ISLAMABAD: “In a country where a father forgives his son for killing his own sister in the name of honour – when both had planned the murder together – how can we not need a bill that will protect the rights of women,” columnist Khursheed Nadeem rhetorically asked on Saturday.

He was speaking at a discussion on the recently-passed Punjab Women’s Protection Bill where experts had gathered to discuss why religious parties were opposing the bill and whether they had any right to do so.

Mr Nadeem opened the discussion by saying that religious parties seemed to think that women should be content with whatever rights were given to them by men.

He asked the panellists why religious parties opposed measures to empower women, and whether there was anything against Islamic culture in asking for legislation to protect women.

Justice Nasira Iqbal dispels myth of male superiority; audience boos CII member

Council of Islamic Ideology (CII) member Samia Qazi responded, saying the council had spent four days deliberating on the bill and had decided that it was not completely un-Islamic. She said that the council acknowledged that there was domestic violence in the country and it did not want to ignore such issues.

However, she also noted that the respect women were given in the majority of households should also be highlighted.

She then followed this up by saying that Pakistanis needed to also look at the other side of the picture; at the “beautiful relationships” that exist within Pakistan’s family system, and contended that the bill would only serve to break them apart.

Ms Qazi said the CII was more concerned about not alienating men and women from each another, adding that the bill wanted to turn homes into boarding houses, where people had no real connections with one another.

“To free men and women from one another is to make women even more vulnerable,” she maintained. Justice Nasira Iqbal pointed out that the notion that men and women were not equal in Islam came from a verse of the Holy Quran, which said that men were women’s protectors.

“What do you say about men who are supported by their wives, but still abuse their spouses because they think they are the protectors,” she asked, adding that Islam gave women the right to retain whatever she earned.

“Men go and get a power of attorney and are then in control of whatever their wives earn. Is this not un-Islamic,” she asked.

About objections to the women’s protection bill from religious leaders, she said: “They think they are the only Muslims. Are we not Muslims? Are those who drafted the bill not Muslim?”

Scholar Arfa Sayeda Zehra said that it had become a trend for people to be divided on nearly all issues, “but we should not be divided when it comes to human rights”.

Talking about the objections raised by religions leaders, who said the law would damage relationships, Ms Zehra said: “Laws are made for humans, not for relationships. If humans are hurt by relationships, they should be ended.”

Director Lok Virsa Fouzia Saeed said that the protection of women is now a devolved subject and that asking the prime minister to intervene and take the Punjab bill back, like many of its opponents have, is going against the constitution.

“Any political party which is not part of the Punjab Assembly also does not have a right to interfere in this matter,” she said.

But the CII member invoked the audience’s ire when she said, in response to a question, that religious leaders were not against women and that their wives were among some of the happiest women in the country.

Upon hearing this, the audience began to boo Ms Qazi and, at this point, the moderator had to step in to end the session.

Published in Dawn, April 17th, 2016