By Karan Parkash
One of Pakistan’s biggest issues is gender inequality, which is a result of our social tradition that prioritizes sons over daughters because we as a society think that males will grow up to work and maintain the home while protecting the females of the family, whereas females will become housewives and remain at home.
Women in Pakistan experience a variety of injustices as a result of gender discrimination, including a sizable gender pay gap, occupational segregation, rejection of leadership promotions, a glass ceiling in various professions, trafficking, forced marriage, child marriage, female genital mutilation, honor killings, violence against women in the home, workplace, and public spaces, as well as lower levels of education and employment opportunities.
2020 Pakistan is presently ranked 151st out of 153 nations for gender equity, according to the Global Gender Gap Index. The World Economic Forum creates an indicator every year to investigate the disparity between men and women in four key areas: political freedom, health and survival, educational achievement, and economic involvement and opportunity.
The index indicates that women have very few economic prospects in Pakistan (32.7%), and that they are considerably underrepresented in the labour force. One of the biggest societal injustices of our time is the gender pay gap, which is a measurement of the disparity between men and women’s typical earnings. The female pay disparity in Pakistan was found to be 34%, more than double the world average, according to the 2018–19 world Wage Report. The study also reveals that women make up nearly 90% of Pakistan’s lowest 1% of salary earners.
According to UNICEF, 21% of females in Pakistan are married before the age of 18 and 3% are married before the age of 15, making Pakistan the country with the sixth-highest percentage of child marriages globally. In some areas of Pakistan, compensation weddings, also known as vanni, the customary practice of forcing women and young girls into forced marriages to settle tribal disputes, are very prevalent. One of the main causes of child marriage in Pakistan is poverty, and for some females, getting married can lead to better financial security and wellbeing.
According to data gathered by White Ribbon Pakistan, an NGO fighting for women’s rights, 4,734 women experienced sexual assault between 2004 and 2016. Studies show that 60% to 70% of women in Pakistan experience some form of abuse. Honor offences have been reported in more than 15,000 instances. Over 5,500 women were abducted during this time, and there were over 1,800 instances of domestic abuse. In Pakistan, Honor killings against women are another type of spousal abuse that is practiced widely throughout the nation. Male offenders are referred to as Karo and female offenders as Kari; both names imply dark. Traditionally, the term “Karo Kari” refers to the community’s or a relative’s right to murder a female relative for engaging in an illicit sexual connection outside of marriage. The majority of the time, this custom is abused, and killings are justifiably committed when there is reason to be suspected.
Girls actively enroll in professional and technical education, but even after receiving technical and professional qualifications, they are not allowed to use their skills to advance the national economy. As a result, the educational status of women in Pakistan is terrible and low, in fact, it is among the lowest in the entire world. The majority of female physicians don’t practice because of social problems. The gender gap in schooling has been closed or is almost closed in most nations, but it is still almost 20% in Pakistan. According to the index, less than half of women are literate, compared to 71% of men, and the percentage of women engaged in primary, intermediate, and higher education is consistently lower than the percentage of men.
Although it has significantly decreased over the last two years, the legislative gender disparity is still large. There was not a single female official in 2017. The 25-member government included three women as of January 1st, 2019.
In Pakistan, the youth population is larger than it has ever been, with 64% of people under the age of 30. While this new generation may be able to change Pakistan’s economy and educational system, it is unclear how girls can affect societal change when only 39% of that age group, 2% of whom are female, have jobs.
We must have equitable access to health, education, earning potential, and government participation because women make up half of the world’s population. The foundation of progress is gender equity. Leaders at the international, national, and business levels must strive to create economies that are equitable and more inclusive.
“I am an illustration of what is possible when females are loved and nurtured by those around them from the very beginning of their existence. I was raised by exceptional women who taught me the value of dignity and quiet fortitude. Obama, Michelle