KOHISTAN: Women candidates in Kohistan are breaking social barriers and defying the odds to contest polls on February 8. Tehmina Faheem, Shakeela Rabbani, Sannaya Sabeel and Momina Basit are among the first women to enter the electoral battlefield in the conservative constituencies of the Kohistan and Torghar region of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s Hazara district. Last week, a group of Kohistan clerics, mostly members of the Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam-Fazl, issued a fatwa (Islamic decree) against canvassing by and for women election candidates and declared the act unIslamic. Zahid Khan, the regional coordinator the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) termed the fatwa contrary to women’s rights. He said the Torghar and Kohistan region — comprising Upper Kohistan, Lower Kohistan, and Kolai-Palas (Kohistan) — stands atop Khyber Pakhtunkhwa where women and child rights were routinely violated.
