Female activists of the Long March

Women protestors are being manhandled in the on going Long March. Pictures of women lawyers and political activists being brutally pulled and pushed into police vans have been beamed across the world. PPP leader Naheed Khan too has expressed shock over the incidents of manhandling of women by the authorities.

Naked ambition triumphs in Pakistani politics …

Lawyers’ Movement: A Political Beast

One of the gravest errors made by commentators when discussing the lawyers’ movement is to describe it as an apolitical civil movement. This is a fiction perpetuated by the media, and to some extent politicians. Both have a similar motivation for their abridgement of the facts. It is, after all, easier to sell a story when it has a clearly defined plot, a hero and a villain. In fact, what we today refer to as the lawyers’ movement is clearly a political beast. The movement organises marches and stages rallies. It lobbies for public support and has a clear policy statement. It is backed by a loose alliance of political parties.