100 Women Who Shake Pakistan

[Xeric]

http://www.newsweekpakistan.com/features/270

100 Women Who Shake Pakistan


From the March 21‚ 2011‚ issue


They make up almost half of Pakistan's population of 180 million, but are rarely given the space and coverage they deserve. From Fatima Jinnah to Rana Liaquat Ali Khan to Benazir Bhutto, Pakistan has produced some very remarkable women. Today, they are bankers, businesswomen, activists, artists, sport stars. From a pool of almost 350 women, here's our list of the 100 women who matter most.

THE SHAKERS


Roshaneh Zafar

Inspired by Nobel laureate Dr. Muhammad Yunus's work at Grameen Bank, Roshaneh Zafar, 42, ditched her World Bank career to set up Kashf Foundation, Pakistan's first microfinance institution, in 1996. She started with a $10,000 loan from the Grameen Trust, Rs. 100,000 of her own, and 15 clients. Today, Kashf has more than 306,000 clients, and has disbursed more than $202 million in small loans to poor women. Kashf made Forbes's list of the world's top microfinance institutions in 2007, and U.S. President Barack Obama acknowledged her work at the inaugural Presidential Summit on Entrepreneurship last year. "The women I meet tell me, 'don't tell us about water sanitation projects, tell us how to earn a living," Zafar says. In setting up Kashf, she moved away from conventional development projects to help women finance their own empowerment.


Bilquis Edhi
One of Pakistan's most respected social workers, runs the Edhi Trust with her husband

Aafia Siddiqui
Neuroscientist convicted by a U.S. court for attempted murder is the cause célèbre for Pakistan's Islamists



Aamna Taseer
In tragedy, she showed Pakistan what grace and dignity look like. Punjab's former first lady now runs her late husband's business empire



Sherry Rehman
The Incredible Sherry
Journalist turned politician turned conscience of the nation, she is the most important voice in a country gripped in darkness



Sultana Siddiqui
The director and producer also owns HUM TV, a popular women's cable channel



Bushra Aitzaz
Activist, businesswoman, and chief of the women's cricket board




Kiran Baluch
Set highest test score record in women's cricket


Rubina Feroze Bhatti
Fights for the rights of women victimized by violence


Abida Parveen
Globally renowned Sufi vocalist with over 20 albums


Um-e-Hassan

She shows us the Jamia Hafsa still lives

Um-e-Hassan, the wife of Lal Masjid's chief cleric, Maulana Abdul Aziz, came to national prominence four years ago as head of Jamia Hafsa, the mosque's seminary for women which was leading the charge to have Shariah laws imposed in Pakistan. The protests and actions of the burqa-clad students in Islamabad got the attention of the world—and the Army. At least 84 lives were lost when commandos finally stormed the Lal Masjid compound in July 2007. A native of Rawalpindi, Hassan cites the Prophet Mohammed (Peace Be Upon Him) and his wives Khadija and Ayesha as inspirations. She began religious instruction for women shortly after her marriage to Aziz in 1985. "Women are very important because they have the most influence on their children," she told Newsweek Pakistan. "For a good society, you need to work hard on the education of women." Hassan says she imparts a positive message to women in her lessons, "Women shouldn't think they have no role in society. They are wives, sisters, mothers, daughters." Hassan says she has never urged any of her followers toward violence, and that the reform of society is the responsibility of religious scholars operating with the authority of the state. One model, she says, is the Saudi religious police, the Mutaween. "When we see injustice and wrong in society," Hassan says, "it is our duty to at least point it out and tell people that this is wrong. This was our position back then, and this is our position now."


Carla Khan
Pro-squash player continues the Khan legacy


Ruth Pfau
Fights to eradicate leprosy in Pakistan


Nabila Maqsood
Stylish and smart, the fashionista has made a career out of making other people look hot


Bapsi Sidhwa
Doyenne of South Asian English lit is still going strong

Jehan Ara
Leading software development in Pakistan




Naseem Hameed
South Asia's fastest woman and endorsements' queen


Bunto Kazmi
Fashion designer shows modern sensibility with traditional styles


Shazia Marri

Energy czarina

Married at 14 and divorced by 16, Sindh's first ever minister for energy, oil, and gas doesn't show it, but she's had to overcome plenty of challenges. The poised and articulate Marri, 38, was roped into politics by Benazir Bhutto, and has electrified us.






Aasia Noreen
Her plight has inspired thousands to question controversial laws


Ameena Saiyid
The power behind Oxford University Press in Pakistan


Dr. Rufina Soomro
Helps cancer patients feel normal with low-cost breast prosthetics


Dr. Feriha Peracha
Runs Sabaoon to deprogram children brainwashed by the Taliban


Jugnu Mohsin
Publisher of Pakistan's first independent weekly is also the country's most powerful humorist


Sajida Zulfiqar
Established successful furniture business despite Taliban threat


Ayesha Jalal
Tufts professor is top South Asian history scholar


Nigar Ahmad
As a founder of Aurat Foundation, she has been key in getting women's voices heard


Asma Jahangir
Nothing scares dictators and demagogues more than this brave, rabble rousing, SCBAP president and human rights activist


Sara Suleri
Meatless Days author and Yale prof


Sana Mir

She raised the bar for cricket

The 25-year-old led the Pakistan women's cricket team that won gold at the Guangzhou Asian Games, and the hearts of a nation craving sporting success. "We will have this medal for the next 4 years, I want to enjoy that," she told Newsweek Pakistan. She is the top rated Pakistani player, and among the top 20 best bowlers in the world.




Nergis Mavalvala
Astrophysicist imparts her knowledge to new crop at MIT


Shamshad Akhtar
The first woman to head the State Bank, Akhtar now runs the World Bank's MENA operations


Rukhsana Bangash
Don't let her low-key demeanor mislead you, President Zardari's political secretary is the one who keeps things moving along


Shahnaz Wazir Ali
The educator and philanthropist is also the architect of the Benazir Income Support Programme


Aseefa Bhutto Zardari
The youngest of Benazir Bhutto and Asif Ali Zardari's children has been the face of the anti-polio campaign since she was born


Yasmin Rehman
Key voice on the powerful Public Accounts Committee


Shafqat Sultana
President, First Women Bank


Fehmida Mirza
The first woman speaker of Parliament in the Muslim world


Fauzia Gilani
The industrious first lady is a political operator and a leading businesswoman


Asiya Nasir

Pakistan woke up to Asiya Nasir after her hard hitting speech in the National Assembly following the assassination on March 2 of minorities minister Shahbaz Bhatti. Representing the orthodox Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam (Fazl), the 39-year-old Christian M.P. left teaching to enter politics in 2002. We're glad she did.






Kulsoom Nawaz
The former first lady wowed us all by her courage after her husband's government was overthrown in a coup


Nasreen Kasuri
Her self-started education empire now sprawls continents


Shaista Wahidi
Replaces Nadia Khan as face of GEO TV and Pakistan's Oprah


Salima Hashmi
Painter, curator, gallery owner, she is the face of modern Pakistani art


Samar Minallah
Her video of a young woman being flogged in Swat turned public opinion firmly against the Taliban


Shazia Sikandar
The New York-based modern miniature artist has shown at every major gallery worth in its salt


Shirin Tahir-Kheli
The former adviser to George W. Bush got Pakistan and India talking again


Sonya Jehan
Telecom's most attractive mascot


Souriya Anwar
Founder of and indefatigable spirit behind Pakistan's SOS Villages


Syeda Hina Babar Ali
When she's not busy running Packages, one of Pakistan's largest business groups, she's writing poetry


Nafis Sadik
Internationally renowned, her efforts as the U.N. special envoy for HIV/AIDS in Asia have helped stem the disease in the region


Ghulam Sugra
The Sindhi activist has gained new popularity after recieving the International Women of Courage Award from Hillary Clinton and Michelle Obama


Madeeha Gauhar
The Lahore-based writer opened an outlet for human rights activisim when she launched Ajoka Theatre under Gen. Zia


Maj. Gen. Shahida Malik
Pakistan's first woman to make a two-star general marked a new era in women's rights


Maria Toor Pakay
The squash wunderkind is making Pakistan proud


Nighat Said Khan
One of the founding members of Women's Action Forum, she doubles as a talented filmmaker


Mukhtar Mai

She turned a horrible tragedy into a triumph of the human spirit. Gang raped in 2002 at the orders of a tribal jirga, Mai, 39, has fought a long and tough battle to get those who assaulted her convicted. Along the way, she founded a school and authored the best-selling In the Name of Honour. Today, Mai, who is herself illiterate, is working to ensure every girl in her village gets an education.




Rubab Raza
Only 13 when she qualified for the Summer Olympics in 2004, Rubab has a bright career ahead of her


Hina Tahir
Pakistan's first female fighter pilot


Sabiha Sumar
The award-winning Independent filmmaker has dedicated herself to social change through film


Saima Mohsin
Freelance journalist who often reports on Pakistan for PBS and ITV


Salma Maqbool
Co-founder of Pakistan Foundation Fighting Blindness has made it her mission to ensure no one else suffers her affliction


Samina Qureshi
The award-winning author has toured the world, bringing the beauty of Pakistan with her


Zubaida Tariq
Food and homemaking guru


Reema
Lollywood actress reinvents herself as savvy talk-show host


Kishwar Naheed
Veteran columnist still going strong after four decades


Juggan Kazim
Ubiquitous cherub-faced model and actress


Mehrbano Sethi
With her Luscious Cosmetics, the Estée Lauder of Pakistan


Marvi Memon
Parliamentarian and twitter queen


Sanam Marvi
Folk and sufi singer sets her own tone


Huma Abedin
Aide to Hillary Clinton is Pakistani on her mother's side


Sania Mirza
Tennis pro has been welcomed by Pakistanis as their own


Seema Aziz
CARE Foundation founder proves that philanthropy can make a difference


Shandana Khan
The Rural Support Program Network CEO focuses on the grassroots


Shazia Ahmed
Leader of the first four female fighter pilots trained by Pakistan's Air Force


Reshma
Legendary folk singer


Samina Ghurki
The only PPP leader with a safe National Assembly seat from Lahore


Nafisa Shah

She was among 1,000 women nominated for the 2005 Nobel Peace Prize. Encouraged to enter politics by the late Benazir Bhutto she excelled as the mayor of Sindh's Khairpur district and is currently a Pakistan Peoples Party member of the National Assembly.







Faryal Talpur
The first sister is running the day-to-day of the country's largest party


Tehmina Daultana
PMLN pol has nerves of steel, and a sense of humor


Tina Sani
No one can put Faiz's verse to song quite like her


Meera
Lollywood siren lives in the headlines and in our hearts


Samia Raheel Qazi
Heads the women's wing of Jamaat-e-Islami, the largest religio-political party


Zareen Khalid
Pakistan's original event planner


Spenta Kandawalla
The U.S. Secretary of State's former classmate is a business mogul in her own right


Farhat Hashmi

She established Al-Huda International in 1994. Since then, Hashmi has been the favored proselytizer of the ladies-who-lunch crowd in Lahore, Islamabad, and Karachi. She has a Ph.D. in Islamic Studies from the University of Glasgow—and in converting women to Al-Huda's brand of Islamic conservatism. "I just translate the word of God," she told filmmaker Sharmeen Obaid Chinoy in an interview. So if people have a problem with her, she said, "they have a problem with God."


Tahera Hasan
Founding member of KaraFilm Festival maintains a healthy law practice for entertainment industry


Farzana Bari
Human rights campaigner


Bano Qudsia
Novelist and playwright was awarded the Hilal-e-Imtiaz in 2010


Maryam Bibi

Since founding Khwendo Kor, which means "sister's home", a nongovernmental organization, in 1993, she's been struggling for funding. "Big donors like big projects," she told Newsweek Pakistan. They don't seem to find her organization's sharply focused work with internally-displaced women and children headline worthy. But, luckily, Bibi is trucking along just fine. "It is the poorest of the poor women who inspire me to keep working."


Nahid Siddiqui
Kathak dancer introduced her skill to universities across the world


Nazish Ataullah
Printmaker and social activist


Tehmina Durrani
Author and activist


Samina Ahmed
South Asia project director at International Crisis Group


Samina Khan
Sungi head is working on several development projects


Ronak Lakhani
Tech wiz also runs the Special Olympics


Nusrat Jamil
Author, rights activist and dynamo


Marriana Karim
Raises funds for several charities and runs a kidney center


Madiha Sattar
Journalist


Veena Malik
Spark and Provocateur

She says she is 27. Veena Malik, the actor, comedienne, and cultural lightning rod, says and does a lot of things that prompt a double take and require suspension of disbelief. Pakistanis remember her from such hits as "cricketer Muhammad Asif stole my heart—and my money!"; "Meera should watch her back"; and, of course, last year's Bigg Boss on Indian television that had Pakistan—and India—aghast, more because of her desperate determination to hog the spotlight rather than anything real saucy or salacious. For the finale, after she was voted out of the Bigg Boss house, Malik appeared on Frontline with Kamran Shahid in Pakistan taking on a mullah in a highly scripted, and spirited, performance that had Pakistan's pathetic Internet liberals hailing her as their new hero. The debate surrounding Malik's TV antics have served to further confirm the poverty of the liberal elite and the hypocrisy of the religious right. It has also shown Malik to be a savvy entertainer in this age of guns and Gaga. "I'm not one of those you can malign and get away with it," Malik told Newsweek Pakistan. "If people think they can because I'm a woman, they're mistaken." Malik was last seen on India's World Cup-related show, Bigg Toss. Veena, vidi, vici, indeed.

 

[FreekiN]

Veena Malik xD

 

[Gandhi G in da house]

How did sania mirza make it to that list .

Last i saw her she was winning games for India .

Don't mean to be harsh or anything but isnt this thread about proud pakistani women ?

 

[Imran Khan]

How did sania mirza make it to that list .

Last i saw her she was winning games for India .

Don't mean to be harsh or anything but isnt this thread about proud pakistani women ?

we own her by hacking her .lol

yes you are right she is indian.

 

[Xeric]

The list expands upon Sherry like this:

The Incredible Sherry

The Incredible Sherry

In a country battling dark times, Sherry Rehman gives hope, and courage.

By Fasih Ahmed | From the March 21, 2011, issue

It’s no coincidence that Sherry Rehman’s mango-colored, Raj-era house in Karachi’s Old Clifton sits close to Fatima Jinnah’s. Like the sister of Pakistan’s founding father, Sherry—whose Westernized diminutive is derived from Shehrbano, a classical Persian name that means “princess”—has devoted her life to her country. As a journalist, author, and (for a decade now) politician, the elegant 50-year-old has seen and suffered violence without yielding to the temptation of an easier life.

It has been a bleak year so far for Pakistan, even by its own harrowing standards. Salmaan Taseer, governor of the Punjab, was assassinated by his own fanatical security guard in January, and minorities minister Shahbaz Bhatti, the only Christian in Pakistan’s government, was gunned down earlier this month by the Punjabi Taliban. Like them, Rehman has urged a review of the country’s blasphemy laws to prevent their misuse. Like them, Rehman had stood up for protecting minorities as well as vulnerable Muslims in Pakistan. Last November, after Taseer took up the cause of Aasia Noreen, a Christian mother of five sentenced to death for blasphemy, Rehman put forth a bill in Parliament to amend the controversial laws.

The jihadists were outraged by Rehman’s move. She was anathematized at high-octane Islamist rallies and burned in effigy. A cleric at a major mosque in an Army-run neighborhood in her hometown of Karachi issued a fatwa, declaring her wajib-ul-qatl, or fit to be killed. The Tanzeem-e-Islami, an organization devoted to an “Islamic renaissance through the revolutionary process,” pamphleteered against her for “provoking the religious honor of the Muslims of Pakistan.” A lawsuit in Lahore seeks her dismissal from Parliament. The charges against her are outlandish, but passions in Pakistan are running dangerously, even insanely, high.

“That call to emotion, ‘if you’re not with us, then you’re not really a good Muslim,’ instills fear in many hearts,” said Rehman in an interview with Newsweek at her house, where she lives with her daughter, husband, and mother. “It has rattled the religious right that many of us have read chapter and verse of the Quran, as well as the sayings of the Prophet (peace be upon him), and we make our arguments in Parliament and on television on the basis of that.” She is well versed about Islam, but does not wear her faith on her sleeve, as many women in public life here are expected to as proof of their piety and domesticity. Ultimately, she says, there will have to be a new middle ground.

“There has to be a much more tolerant Pakistan because everyday issues are sweeping up people’s lives, and those everyday issues are structured in inequalities that are getting more and more aggravated and deep. And when that happens, your passions inflame much easier.” The religious right has used Pakistan’s social fragmentation to inflame passions on issues that are framed in religious or theological terms in order to control the political agenda. “It’s not as if Pakistan does not have major structural and economic problems, and we really need to focus on those in the days ahead,” she says.

Rehman, who has largely been keeping to her Karachi home because of the security threat, met with Bhatti at the National Assembly a week before his assassination. “He was understandably very upset and frustrated. He said he was going to go to Lahore and address issues of religious intolerance at public meetings, but the Raymond Davis issue had added to the flames in the street,” she says, referring to the CIA contractor on trial for killing two Pakistani men. “He knew that blasphemy and anti-Americanism have become one deliberate and unfortunate conflation, and that was not good for anyone.”

Bhatti was killed on March 2 in Islamabad outside his mother’s house. His assassins have warned that they will target other members of the ruling Pakistan Peoples Party—whose ideology preaches a tolerance that is derided by its critics as secularism, a word that carries an increasingly pejorative charge in Pakistan. Speaking in Parliament the day after Bhatti’s assassination, interior minister Rehman Malik identified the targets that the Tehrik-e-Taliban have in their sights. “I am at No. 1, Sherry is at No. 2, and Fauzia Wahab [an M.P.] is at No. 3,” he said. “Next time, you may not find me here,” he added.

Precautions would seem to make sense. In February 2007 Rehman was hospitalized after being attacked at a rally in Karachi against Gen. Pervez Musharraf, then president of Pakistan. Three months later, she was caught in an ambush when Musharraf loyalists opened fire in various parts of the city to disrupt a protest against the sacking of the country’s chief justice, an opponent of Musharraf. The clashes claimed at least 42 lives. That October she survived the attack on former prime minister Benazir Bhutto’s homecoming procession in Karachi—at 136 dead, this was Pakistan’s most brutal suicide bombing. “Those kinds of experiences, the kind of fire you walk through, sharpen your resolve to at least stay centered,” says Rehman. It was Bhutto who persuaded Rehman to join her Pakistan Peoples Party. “One day she rang me in London and said, ‘Sherry, have you registered your vote?’ I said, ‘Of course. Do I look like a nonvoter to you?’ ” When they met in London, Bhutto asked her to accept a party seat in the Senate. “She was a force of nature. How could you ever say anything but yes to her?”

In 2002, Rehman became one of 60 women who had seats reserved in Parliament, the result of an affirmative-action initiative to enhance the woefully small number of female legislators. “I think it revolutionized the discourse,” she says of the reserved seats. “It’s women who always tackle the difficult, head-on challenges—always the women.” Rehman is not one to shy away from a good challenge. As a legislator, she has often had to reach across the aisle to push for laws against domestic violence and sexual harassment, and for amendments to the country’s rape laws, which stack the deck against the victims. “In the last assembly I was constantly battling women’s issues,” she says. “The main work I do is national security. That doesn’t usually draw this kind of controversy; it’s safe work.” Jinnah Institute, the think tank she founded in 2000, focuses on regional peace and security matters.

When Rehman became the country’s first woman information minister in March 2008, she introduced a bill to remove restrictions placed on the media during the last days of the Musharraf regime, and she has authored a right-to-information bill that will force greater official transparency if signed into law. She made an in-camera presentation on national security to a joint session of Parliament; this was novel in a country where women, who make up almost half the country’s population of 180 million, are almost never taken seriously on security matters. In April 2009, she made an impassioned plea, urging Parliament not to abandon the northern district of Swat to the Taliban. The appeasement of the Taliban backfired, as she had feared it would. The Army had to be sent in, and the military operation to flush the Taliban out of Swat created the world’s largest population of internally displaced persons.

Through it all, Rehman kept her party colleagues on message, and maintained her cool despite provocations from opposition M.P.s, news anchors, and smear campaigns through anonymous mass text messages. Rehman was one of President Asif Ali Zardari’s closest advisers and, for most Pakistanis, an important face of his government. After she resigned from office in March 2009 (in protest against the government’s disruption of TV channels critical of it), she was also removed as her party’s information secretary. Now, after the recent assassinations, the party has pulled together. “The PPP is still the most tolerant party for women and minorities, and at times when Pakistan faces serious crises, we stand by each other,” says Rehman. The government is providing security cover to her.

In Karachi, Rehman is now deluged with visitors concerned for her safety, many of them begging her to leave the country. “It already bothers me that I’m not at the rallies and the vigils. The least I can do is not walk away from this,” she says. “What is a life worth living? What is there left for me to protect forever? If I go away, I’ll always be anxious about what I did, what is happening at home, and what I left behind.”

But things may already be changing. Conservatives like ex-prime minister Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain and cricketer turned politician Imran Khan share Rehman’s position that the abuse of the blasphemy laws must be prevented. Maulana Fazlur Rehman of the orthodox Sunni Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam, a former coalition partner, also seems to have come around. “This is not about constitutionalism or secularism, this is about having laws that conform to the Quran,” says Rehman. “Injustice is not something we need to show tolerance for.”

The narrative of lost hope, she says, is a tired one. “We will not be able to turn back the tide of militancy with only military means. Extremism will have to be challenged now, especially when it takes a murderous turn. Pakistan must not be allowed to turn into a country where a person is killed for their beliefs,” she says. “This is not who we are, either as citizens or Muslims.”

With ANAM MANSURI in Karachi and JAHANZEB ASLAM in Lahore.

 

[President Camacho]

Off topic.

 

[mehru]

Two women should not be on the list.

First Sania Mirza as she is an Indian.

Second one is Um-e-Hassan. She is Pakistani though but she is the face of an extremist Pakistani woman. Nothing to be proud of. The way she tried to "reform society" is still fresh in my mind.

My favourites are Asma Jahangir and Sherry Rehman.

 

[Xeric]

Two women should not be on the list.

First Sania Mirza as she is an Indian.

Second one is Um-e-Hassan. She is Pakistani though but she is the face of an extremist Pakistani woman. Nothing to be proud of. The way she tried to "reform society" is still fresh in my mind.

The list contain those women who 'shake' Pakistan both positively and vice versa.

My favourites are Asma Jahangir and Sherry Rehman.

Sherry is guud. Asma? Well you sure have surprised me.

 

[Kompromat]

Apart from veena malik the list is pretty impressive - lol @ veena the booky

 

[mehru]

The list contain those women who 'shake' Pakistan both positively and vice versa.

Sherry is guud. Asma? Well you sure have surprised me.

I certainly admire their work. Asma is certainly not likable but she has done a lot of work.

 

[DV RULES]

My favourites are Asma Jahangir and Sherry Rehman.

Well, it is your choice and i admire it but they have nothing to be respected for someone's favorite (In my point of view).

 

[Myth_buster_1]

I laughed when i glimpsed at this list. I mean seriously is this all what pakistan can offer? Bunch of corrupt female politicians, NGOs and handful of socialist and religious workers.
I think Pak Military female officers are doing way better job then most of the above list.