LAHORE: In a well-attended session titled, Literature as Resistance, renowned author and journalist Mohammed Hanif and Prof Shaista Sonnu Sirajuddin explored different aspects of literature on Friday on the inaugural day of ThinkFest.

The session was more of a conversation between the two speakers. Ms Sirajuddin gave a brief introduction of Hanif, saying that his broadcast in Punjabi from BBC was of great interest for many as he conveyed his thoughts to the ordinary people in a very cool and impressive manner. She said perhaps as author Hanif found an escape from the stress of journalism and started writing fiction.

To a question, Mr Hanif said he had had his schooling at military school system but ended up in civilian life. He held in high esteem his teacher who was also his editor, Razia Bhatti. He said Ms Bhatti told him how to tell a story, where to place sentences to create the effect of the story. In a lighter vein, he said Bhatti used to tell him that the media had never been free; perhaps that’s why the journalist Hanif later started writing novels.

Ms Sirajuddin lauded Hanif for using wonderful metaphors and phrases. She said in his novels names of different characters were also of great significance such as Teddy Butt and Joseph Bhatti, and added that he used cinematic images in his novels, caricature in description with extremely interesting characters.

While talking about literature as resistance, Hanif mentioned Junaid Hafeez who had to Lahore for study, he was studying medicine here but he also started doing poetry, he read one of the poems of Junaid Hafeez. He said Hafeez was arrested and sentenced to death.

Sirajuddin further threw light on Hanif’s writings, saying that Hanif used comedy as a weapon, a tradition that went back to the Greeks. She also mentioned Hanif’s book, Red Birds, and the book drew experiences about flying. She read out excerpts from Red Birds.

CHILD MARRIAGE: In a session on ‘Child Protection and Interventions against Early Marriage in Pakistan’, was held at Afkar-e-Taza ThinkFest happening at Alhamra in which speakers explored various expects of child marriage in Pakistan.

Jennifer Malton from Unicef said: “80pc children in Pakistan experience violence, 26m children are out of school, eight million are engaged in child labour. A strong legal framework is there but there are gaps in it”. She talked about child abuse and how could we improve things to protect children from abuse. She added that children were very important and it was important to listen to the wishes and thoughts of children. Children need quality education, quality nutritional food, she said academia and students should amplify the children’s voice.

Justin Jones from Oxford talked about child marriage, saying that according to statistics, 21pc women were married off as a child in Sindh, southern Punjab, KP and some parts of Balochistan. He added that the outcome of such marriages were negative and domestic violence attached with child marriages. He underlined the need to have a second look at birth registration process when it comes to child marriage he also discussed the negative role of Nikah Khawn and the registrar in child marriages.

Sara Malkani, a lawyer from Karachi, explained the legal framework around child marriage, saying that Sindh was the first province that brought the change in age system as earlier marriage could take place when boy was 18 and girl was 16 and the bar for girl was also changed to 18.

Later, other provinces, though late, also followed this age bracket. She said when it comes child marriage law, its implementation in Sindh was very weak . She said many minor girls were entering into marriage of their choice as they eloped with minor boys. She stressed that rethinking legal frame work was important.

Muhammad Faisal Khalil from Oxford also discussed the negative role of Nikah Khawans and registrar in the case of child marriages. He said the birth registration rate was very low and not much was invested into children and old people.

Published in Dawn, January 24th, 2026