KARACHI: National Commission on the Status of Women (NCSW) chairperson Nilofar Bakhtiar called a consultation meeting here on Wednesday to listen to suggestion from civil society and the media ahead of launching the commission’s strategic plan.

She also said that from Nov 25, they will begin a 16-day global activism drive.

The meeting was organised in collaboration with the European Union-funded Huqooq-e-Pakistan Project (HeP).

Speaking on the occasion, she said that the NCSW had already carried out several such consultations across the country and Sindh was her second-last stop before she heading to seek suggestions from the people, and especially the women, of Azad Jammu & Kashmir.

During her visit to Karachi, she said that she held meetings with the Sindh Governor Imran Ismail Leader of the Opposition in the Sindh Assembly Haleem Adil Sheikh.

Role of media in empowering women and strengthening the commission on women status discussed

She also met with women parliamentarians focused on issues in the implementation of women laws as well as pro-women legislation. Besides that, she visited the Karachi central prison as well as the Darul Aman and safe houses.

NCSW dedicated to promote gender equality

“When I went to women police stations, I realised that they are still where they were in 2005. Back then many of them didn’t know how to file FIRs and they are still stuck at that level,” she lamented.

While seeking the views of participants in the consultation session about women’s rights, she also briefed a bit about their work.

“We are only a statutory body exclusively dedicated to promoting gender equality and empowerment of women. Our vision for the next three years includes looking at cases of violence against women, working towards economic empowerment of women and political empowerment of women. We are committed to representing the diverse voices of women across every district in Pakistan as we work towards gender equality in the public and private spheres,” she said.

Further plans for the future include establishing an inquiry committee for reporting harassment cases. She also discussed the role media could play in empowering women and strengthening the commission.

“At the moment, we are only 49 people although our approved strength is 101. So you can say that we are working on half strength. We need image-building, too. We want to show that we are here to work for women, and we want to bring together all people working for women,” she said.

She also said that they wanted to launch a media fellowship programme for 40 journalists to teach them gender sensitisation. “And then they can train others in their respective organisations,” she added.

Awareness campaigns suggested

Among the suggestions received by her were starting awareness campaigns to tell people, especially women about laws that are there and about which they don’t even know, continuing the conversation on women and their issues instead of only just bringing it up on Women’s Day, empowering daughters, highlighting prominent or promising female personalities for their work and bringing them forward as role models, also writing laws in Urdu so that they reach a wider audience and coming up with one helpline with a number that one can easily remember such as ‘786’, ‘111’ or ‘123’.

Nuzhat Shirin, chairperson of the Sindh Commission on the Status of Women, NCSW’s secretary Asif Anwar Baloch, Dr Habiba Hasan, Barrister Haya Emaan Zahid of Legal Aid Society and Seema Jaffer, executive director Huqooq-e-Pakistan also spoke.

Published in Dawn, October 7th, 2021