurity and distress among non-Muslim Pakistanis is shameful.

Courtesy: Dawn News
By Rafia Zakaria

IT would be fair to say that marriages in Pakistan are ‘forced’. On one end of the spectrum are the extreme cases, ones in which young girls, often even those who have not yet reached puberty, are forced to marry older men. These extreme cases often involve the use of young girls offered up as brides to settle disputes or pay debts. Those who dare to go against the fate that has been decided for them by cruel and authoritarian family members may even face physical harm. Declared the ‘honour’ of their families, any effort on their part to exercise their right to choose their future is seen as deserving of the most vicious violence. Even when the girls, or couples, run away, they are hounded until their location is discovered and relayed to their families so that they may be killed.

Draconian and cruel as they are, these sorts of cases of forced marriages are likely just a small percentage of the total instances of forced marriages that occur in Pakistan. A ‘forced marriage’, after all, is one in which one or both parties have not consented. The operative word here is ‘consent’, and while technically speaking consent can be given by saying ‘yes’ or ‘no’, philosophically speaking it is a much more complex issue. In the typical arranged marriage, for instance, both the bride and the groom are asked whether they agree to the match. This ‘asking’ and the consequent provision of ‘consent’ that is obtained when the bride- and groom-to-be say ‘yes’ becomes the basis of their acquiescence.

There is more to consent than saying ‘yes’. Focusing only on the technical definition of consent leaves out so much of the story. It does not, for instance, consider one of the strongest drivers of marriage in our society, which is family pressure. In most cases, when a bride-to-be is asked about whether she wants to say ‘yes’ to a particular proposal, the real message to her is simply that we have chosen this man for you and you should choose this man too. Technically speaking, the bride-to-be can say ‘no’ but the cost of this ‘no’, when everyone in the family has already decided that the proposal is the best one, is formidable. If the girl has the guts to stand up to her family, she will be pressured in other ways — withdrawal of affection, taunting, teasing, and, worse still, accused of misbehaviour and disrespect. It is not surprising that, faced with the usually perfunctory ritual of ‘asking the girl’, they know what they are supposed to say, what everyone wants them to say, and so they say ‘yes’.

Add to this the fact that marriage for women is the basis for ongoing social protection. Once a woman is in her late teens or 20s, it is expected that the umbrella of social protections provided to her by her father must shift to her husband. Being married, after all, is the only way that Pakistani society allows a grown woman to exist. For those who flout this rule, there is a lifetime of exclusions, criticism and intrusions. Grown women who are not under the wing of a husband are automatically considered social pariahs and their morals declared compromised. Even in 2022, it is difficult for a single woman to rent or lease a home in many areas in the country. Faced with such realities, most girls just say ‘yes’.

Consent, in the end, means the freedom to say ‘no’, and that freedom is not available to women in Pakistan. In many cases, even men do not have this freedom. The guy sitting on the stage and smiling has likely just wed a woman picked for him because she is a cousin, because their families want to do business together, or because her brother has wed his sister. Love, both bride and groom are told, will come in time as life is shared, etc., etc. If it doesn’t come, then it doesn’t matter; it’s not like couples in Pakistan divorce because there is no spark between them.

Except these things do matter. Human beings, be they male or female, deserve emotional connection and fulfilment, instead of marrying to fulfil duties of obedience owed to parents. The extreme in forced marriages may be cases of girls who are sold by parents under duress, but forced marriages, as one journalist and activist has said, exist along a spectrum. The marriage of two cousins betrothed when they were born is most likely a forced marriage. From fulfilling duties to parents, the spouses are expected to get busy fulfilling their duties to each other as they bear the burden of an emotionally hollow bond that provides them with none of the gratification and mutual fulfilment that an intimate relationship should.

The availability of social media is doing its own job of pink-washing these hollow relationships as genuinely loving ones so that these sorts of ‘forced marriages’ can continue. Your friend who sees her husband for 30 minutes every day will write a long loving missive to him on Facebook and Instagram, waxing on and on about his greatness because, like consent, affection is also for show. Deep bonds do not require such performative gestures; the gestures exist to deceive all those not yet married that a fairy-tale does ensue after the wedding festivities are over.

Forced marriages are the norm in Pakistan, and they have created a nation of the emotionally unfulfilled. When the basic intimate partnership is bereft of equality, mutual respect, chemistry, etc. (none of which can exist in a made-to-order marriage), you end up with a society that lacks empathy. Instead of genuine human feeling, there is only obligation and duty and endurance, a resentful coexistence until one’s days run out. Forced marriages may differ in degree and submission, but the real plot acted out over a lifetime is always a tragedy.

The writer is an attorney teaching constitutional law and political philosophy.

Courtesy: Dawn News
By Rafia Zakaria

JUST the other day Prime Minister Imran Khan was interviewed by CNN’s Fareed Zakaria. Part of the discussion of his interview has been focused on the prime minister distinguishing between the plight of the Uighur Muslims in China and of Kashmiris in India-held Kashmir. However, the notable point in the exchange is not the answer Mr Khan gave but the question that he was asked. This question, about whether he would condemn Chinese atrocities against the Uighur Muslims, effectively stood for whether Pakistan would stand with the liberal order and its centring of human rights, or with China.

There was a time immediately after the collapse of the former USSR in 1989 that suggested that unlike international orders that have existed before, the liberal order would last forever. It certainly seemed this way for quite some time, as the wave of democratisation spread across the globe to former communist countries.

This, in turn, permitted the Western powers, most notably the United States, to stretch the free market and globalisation to the far corners of the world. The ensuing decades became capitalism’s golden age, even as international institutions controlled by the West created trade and exchange mandates that generally favoured the products, demands, etc of Western countries. Developing nations that were agreeable to the idea of a liberal democracy were blessed with hundreds of millions of dollars in aid and access to their markets.

That age is over now. The European Union, once the shining example of the possibilities of the liberal order, faces challenges with national sovereignty raising its head. The loss of Britain and the inability of everyone else to remain united around the transnational agenda are all testaments to the decline of a kind of thinking that saw national borders as an encumbrance rather than areas of hard-won territorial dominance.

Nor does the affliction belong only to the EU. The United Nations, while still doddering along, has become increasingly irrelevant in terms of brokering solutions between anyone except the smallest and poorest countries, in whom the powers that be in the Security Council have little interest. A case in point is the current conflict in Ukraine and the fact that no one seems to think that the UN, which was ostensibly created to prevent conflict in just such situations, has any solutions.

In Foreign Affairs, the publication of the Council of Foreign Affairs, a foreign policy organisation in the US, historian and political scientist Michael Beckley writes about how the “openness” of the markets is now perceived by the US to be a liability. It is, after all, this openness and the Western willingness to look past China’s undemocratic character that allowed the latter country to be ushered into the World Trade Organisation. The prioritisation of ‘capitalism over democracy’ has allowed it to entrench itself in world trade. The persistence of the liberal order, its ongoing life, is thus dependent on a reprioritisation of democracy over capitalism.

This means that illiberal practices — take, for instance, China’s treatment of Uighur Muslims, allegedly involving brainwashing in camps and forbidding the practice of their faith — will be a much bigger deal now. Beijing’s creation of special trade zones and concerted efforts to expand its influence through the Belt and Road Initiative and various others is seen as a confrontational tone by the West. Furthermore, China’s gathering of warships in the South China Sea and its wanting to re-absorb Taiwan are all seen as deeply problematic initiatives that are aimed at changing the balance of power in the region and in the world at large.

In his essay, Beckley also notes another crucial Chinese goal. According to the five-year plan put out by the Chinese Communist Party (whose endurance is China’s primary national goal), Beijing will be making an effort to get control of what he claims Chinese officials themselves refer to as “chokepoints”. These are the resources that the world is dependent upon, which could be used as leverage. Similarly, it has not escaped the attention of analysts that China has become the world’s chief dispenser of loans, with most of the world’s countries owing something or the other to Beijing.

The US is still the world’s sole superpower, and it appears that it is ready to flex its power in relation to China. Both Democrats and Republicans in the US agree that a hard line on China is crucial and that Beijing needs to be reined in. In the next few years, the narrative of China as an undemocratic force is likely to gain currency. Many in the neighbourhood may endorse this view. India already sees China as a threatening neighbour, Japan has never had very good relations with the country, and even South Korea is witnessing a change in public opinion.

In its relationship with China, Pakistan should factor in the costs associated with its close collaboration with Beijing. Close relations with an undemocratic behemoth could mean an increase in authoritarian influence within the country. This is particularly dangerous given Pakistan’s existing penchant for authoritarianism and the fragility of its democratic institutions. It is expected, therefore, that the illiberal aspects of Chinese governance will be central to world discourse.

The intention of the question put to the prime minister in the CNN interview was loaded with this content. It was not about whether the victimisation of the Uighur Muslims in China and the persecution of Kashmiri Muslims can be considered comparable in terms of the torture being endured by both. It is instead a way of highlighting the contradiction of Pakistan’s demand that Kashmiri Muslims be given the democratic right to decide their fate while endorsing the undemocratic rule of Han Chinese over the Uighurs in Xinjiang.

The writer is an attorney teaching constitutional law and political philosophy.

CourtesyCourtesy: Dawn News

IT appears that we are approaching a season where no one is entirely satisfied. This is not an estimation of the inner turmoil within Pakistan — which nevertheless fits the bill — but an evaluation of the world at large. When our television screens attempt a diversion from the tumult at home, they switch to even more pressing depictions of the doom that is and the doom to come.

For the moment, its visible parameters involve the conflict in Ukraine, where a Russian general mastermind who devastated Syria has now taken charge of Ukraine. In a macabre announcement of his leadership, he ordered the bombing of a train station and killed 50 civilians. Now that the war has gone on for over a month, its reverberations are becoming evident.

In Sri Lanka, the inflation and food crisis had been brewing long before the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and had boiled over onto the streets. The cabinet members have tendered their resignations, seeing themselves as unable to assuage the hunger of the people. As news reports have shown, the people on the streets are not simply political workers. Most, in fact, have no real political affiliation; they are, instead, ordinary people who work in offices and shops and are simply unable to feed their families.

In response, Sri Lanka has sought assistance from international agencies to stave off a debt crisis. Ali Sabry, recently appointed as finance minister, has said that $3 billion will be required to prevent a debt crisis. That’s not all; the country is also seeking to freeze its payments to the IMF and restructure another debt, $1bn of which is due in the next few months.

Over in the Middle East, Egypt is also suffering. Russia and Ukraine not only supplied 85 per cent of the wheat consumed in the country, they were also sources of tourism income, which is crucial to the Egyptian economy. Now Egypt too is asking for help from the IMF. Last week, the Egyptian currency lost 14pc of its value, stabilising only in the hope that a deal would be reached with the IMF. Even if that deal is reached, it is almost certain that there will be a food crisis in the country. While alternative suppliers for imported wheat can be found, the tourists that filled the resorts of Sharm al-Sheikh and Luxor are not coming back anytime soon. When there is war abroad, famine and starvation at home, leisure and fun are often the first things to go.

This is the third time Egypt has turned to the IMF in recent years; the latest was the funding of a $12bn loan. These loans are propping up the economy, which will almost certainly collapse without them.

The months ahead will see the resources of the world’s financial institutions being stretched to the limit.

The crucial point in understanding what is happening in Sri Lanka, in Egypt and, of course, in Ukraine, is that in the summer months we will see the resources of the world’s financial institutions being stretched to the limit. Loans and support that could have been serviced easily are going to be much harder to get. Things that were a matter of course and were counted upon may not happen, and this will lead to dire consequences for countries and people who have already been pushed towards the hellish realities following two years of the Covid-19 pandemic and its associated effects.

With this as the backdrop for the hot summer season, one wonders why anyone would wish to be at the helm of Pakistani politics. Almost a month ago, Shaukat Tarin, who was then the finance minister, was questioned by the IMF about Pakistan’s ability to fund the $1.5bn subsidy package. The last government passed off the inquiry as a matter of course, but the fact is that whatever administration tries to ease the pressure on the people with money borrowed from abroad will likely face similar questions.

In addition to this inquiry, the IMF has also begun its review of the $6n that was part of a ‘rescue package’ that Pakistan received in 2019. The last government had signalled that the money that financed the rescue package would eventually be repaid. Those, however, were the promises of the last administration. As the new administration takes office, they will undoubtedly blame the last one for this mess.

However, the terrible thing about these messes is that the world does not care whether it was the last administration or the current one that created them. Their area of concern is how these debt shortfalls will be handled and if Pakistan is a country to whom further money can be lent. This crucial question has always been a problem for Pakistan, which has relied on foreign guarantors to help get money from international institutions. The future is likely to be no different at all.

The competition, however, is likely to be tough. International institutions facing requests from a number of countries, including war-torn Ukraine, famine-torn Egypt and strife-torn Sri Lanka, to name a few, will have to make difficult decisions. These decisions may shut out Pakistan, creating an awful situation where the people are thrust into ever-worsening conditions that may reach the level of desperation seen in other countries.

The new government should present a strategy as to how it plans to avert the burgeoning debt crisis. The inflated prices of petrol, rice and sugar are already crushing Pakistan’s poor and tightening conditions for the ever-beleaguered middle class. Beyond the sloganeering and the promises, some specifics concerning the future would be welcomed by the people who have so far only been watching procedural dramas being played out in Islamabad. Slogans, after all, can provide moments of victory and uplift that last a few days, but hunger roils in an unrelenting cry of need and want.

The writer is an attorney teaching constitutional law and political philosophy.: Dawn News
By Zahid Hussain
The writer is an author and journalist.

IT is not for the first time that the country has been on the brink of a financial collapse. We have been many times in the proverbial ICU in the past and have been resuscitated, of course with some outside help. It’s no different this time as we wait for ‘God’s hand’.

With the new government unable to swallow the bitter pill and address the situation, our financial recovery now completely depends on an IMF bailout and help from friendly countries. That may provide us with some breathing space. But it will not be long before we are back on the ventilator again.

Our failure to address fundamental structural problems has earned the country the dubious distinction of being the ‘sick man’ of South Asia. We lag behind on most social and economic indicators as compared to the regional countries, with the exception of Afghanistan. Nothing could be more alarming than the spectre of financial collapse of a nuclear-armed country.

For long, successive governments have traded on the back of the country’s strategic resources and geopolitical importance. That has made us completely reliant on international financial aid. Like other rentier states, we have tended to extract rent in exchange for our strategic support. Over the years, our financial dependence on migrant remittances has also increased.

Even if IMF and some states come to our rescue, it won’t be long before we’re back on the ventilator.

All that has reinforced the rentier state of our economy, with little incentive to initiate fundamental structural reforms in order to expand our domestic revenue base and reduce dependence on external resources. The current financial crisis cannot be seen in isolation; it is symptomatic of a more serious malaise. It is not only about reliance on external aid but also an economy based on internal rents limiting our productive capacity.

Unfortunately, it’s hard for our ruling elite to break away from this rentier mindset and move towards a sustainable self-reliant course. The ongoing blame game and political instability have further obscured the fundamental challenges confronting the country’s ailing economy. Postponing the tough measures for political reasons has already cost the country hugely. The short-term thinking will only worsen the crisis in the long term. The country needs to find a durable solution to its financial problems.

It is critical for the government to see the revival of the stalled IMF loan programme. But that will require taking all the tough measures that the government is trying to avoid for political reasons. Not only will the massive subsidy on petroleum products have to go, some other subsidies too will need to be cancelled.

Months before its ouster, the Imran Khan government announced a $709 million subsidy programme. That has further shrunk the fiscal space. Moreover, the government is also required to significantly increase tax revenues. The greatest challenge is to curtail soaring inflation and not resort to more inflationary borrowing. These measures would certainly help salvage the situation in the short term. But for a long-term solution, the government needs to do much more.

Over the years, Pakistan has regularly been going to the IMF for bailouts. We might well be the only country to be more or less perpetually in a Fund programme. A major reason is our failure to implement reform plans. We certainly don’t need to go to the Fund or any other aid agency if we have our house in order. Our failure to increase our revenues has led to the spiralling of domestic and external debt to unsustainable levels.

It seems that instead of taking unpopular actions in view of the coming elections, the government may decide to dissolve the National Assembly and hand the reins over to an interim administration. But can a short-term dispensation with limited authority take the required far-reaching actions within a period of three months? There is strong speculation regarding the prolonging of the term of an interim government to six months. But even that may not solve the problem. A major question is whether any future elected government would have the capacity and political will to continue with those reform measures.

Given the increasing political polarisation in the country it is highly doubtful that elections will produce a strong government, which has the support of all the federating units necessary for implementing a reform agenda. A broad consensus among all stakeholders has become more important with the greater financial and administrative powers given to the provinces under the 18th Amendment.

The lack of a broader agreement between the centre and the provinces has remained a major impediment in taking hard financial decisions. Most probably, new elections would not change the existing pattern of different political parties controlling the provincial governments. Notwithstanding the fact that Imran Khan’s government also had PTI set-ups in Punjab and KP, it remained at loggerheads with the Sindh government controlled by the PPP.

It could get worse with the possibility of three different political parties forming the governments in the provinces. Moreover, given the existing atmosphere of acrimony, there is little possibility of all political forces agreeing on an election mechanism to make the electoral process smooth and fair. Yet another controversial election could worsen the political instability, making it extremely difficult for future incumbents to carry out structural reforms to take the country out of its state as a rentier economy.

Undoubtedly, the frequent disruption of the democratic political process and extra-constitutional interventions have also been a major reason for the perpetuation of the rentier state. The fact that no elected prime minister has been able to complete his or her term is one of the reasons for institutional democracy not taking root. Our elected democratic institutions have increasingly become irrelevant with rising political polarisation and acrimony in the country.

It is true that the state of the economy is intertwined with political stability. For the country to move forward, it is imperative for all political forces to agree upon a charter of democracy as well as a charter of economy. The country cannot afford the politics of confrontation and an economy on the brink. A rentier state with its economy so dependent on external support cannot defend it sovereignty.

Courtesy: Dawn News
By Rafia Zakaria

THE Commons At Vintage Park in the Houston suburb of Spring, Texas, is the kind of apartment complex you can find all over the United States. The sedate two- and three-storey apartment buildings are surrounded by trees and manicured bushes. There is plenty of parking for residents and a measure of extra security, in that the entire complex is gated. Only residents or those with the gate code can gain access.

None of this was enough to protect Sadia Manzoor. A Pakistani-American woman, Sadia worked as a teacher. On the morning of May 19, she was getting ready for work. Also in the apartment were her mother, Inayat Bibi, and her four-year-old daughter Khadija. Within minutes, all of them would be dead. That morning, Sadia’s estranged husband, also a Pakistani-American, barged into the apartment and opened fire, killing his ex-wife, his young daughter, and his ex-mother-in-law. Then he turned the gun on himself.

Since the murder, it has been revealed that Sadia had filed for divorce from her husband because he was abusive towards her and their daughter. The divorce had gone through, and Sadia was trying to build a new life for herself, her mother and her daughter. Having wrangled her way out of an abusive relationship, Sadia did not know that the time when an abused woman leaves a man is the most dangerous moment in her life.

According to the US Department of Justice, the time when a couple separates is the most lethal moment. An abused woman is 500 times more at risk for violence, according to some estimates. Many abused women are hurt or killed during this window of time as the abuser begins to realise that he no longer controls them. In Sadia’s case, it seems that her former husband had decided that if he could not keep his family, then there would be no family.

Then there is the other story of two Pakistan-origin sisters from Spain. A day after Sadia Manzoor and her mother and daughter were slain, the two sisters Aneesa and Arooj Abbas were murdered in cold blood in Gujarat. According to reports, the sisters had been forcibly married to cousins in Pakistan a couple of years ago and were trying to get a divorce. When their in-laws and their own family learned of their intentions, they were tricked into returning to Pakistan. Here, they faced torture and abuse. The six men who have been arrested in connection with the murder include two of their brothers and an uncle, amongst others.

Such is the normalisation of violence against women that no one is bothered even when they know someone is being abused.

These are harrowing and tragic deaths. Both involve abused Pakistani women living in diaspora. Both involve men who, on finding out that they could not exert complete control over their victims, killed them. Sadia Manzoor’s murderer killed himself, so he cannot be punished for the mayhem he unleashed. The suspected killers of the Abbas sisters have been arrested, but it’s unclear whether they will actually be punished. The general routine in cases involving the death of abused women is to make arrests while media attention is on these cases, and grant bail to the suspects as soon as the attention wanes.

The stories also illustrate how living in countries like the United States or Spain or any other Western nation exposes the masculinity crisis that confronts Pakistani men who migrate to other countries. In Pakistan, control over women is complete. Such is the normalisation of violence against women in the country that no one is bothered even when they know a woman is being abused. Otherwise incessantly nosy Pakistanis are experts at looking the other way when it comes to abused women. One of the cruellest depredations of a hyper-patriarchal society is that even women, whom one would expect would support their own, smugly blame the victim.

Such all-encompassing dominion over women is not available to men in other countries. Pakistani men living in diaspora in this or that Western country suddenly discover that they can no longer exert complete control over the women in their family. Relationship dynamics change when their wives discover that it is not very difficult to obtain a divorce. In Texas, as in other American states, a divorce is granted if either party wants it. Legally, at least, no one can force a woman to continue to stay married to a man. Unlike in Pakistan, a husband’s consent is simply not required to obtain a divorce. Some men, like Sadia Manzoor’s killer, cannot believe that they no longer command their families in the way they used to.

It is important for all Pakistani women to learn from the stories of Sadia Manzoor and the Abbas sisters. The three women had been trying to live a life free of abuse; a life where they could make their own choices. Their lives were destroyed because of the male ego: their killers’ insatiable desire to control transformed into a desire to kill. Such was the bloodlust of Sadia Manzoor’s killer that even a four-year-old child was not spared. According to their autopsy report, the Abbas sisters were severely tortured before they died.

Women leaving abusive relationships need to take the threat that they face very seriously. Sadia Manzoor may have been doing just that by living in a gated apartment complex. Unfortunately, it was not enough to save her and her small family. The lesson is clear: the raving and ranting abusive man can easily transform into a killer. Brothers and uncles can undergo similar transformations, egged on by their lurid desire for complete control. Lurking beneath the thin veneer of normalcy, all abusive men are potential murderers of women; aided and abetted in their plans by conspiring family members, misogynistic laws and societies that choose to look the other way when men kill.

The writer is an attorney teaching constitutional law and political philosophy.

Courtesy: Dawn News
By Rafia Zakaria

YOU can see it happen on reality shows. Participants who are living ordinary lives suddenly find that the world’s voyeurism — curiosity about how other people live — can become a lucrative source of income, even riches. Initially, the couple or family just lives the life they had, as viewers watch them raise their 15 children, or live their lives as little people or participate in some elimination game where the worst fate is getting kicked out of some mansion or marrying someone sight unseen.

In one show that airs on the American network glibly titled The Learning Channel, an overweight woman documents her travails in trying to find a partner as she runs a dance club. Someone, I imagine, tells these people that this is just their 10 minutes in the world’s allotment of 15 famous minutes. I can also imagine that a good number of these folks imagine that they will be different. They will always be random voyeurs interested in what they ate in a day or how they prepare chicken curry.

But the end does come, and you can see which reality shows have content that is being suggested by the show’s producers and would never have been a part of the reality show star’s life had it not been for the piles of money the show has suddenly brought into their lives. There are flashy vacations to Europe and stays in five-star hotels. There are new homes full of snazzy upmarket appliances and new cars, even as the stars have nothing in terms of a career or vocation.

In other episodes, long-forgotten exes and rejected friends show up. An attempt is made to create some engrossing conflict that will accomplish the ultimate goal of every such show: keep the audience hooked. Eventually, even these ideas begin to run out; the fights that people on the show have are no longer the ordinary fights that viewers can identify with. Now, they are the problems of those who have hit sudden jackpots, whose income levels have gone far above those of their former friends and jealous relatives. This is the end for the show; the private lives that were being presented have been chewed up and spat out. Waiting in the shadows are other reality stars who think they will beat this cycle, who imagine they will be famous and hence rich forever.

Vloggers suffer from burnout from constantly producing likeable and viewable content.

Pakistan does not have the avalanche of reality shows that are proliferating in India and in the West. But while television networks have stayed out of the game, via the proliferation of platforms such as YouTube and TikTok, with the former actually paying content creators by views, it is easy to develop one’s own reality show. Behold the arrival of the vloggers, people who document their days and doings on camera and then, thanks to some basic editing, setting to music etc, are able to produce an individual version of a reality show.

Most of these vlogs are watched only by immediate circles of friends and family netting not more than a few hundred views at best. These vlogs are consistent for a while, the vlogger having heeded earnest advice about developing a following and staying consistent. Most times, however, these do not get the kind of viewership that would make the effort a lucrative venture. Some keep at it, throwing their words and experiences out into the world in the hope that someone will hear them, perhaps even benefit from them, or connect with them.

The real test is only set before those whose vlogs take off. Most of those who see this happen are already semi-famous or ‘fame-adjacent’, meaning that they are related to someone who already has a large audience and is pushing their vlog. Here again, you see the same life cycle of the reality show star. At first, there is endearing glee; the vlog takes off and the thousands of views each pay $0.18. Given the exchange rate between the dollar and the rupee, it means that a pretty penny can be made, especially if the vlog is a daily offering.

At this point, the vlogs feature the details of their lives. Having foregone privacy, we are taken inside bedrooms, inside closets and cupboards, inside relationships between mothers-in-law and daughters-in-law, inside fights with friends, onto restaurant tables, and so on. The best at it are those who simply do not seem to mind that they have exchanged privacy for money. Since there has not been a monetary value put on privacy, it feels like easy money.

What they do not seem to realise is that at some point during this pursuit, the stars of these self-produced show go from documenting their lives to choreographing their lives for the sake of a vlog. When recording yourself is your source of income, then it is hard not to make decisions with successful vlogging in mind, what looks good on camera or what viewers engage with the most. Suddenly, the terms of living life transform from being judged by their inherent value or enjoyment to whether they are good material. Then there is the constant fear of losing the viewers and the views that have been acquired thus far, a fear so real that viewers begin to control rather than only consume the content presented to them.

It may seem surprising in this day and age where everyone is an influencer that these self-made stars suffer from burnout from constantly producing likeable and viewable content. Some experience such psychological fallout that they have to quit altogether. Others have to cut down or take breaks or simply lose viewers. It is a terrible outcome but one that proves that monetising something that was not initially allotted a monetary value can have consequences. The private life of individuals can seem like easy money when the truth is that there is no such thing as free money.

The writer is an attorney teaching constitutional law and political philosophy.

Courtesy: Dawn News
By Tahera Hasan
The writer is a lawyer and founder-director of Imkaan Welfare Organisation.

THERE are certain responsibilities a state has towards its children. The most fundamental of them is providing access to education, alongside the other basic rights of nationality, housing, recreation, freedom, protection and belonging.

Inability to access education is one of the major challenges faced by people in Pakistan. The non-existence of quality public institutions leads to few opportunities and possibilities. In marginalised communities, there are home-grown schools that parents send their children to as a last resort. However, these schools are unable to retain their students due to lack of quality engagement and nurturing and the inflicting of corporal punishment. This combination results in children dropping out of school or playing truant.

Education in Pakistan is a luxury that most cannot afford. Without educating children, there is no hope for empowerment and progress. In this landscape, we have a large population of children who are stateless: ie, they are without any identity or citizenship documents in their country of residence, which makes them virtually non-existent.

The requirement for school admissions and subsequently taking high school exams is a Child Registration Certificate. There are countless families in Pakistan that, because of the lack of documentation, are unable to acquire a CRC. Struggles of this nature exist not only in communities that are stateless, but also among those who have a generational lack of documentation.

Lack of documents is depriving children of education.

The kind of challenges faced by children and young people due to this requirement are unimaginable. There have been cases of children who have been removed from school in secondary grades or whose studies have been aborted midway. In most cases, there has been no access to schooling as schools refuse to enrol a child because of lack of documentation. There are students who have managed to complete their college degrees but are then unable to get their certificates, rendering their education useless.

These are violations of the fundamental rights of the child guaranteed by the Constitution of Pakistan, the Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights that have been ratified by Pakistan. Pakistan has therefore accepted its legal obligations and is bound to make the changes required to ensure implementation.

The Constitution of Pakistan in Article 25A clearly lays down that “The state shall provide free and compulsory education to all children of the age of five to 16 years in such manner as may be determined by law”. Similarly, Article 28 of the Convention on the Rights of Child asserts that primary education must be compulsory and free for all and stresses the development of secondary education, and accessibility to vocational education.

In addition, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights recognises education as a fundamental right and, as such, one of the most important rights for survival. It is very clear that the right to education is a fundamental right and cannot and should not in any way be curtailed through policy and process. It is imperative that as a state that is vested in its children, and for progress and the future of our country, we ensure that every child can access his or her right to education.

Removal of children from school, or children not being allowed to be educated, is violative of the Constitution and the principles of child welfare. Vocational training centres in most cases require a Matriculation certificate for enrolment, which automatically restricts it to those that have access to education, while depriving those who need it most.

At a mental health clinic that Imkaan Welfare Organisa­tion runs at Machhar Colony, one of the largest informal settlements in Karachi and home to a primarily stateless population, engagement and studies show that in 80 per cent of cases of depression the lack of access to education is cited as the main cause. The inability to progress, together with hopelessness, impacts the youth and increases gravitation towards drug addiction and anti-social activities.

Not implementing Article 25A is anti-poor and ensures that a marginalised and deprived section of society has no chance of progress. There is an urgent need to make sure that all children have the right to access education by removing the requirement of CRC for school admissions and high school examinations. School registrations can be done, alternatively, on the basis of a birth certificate or any other proof of birth. This will ensure equal access to education for all. By implementing this change, we will be able to give children one of the very basic rights granted to them and protected in our Constitution and a chance for a better future and society.