Claiming Their Space: Muslim Women-led Networks and the Women’s Movement in India

The Shah Bano case of the 1980s was a landmark in the discourse on ‘Muslim women’s rights’ in India. At this time, however, few Muslim women actually participated in the debates, which were dominated by male religious leaders and politicians or by ‘secular’ women’s groups, which had scant Muslim representation. Since the 1980s several Muslim-women led organisations have emerged in urban areas across the country, some of which have formed networks to advocate for Muslim women’s rights. This article looks at the emergence of two networks in particular, the Muslim Women’s Rights Network (MWRN) and the Bharatiya Muslim Mahila Andolan (BMMA), both of which were established during the last ten years. These networks have different but overlapping ideological bases, priorities and strategies. They both aim to challenge the authority of the Muslim religious leadership, represented by institutions such as the All India Muslim Personal Law Board. They also offer a critique of the mainstream women’s movement, either from within the movement or from outside, as not having given sufficient space to the perspectives of women from marginalized communities. Both networks are engaged in struggles to reformulate power relations at the local and national levels, thus challenging the dominant conception of Muslim women as a passive, homogenous group with a common set of interests. Rather, the MWRN and the BMMA demonstrate new forms of political agency and are creating a space for a conceptualisation of identities that complicates the dichotomy between religious and gender-based interests and aims to reconcile the two in a manner that protects and promotes women’s rights without denying the importance of religious identity

Re?thinking the Promotion of Women's Rights through Islam in India

Religiously framed approaches to women's rights advocacy, which include those that utilise religious discourses or work through religious leaders and institutions, have increasingly been adopted by a variety of actors, particularly in Muslim contexts. While the use of such approaches may often be an effective means of advocating for reform of laws on women's rights that are founded on principles deriving from religious jurisprudence, there remains a need for critical analysis of such engagements. This article examines the experiences of two Muslim women's rights networks in India, the Muslim Women's Rights Network and the Bharatiya Muslim Mahila Andolan, both of which have attempted to work with religious institutions and through religious framings in order to secure women's matrimonial rights. This case study highlights both the possibilities and limitations of adopting religiously framed approaches and argues that the strategies of women's rights advocates must be grounded within political and social realities without being either essentialist or exclusionary

The role of faith in the charity and development sector in Karachi and Sindh, Pakistan

'Faith-based organizations'(FBOs) are gaining increasing attention in development circles amongst practitioners, funders and policy-makers, as well as academics. There has been some discussion of the meaning of the term 'FBO' in academic circles, but little empirical research has been conducted on how the term is defined in different contexts. In addition, especially in developing countries, there is little research on what kinds of FBOs actually exist, and how they approach and either contribute to or hinder processes of development. Futhermore, little is known about how, if at all, these organizations differ from 'secular' non-governmental organizations (NGOs). This report explores how 'faith-based organizations' are understood and operate in the Pakistani context, with a focus on Karachi and Sindh

Mobility and Urban Conflict: A Study of Lyari, Karachi

This paper […] focuses more closely on the transregional impacts of conflicts on local residents, most of whom are not themselves personally involved in these conflicts. For young Baloch men struggling to survive within Karachi, urban conflicts make their everyday lives all the more difficult. Faced with multiple forms of insecurity including physical, economic and social insecurity, these young men must tactically navigate multiple social and spatial boundaries in their everyday lives. For some of these men, migration to Iran or the Gulf presents itself as the best possible option in order to escape a city that they feel has become hostile to them. Therefore, urban conflicts had contradictory impacts on men’s mobility. While the conflict restricted the mobility of young, Baloch men within the city in a variety of ways, it also increased mobility, at least for some, across national borders. Therefore, in order to be properly understood, both the causes and consequences of urban conflicts such as those taking place in Lyari should be viewed through a transregional lens as the product of multiple forms of mobility

Predictors of neurocognition outcomes in children and young people with primary brain tumor presenting to tertiary care hospitals of Karachi, Pakistan: A prospective cohort study

Introduction: Primary brain tumors are a common cause of morbidity and mortality in children and young people (CYP) globally. Impaired neurocognitive function is a potential severe consequence in primary brain tumor (PBT) survivors. There are no in-depth studies from low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) to inform management and follow-up. The research questions of this study were as follows: Are the sociodemographic factors (lower age of CYP, female gender, low socioeconomic status, low parental education), disease-related factors (high grade of tumor, presence of seizures, presence of hydrocephalous), and treatment-related factors (adjuvant therapy, no surgical intervention, post-treatment seizures, placement of shunts) associated with decline in neurcognition outcomes 12 months post-treatment in CYP with PBTs?Methods: A prospective cohort study was conducted from November 2020 to July 2023 at the Aga Khan University Hospital and Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre, tertiary care hospitals in Karachi, Pakistan. All CYP aged 5 to 21 years with a newly diagnosed PBTs were eligible. The neurocognition assessment was undertaken by a psychologist at two points, i.e., pre-treatment and at 12 months post-treatment using validated tools. The verbal intelligence was assessed by Slosson Intelligence tool, revised 3rd edition (SIT-R3), perceptual reasoning by Raven\u27s Progressive Matrices (RPM), and the Processing Speed Index by Wechsler Intelligence Scale (WISC V) and Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS-IV). The data were analyzed by STATA version 12 software. Generalized estimating equation (GEE) was used to determine the factors associated with the mean change in 12 months post-treatment verbal and non-verbal neurocognition scores. Unadjusted and adjusted beta coefficients with their 95% confidence intervals were reported.Results: A total of 48 CYPs with PBTs were enrolled, 23 (48%) of them were lost to follow-up and 10 (21%) died. The remaining 25 (52%) were reassessed 12 months after treatment. On multivariable analysis, a significant decline in verbal intelligence scores at 12 months was predicted by post-treatment seizures beta = - 20.8 (95% CI, - 38.2, - 3.4), mothers having no formal educational status and lower household monthly income. Similarly, a significant decline in perceptual reasoning scores was also predicted by post-treatment seizures beta = - 10.7 (95% CI, - 20.6, - 0.8), mothers having no formal education and having lower household monthly income. Worsening of processing speed scores at 12 months post-treatment were predicted by tumor histology, post-treatment seizures beta = - 33.9 (95% CI, - 47.7, - 20.0), lower educational status of the mother, and having lower household monthly. However, an improvement was seen in processing speed scores after surgical tumor resection.Conclusion: In this novel study, the post-treatment mean change in verbal and non-verbal neurocognition scores was associated with sociodemographic, tumor, and treatment factors. These findings may have potential implications for targeted early psychological screening of higher risk CYP with PBTs. Identification of these predictors may serve as a foundation for developing more cost-effective treatment thereby alleviating the burden of neurocognitive morbidity. However to establish generalizability, future research should prioritize larger-scale, multicountry studies. (Trial registration: ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT05709522)