Heading home at 10:30 pm, after working 14 hours, Aliya rests her head on the window sill of the factory bus. As the evening sea breeze brushes against her haggard face, she doses off, embracing this brief respite from the reality of her life.

The raucous blare of a speeding truck wakes her up. Her bus stop is still a few minutes away. This is her daily routine.

Aliya Nasir, 34, mother of five children aged 5-12, works in a readymade garment factory. Her husband, Nasir Iqbal 40, is a drug abuser and has been unable to secure a regular employment. Therefore, for the last 14 years Aliya has been the breadwinner of the family. She earns Rs4,200/$70 a month. She is paid Rs16/26.6 cents per hour for the overtime which is not optional. "Whenever the need arises we are required to stay late", she told Dawn in a brief interview about her life as a semi-skilled worker.

The amazing part of the story is that with all the problems that she has Aliya is not bitter for she sees herself as a fortunate one amongst her equals. "My meagre salary is far less than the money required to cover even the very basic needs of my family but at least I have a regular income", she explained.

Aliya is right. She is lucky that she managed to join the economic mainstream. Most women in Pakistan are either not allowed, lack opportunities and in extreme cases are forced to work without a pay. Issues related to gender based disparity in wages, therefore, come later in a country where female population is still struggling to be allowed to work outside their homes for a salary.

Low female participation in formal economic activities can be traced to gender disparities in education. Also, there are socio-cultural and historic factors responsible for their comparative backwardness.

However, if after sixty years, women are deprived of their basic right to equal economic opportunity, the issue cannot be brushed aside as a legacy of the past. It is the responsibility of the government to ensure that all citizens are allowed and facilitated to partake in economic mainstream.

Besides, the women participation is not only an issue of gender disparity. Today in a modern competitive world it is an issue closely linked to the development potential in a country. With half of its able bodied workforce shut out, no country can hope to achieve what it can on the strength of efficient engagement of its full human capital in development efforts.

Sadly, successive governments proved to be negligent and insensitive. They treated women participation in economic mainstream as a soft issue without realising the consequences of keeping half the workforce on the sidelines. The current dispensation proved equally inept. With all the government claims of enlightened moderation and promotion of westernised images of Pakistani ladies in media, the country missed even the millennium development goal preferred target year of 2005 to achieve GPI (gender parity index) 1.0 in primary and secondary education. There are in fact reports that in certain districts in NWFP girl schools were closed down and parents of girl students were threatened against sending girls to schools.

As for a policy initiative to include women in economic mainstream there seems to be no integrated policy at hand to supervise a turn around. There are huge gaps in information regarding women economic life in the country.

The fact is that at sixty the country does not have a clue about the contribution made by its women population in the GDP. A recent paper, 'Draft policy study into economic empowerment of women in Pakistan and its linkages with competitiveness and economic growth' by the USAID funded government project, Competitive Support Fund highlights this fact: "the contribution of Pakistani women to GDP is possible and indeed should be undertaken. More relevant empirical data such as female labour productivity or number of women seeking to be employed must be documented".

This by no means implies that women have been sitting back home, all through last sixty years, waiting for the government to pull them into economic mainstream. Women are pushing ahead against all odds to follow their dreams. In most cases, however, economic compulsions push them out of their home and into the labour market. Lack of institutional support and lesser access to skill development facilities give them a disadvantaged start. Absence of child care centres force many young mothers to drop out or settle for job from home that are less paying.

Employers in many sectors such as garment stitching prefer women over male workers not only because they can handle the job better but also because they are more vulnerable and therefore cheaper. However, a sizable segment of women population, continue to live a life that given a chance they have both ability and willingness to improve.

Therefore if Pakistan stood second worse performer on the World Economic Forum's index on empowerment of women of 58 countries surveyed it hardly comes as a surprise. The forum sees a direct relationship between women empowerment and economic growth rates.

According to the survey, "during 1970-90 Asia Pacific economies recorded that a 1.96 per cent increase in GDP for every one per cent increase in women's participation in non-agricultural employment. Female economic participation in newly industrialised country's economic growth over three decades contributed 35-40 per cent of the annual GDP growth".

Several attempts to contact responsible government officers and public representatives in the women ministry to comment on the low ranking of Pakistan proved futile as both secretary and minister women affairs Ms Sumaira Malik are abroad on official visits attending some events. People in the labour ministry were either unwilling to own their comments or not available.

The analysis of world economic data of the past 30 years has demonstrated that rate of progress is higher in countries where women's contribution of GDP is higher (41.5 per cent in South Korea, 55.5 per cent in Vietnam and 60.2 per cent in China).

Current political scenario is too engaging to spare government time to reassess its policies regarding women empowerment, make corrections or fashion a more suitable policy response to the deep seated problems such as low women participation that the country is faced with.

If, however, the government makes a genuine attempt to support women in their endeavour to become financially independent by special allocations in the budget, it can win itself some supporters in an election year.