Ismat Shahjahan | |
|---|---|
عصمت شاہ جہان | |
| Born | Ismat Raza Shahjahan (1963-05-06)May 6, 1963 (age 61) |
| Nationality | Pakistani |
| Alma mater | International Institute of Social Studies ofErasmus University Rotterdam University of Peshawar |
| Occupation(s) | Political activist,socialist,feminist |
| Years active | 1983 – present |
| Known for | Women Democratic Front Awami Workers Party Pashtun Tahafuz Movement |
| Notable work | Pashto magazineLeekwal (published in 1992) Urdu magazineNariwad (published in 2018) |
Ismat Raza Shahjahan (Pashto/Urdu: عصمت رضا شاہ جہان; b. May 6, 1963) is asocialist-feminist political leader fromKhyber Pakhtunkhwa,Pakistan. She is the president ofWomen Democratic Front (WDF),[1] the deputy general-secretary of theAwami Workers Party (AWP),[2] and a leading member of thePashtun Tahafuz Movement (PTM).
She ran for theNational Assembly seatNA-54 (Islamabad-III) in the2018 Pakistani general election.[3][4][5]
Shahjahan belongs toTakht-e-Nasrati inKarak District,Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan.[6] She did herBachelor of Arts inlaw andpolitical science fromJinnah College for Women,University of Peshawar, and also studiedpublic administration at the University of Peshawar. She studieddevelopment studies at theInternational Institute of Social Studies (ISS) ofErasmus University Rotterdam (EUR) inThe Hague,Netherlands.
She has worked as an international finance specialist at theAsian Development Bank (ADB) inIslamabad.[7][8]
Shahjahan's son, Sparlay Rawail, is a lead guitarist inKhumariyaan, aPashto music band.[9]
Shahjahan was born into aprogressive family that had supported the Pashtun leader,Abdul Ghaffar Khan (Bacha Khan), in hisnonviolentKhudai Khidmatgarresistance movement against theBritish Raj.[10] Shahjahan gained political consciousness since very early in her life. She started revolutionary politics as a university student leader in 1983, during the era ofZia-ul-Haq’s martial law, when there was ban on student unions. In 1986, she joined the left-wingDemocratic Students Federation (DSF),[10] and then theCommunist Party of Pakistan (CPP). She worked actively with theMuttahida Labour Federation (MLF). During her time with the CPP, she also established the provincial front of theDemocratic Women's Association (DeWA) in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (then known as theNorth-West Frontier Province).[10]
Shahjahan’s entire life revolved around progressive political struggle. She has remained part of democratic movements against anti-state oppression, dictatorships and anti-war campaigns.[11] Shahjahan is described as asocialist,feminist[12] and anti-imperialist.[13] Through her political ideologies and organizations, AWP and WDF, she aims to provide aid to the ignored societies of Pakistan by unifying their struggles. This includes the struggles of women, students, workers, peasants, and ethnic andreligious minorities. Throughout her political struggle, she remained on frontlines of the feminist struggle andclass struggle.
Shajahan played an important role in merger of three smaller leftist outfits (Labour Party, the Awami Party and theWorkers Party) to form a progressive forceAwami Workers Party in November, 2012[14] as a platform to rebuild the political Left. She is now the deputy general secretary[15] of the party and aims to promote progressive politics in Pakistan.
In 2014, as a feminist from the left wing politics, she, along with other party workers, drafted a document about guiding principles of the party’s position on issues central to the liberation of women. In the document, elimination of all economic, social and administrative structures was demanded, that lead to gender-based exploitation. It asked 33 percent representation of women in all units of the party.[16]
Shajahan contested for the2018 Pakistani general election on National assembly seat NA-54 in federal capital Islamabad.[17][3] Her electoral campaign included the vision to ensurekatchi abadis (informal settlements) get official land titles and to get water for Islamabad.Awami Workers Party is working since a long time on the issue. The party wants to legislate to provide them protection. She said, "Our support base is largely in the katchi abadis. Their women go to the rich houses to work as domestic help. Their children, especially girls, care for the children of the rich. I want these women to be recognised under the purview of the labour law. Their girls suffer a lot of sexual abuse at these big houses and it goes unreported.”[4]
Shahjahan is involved in building a socialist feminist movement, from the platform of theWomen Democratic Front.[10][18]She is serving as president of WDF which was founded after ‘Aurat Azadi March (2018)’,[19] being celebrated onInternational Women's Day, 2018 when a large number of working women, political workers, students and intellectuals gathered to inaugurate this organization.[20] During the Aurat Azadi March 2018, inIslamabad which was held from press club to Nazimud Din Road, Shahjahan as president WDF said that the Constitution calls for gender equality but the laws and policies of our country are based on discrimination, gender inequality and violence.[21]
Shahjahan's feminist organization WDF along with Awami Workers Party (AWP), Women Action Forum, Women’s Collective and Haqooq-e-Khalq Movement, Jammu and Kashmir Nationalist Students Front and other organizations also organizedAurat Azadi March, 2019 onInternational Women's Day, 2019.[22]
Shahjahan also took part in organizingAurat Azadi March 2020 in Islamabad despite facing threats from the right wing parties.[23][24][25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32] For Aurat Azadi March 2020, Shahjahan wrote the anthem song “Hum Inquilab Hain” (We are Revolution).[33][34] Shajahan got hit with a brick during Aurat Azadi March 2020 Islamabad by the religious extremists.[35][36] She along with other organizers of the march called press conference after the march and demanded from government to take action against those who attacked on march.[37][38][39]
ThePashtun Tahafuz Movement (PTM) emerged at the start of 2018 with marches demanding the end of extrajudicial executions and enforced disappearances committed by security forces against Pashtuns living in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and northern Balochistan along the border with Afghanistan.[40]
In May 2018, Shahjahan was nominated as a representative of the PTM's reconciliatoryjirga for negotiations with the state institutions.[41]
On 18 January 2019, a video surfaced in which a 13-year-old boy, Hayat Khan from Khaisor,North Waziristan, said Pakistani security forces had arrested his father and brother, and that his family had been facing harassment due to frequent visits by two security personnel to his home when he was the only male among the females present at home. On 27 January, Shahjahan visited Khaisor along with five other female PTM activists,Gulalai Ismail,Bushra Gohar,Jamila Gilani,Sanna Ejaz and Nargis Afsheen Khattak, to express solidarity with Hayat's mother and to also interview the local women about other incidents of sexual harassment.[42][43] Shahjahan said, "[dozens of] women came out of their homes when we visited them, pleaded and cried, and asked us to help them bring theirmissing sons back. We cried with them." Gulalai Ismail said that due to the bombing of their homes by the armed forces, "the mental health of women from thetribal areas has deteriorated so much that they cannot endure another day of war.”[44]
On 21 April 2018, a night before thePTM public gathering inLahore, the police arrested Shahjahan along with several other leading activists, including AWP presidentFanoos Gujjar and PTM leaderAli Wazir. As a result of protests in various parts of the country and a social media campaign for them, they were released within hours.[45][46] The arrests were criticized by the public and notable politicians, includingMaryam Nawaz,Pervaiz Rashid, andBilawal Bhutto Zardari.[47]
On 28 January 2020, Shahjahan and 28 other protesters, including PTM leaderMohsin Dawar andAmmar Rashid, were arrested by the police outside theNational Press Club inIslamabad, where they had gathered to stage a protest against the arrest of PTM chairmanManzoor Pashteen, who had been arrested inPeshawar a day earlier on allegations of sedition.[48] Shahjahan and Mohsin Dawar were released on 29 January but Ammar Rashid and 22 others were sent to jail on sedition charges. The protesters appealed to theIslamabad High Court where they were granted bail by chief justiceAthar Minallah on 3 February. Minallah summoned the Islamabad City Magistrate and asked an explanation for first placing sedition charges on peaceful protesters and later turning them into terrorism charges in thefirst information report. The charges were dropped against all 23 of them on 17 February.[49][50][51] Manzoor Pashteen was also released from jail on 25 February.[52]
She remained a publisher of the well-known progressive revolutionaryPashto journalLeekwal in 1992.[11] In 2018, she launched her own feminist-socialist magazine namedNariwad, from the platform of WDF, that highlights the importance of rights of women facing oppression and injustice.[53][54]
This article was created during ‘WikiGap’[55] event, inIslamabad, Pakistan on 11 and 12 October 2019. The event was organized by the Swedish Embassy, Pakistan.[56][57][58]
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