The story is all too familiar in Pakistan; for far too long, we have witnessed the various manifestations of the unfair choices working parents are subjected to in the face of relentless socio-economic pressures. Whereas child birth brings with it unquantifiable joy, skewed expectations and pressures can make it an overwhelming experience. For women particularly, the bargain can be brutal, as childbirth brings with it the painful realization that the very ethos of our workplaces makes their careers and ambitions discardable commodities. However, there are days we are reminded of the monumental role the state can play in navigating the arduous terrain of parenthood. On May 15, 2023 three historic bills that seek to effectively respond to the contemporary realities of parenthood were passed by parliament in a joint sitting.

The bills are monumental for ensuring fair and sustainable employment for both men and women. According to the bill regarding maternity and paternity leaves for parents, women are entitled to paid maternity leave of: 180 days (six months) on first birth; 120 days (four months) on second birth; and 90 days (three months) on the third birth.

Male employees will be entitled to paid paternity leave of: 30 days (one month) a total of three times during service.

As per the bill, the maternity/paternity leave policy will be applicable to both public and private establishments in the federal capital territory of Islamabad. Whereas implementation comes under the purview of the executive, the bills mention explicit penalties for non-compliance. Employers who do not comply face up to six months of imprisonment and/or a fine of Rs100,000.

Similarly, the bill concerning daycare centres requires all government and private establishments which have at least 70 employees, to provide daycare facilities, in light of more women entering the workforce. Non compliance can be punishable by a fine of Rs100,000 and/or up to six months in prison. Lastly, the bill pertaining to paramedics in schools requires all public and private schools, with an enrolment of over 30 students to have trained paramedical staff who can provide immediate medical assistance and administer first aid to the students.

Senator Quratulain Marri, the architect behind these landmark bills, holds a special affinity for legislation around various social issues. Like numerous Pakistanis, she has witnessed close friends and family face a myriad of hard choices and anxieties while starting or expanding their families. A time which should otherwise be momentous and joyous, she says, becomes riddled with financial worries and societal burdens.

The lack of adequate paid maternity leave leads numerous women to opt out of the workforce or take prolonged breaks, which eventually hampers their future career prospects, and has far reaching consequences for the economy. Even where maternity leave is provided, it is followed by the abject lack of daycare facilities, which leaves new mothers disgruntled and may affect productivity. For those who cannot rely on families or paid helpers for child care, the workday seems bleak. Consequently, the financial expectations from fathers are no less worrisome, who are unable to adequately participate in the child’s early months, leading to unbalanced familial relationships.

The benefits of employers acknowledging and responding to the needs of parents are enormous. There is overwhelming evidence to support the numerous positive outcomes of female workforce participation, both to the workplace, and to the economy and society at large. Pakistan’s current female labour force participation stands at around 22 per cent, which is one of the lowest in South Asia and globally. This is a lost opportunity in terms of productivity and economic growth.

The State Bank of Pakistan has recently estimated that reducing the gap in female labour force participation can generate 19.3 million jobs and can boost GDP by almost 23 per cent. Similar figures have been presented by the World Bank and the ILO. In a recent report, the World Bank has emphasized the need to remove barriers that limit women’s workforce participation and recognise the potential of this massive untapped reservoir. Per Najy Benhassine, World Bank country director for Pakistan, “Women in Pakistan have made progress in educational attainment, but this accumulated human capital is underused because of constraints they face to participate in the labour force.”

These bills go to the root of the problem; they remove the impossible and unfair constraints women are subjected to which become the primary reason for their exit from the workplace. The choice between a satisfying career and a fulfilling family life lies at the very heart of the patriarchal bargain. Very few women are able to convince their families that they can balance both responsibilities, and unfortunately the way workplaces are structured makes failure almost inevitable. Hence, the system sets women up for failure, depriving society of financially empowered women and the economy of additional growth and productivity.

It is also well documented how workplaces negatively view female employees who choose to get married or start families during their employment tenures. Numerous women choose to conceal the news of their weddings and pregnancies from their employers due to the fear of negative stereotyping. Meanwhile, workplaces are known to try and evade responsibility under such circumstances which skews the balance against working mothers. The state must act responsibly and enact legislation which enables workplaces to become fairer places of employment for both men and women.

Many of these constraints are interconnected and require targeted state interventions, such as these bills, to address them. The gendered cultural norms that seek to limit women’s workforce participation also place the entirety of financial burdens on fathers. New fathers are expected to resume work, unfazed, soon after the birth of their children, whereas new mothers are to forget the world outside their homes. Several studies suggest the importance of the early close relationship between a father and child which has long term implications. It is important to recognize the role of both parents in the childcare process as a necessary step towards healthier family structures. It is positive to see the state recognize this.

It is equally important to note that bills pertaining to such sensitive issues undergo vigorous debate which often last for several months. Oftentimes, external audiences are unaware of the dedication and consistency the passage of bills, especially those as monumental as these, requires. Senator Marri credits the leadership of the PPP, especially Chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, for always standing behind such initiatives and lending credence to them.

Legislation such as these three recent bills also reaffirms the PPP’s commitment to women’s economic empowerment, which was integral to the PPP Manifesto in 2018. Furthermore, it will also assist in the mainstreaming of women in public life. Previously, the Protection against Harassment of Women at the Workplace Act 2010 was another milestone achieved under the PPP-led government. Senator Marri is also hopeful that the Sindh government will follow the precedent set and pass these bills in the provincial assembly too.

In order to respond to the mounting challenges faced by contemporary families, the state must change its outlook and respond according to these new realities. With higher educational attainment of women, we must find ways to translate this potential into increased economic opportunities and sustainable employment for women. Just as change in social realities is the law of life, responding to such changes is the life of law.

As women increasingly join the workforce and break the proverbial glass ceiling, the law too must yield to these changes and affirm that women need not choose between their career and their homes. While women’s dreams have often been shattered by patriarchy and other pressures, such legislation is a significant step towards preserving such dreams and keeping the flickering flame of hope alive.

The writer is a women’s rights activist and political worker for the Pakistan People’s Party, currently holding the office of deputy information secretary for PPP Central Punjab. She tweets @NayabGJan

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Power and rights are neither absolute nor permanent but dynamic, situational, contested and socially constructed concepts. Power, in the sociological context does not merely mean raw physical force or economic might to influence the thoughts, actions and behaviour of others. In reality, it represents the will and capacity to give a particular context, on the basis of one’s own values or interests, which other people, organizations or nations willingly or unwillingly follow.

According to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, the concept of privacy is rooted in Western philosophy. Aristotle introduced and distinguished between the notions of ‘polis’, meaning the public domain of political activity, and ‘oikos’, which refers to the domestic family sphere. However, in this Greek intellectual distinction the original purpose was not to restrict self-regulation or obviate state oversight which is different but equally important for appropriate social behaviour and prevent individual criminal activities in both individual and public gatherings and situations.

During the late 19th century, the evolution of the US privacy protection law was mainly influenced by the moral consideration to protect family values and customs within an increasingly diverse and multi-racial, multi-ethnic and multi-religious American society rather than to merely serve as a legal instrument to protect an individual’s right to deny the state’s intrusion into his/her personal affairs.

It is important to recognize and appreciate the fundamental reality that mutual relations between state and its citizens are primarily grounded in its social contract, based on how the rights and obligations are socially constructed within a particular cultural context, before being constitutionally agreed and subsequently enforced through law-making and protected through legal implementation.

In Quran, Surah-e-Hujurat (Chapter 12, verse 49) describes the Islamic concept of privacy but comprehensively and clearly demands a careful balance between social and individual rights and obligations, by urging Muslims to simultaneously avoid suspicion, spying and backbiting. This indicates that unlike Western philosophy and modern jurisprudence the Islamic notion of privacy is neither unilateral, unconditional nor isolated from the overall and overarching objective of creating a just, peaceful and respectable society, in which the individual’s rights are balanced with his/her equally vital social obligation of not indulging in backbiting or conspiracies against the state.

According to ‘Tarikh-e-Tabari’ (Volume 2, Pages 320-321), Hazrat Hatib bin Abi Balta’ah (ra), a Muslim companion of the Prophet (pbuh) and a war veteran of the battle of Badr, sent a secret letter to his tribe to warn them about the Muslims’ plan to attack them. The letter was covertly hidden and carried by a woman. The prophet (pbuh) sent Hazrat Ali bin Abu Talib (ra) and Hazrat Zubair bin Awam (ra) to intercept that woman and ensure the letter did not reach the enemy. Hazrat Ali swiftly followed the woman and after stopping her searched her camel and all her belongings but couldn’t find the letter.

Since Hazrat Ali was convinced about the authenticity of the information, he threatened the woman with dire consequences. Upon realizing that he would not budge or let her go unless she handed over the letter, the woman took it out of her hair and gave it to Hazrat Ali (ra) who promptly brought it to the Prophet (pbuh). The Prophet (pbuh) called and investigated his Muslim companion Hatib bin Abi Balta’ah (ra) and demanded an explanation before other companions. Hazrat Umer (ra) advised the Prophet (pbuh) to punish the concerned sahabi for his betrayal and breach of trust but the Prophet (pbuh) stopped short of punishing him only because he was a war veteran of the battle of Badr.

This very important historic incident proves that the concept of privacy is neither universal nor provides a legal justification to allow any individual or group, irrespective of their rank or prestige, to indulge in anti-state activities and harm state interests.

Islamic philosophy offers great respect and sanctity to all individuals, particularly in terms of protecting the dignity and honor of ladies and protecting all individuals against several forms of discrimination. However, the above Quranic verse and this particular personal decision, act and instruction of the Holy Prophet (pbuh) clearly proves that any individual, including a close, respected companion and war veteran of the Prophet (pbuh) as well as a woman were not allowed to use the notion of privacy to harm the collective public and state interest of the entire Muslim state and even their personal letter addressed to a relative, which is private property, was confiscated.

In the contemporary environment characterized by accelerated globalization, rapid advent of IT and cyber technologies and growing popularity of social media, reviewing the notion of privacy has become very significant – not to reject it but to adapt and tailor it more accurately to the changing global, regional and domestic environment. The social and actual purpose of the concept of privacy and its traditional legal framework needs to be dispassionately and logically revisited in order to ensure that the social contract between state and society is realistically and practically preserved in line with our values, culture as well as national security considerations.

The global war on terror, the swift evolution of the IT sector and growing domestic and global cyber security challenges have made information domain the most critical battlespace in the perpetual contest between values, interests, wealth and power between states as well as within states, way beyond conventional battlefields.

We are all living in an environment in which our family structure, values, ideology and culture are constantly facing moral and intellectual threats not merely economic losses or data theft. Hybrid warfare has virtually replaced conventional warfare as a superior, low-cost but more effective strategy to disrupt the social cohesion, political stability and moral values of other states. Therefore, the modern legal system must recognize that these rapid, real and deep transformations in our social interactions, relations, behaviour and norms pose critical and decisive challenges to our values, social structures as well as national interests, not merely the rights of an individual.

It is a national security imperative for our parliament, along with its relevant standing committees on law, justice, human rights, religious affairs as well as the Council of Islamic Ideology to start a timely, unemotional and informed debate to ensure that the concept of privacy and national security are mutually consistent and our privacy laws are compatible with our own values, ideology, culture and national interests and not driven by merely by individual and political interests as well as liberal norms, external expectations and pressures.

The writer is an international security analyst with over28 years of internationally negotiating, advising,analyzing, publishing and teaching several aspects ofnational security.

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THIS government`s legislative interventions will be remembered for making even good things seem bad because of how cynical and self-serving the intentions behind each appear to have been. According to news reports, lawyer Irfan Qadir, recently reappointed as special assistant to the prime minister on legal reforms and accountability, has reignited a discussion on the possibility of establishing a constitutional court to work alongside the Supreme Court. The creation of a separate court to deal with the constitutionality of various parliamentary actions and legislations was a proposal jointly agreed to by the PPP and the PML-N under the Charter of Democracy signed in 2006. It was never really pursued with the required seriousness thereafter, but the PDM now feels the need to revisit it. The question is, why? Mr Qadir has said that the proposed constitutional court would be composed of retired, `non-controversial chief justices`, along with judges drawn from the superior judiciary as well as parliamentarians with legal expertise. He has presented such a court as a solution to the many challenges dogging the Supreme Court, which, he believes, are preventing it from issuing `unbiased` verdicts. While the idea may not be without its merits, the establishment of a constitutional court cannot be done without national consensus or enacted through a parliament that is not truly representative of the people. This government, which has denied the public their right to participate in the democratic process by refusing to hold due elections to the KP and Punjab assemblies, has lost whatever little moral authority it had to make such decisions on their behalf. It is also rather unseemly that this proposal has been tabled not because it is a required next step in the evolution of the Pakistani judicial system, but because the government considers it a power play in its confrontation with the Supreme Court. The question will, therefore, be asked: is this good for the country, or just good for the PDM? The idea of constitutional courts is not unheard of more than five dozen countries have them in place. It is also not a bad one, considering the massive and continuously increasing backlog of cases pending before Supreme Court justices, who must currently deal with both pressing constitutional matters as well as regular criminal and civil appeals. Splitting the workload between two courts could greatly help ease this pressure. A separate constitutional court would also utilise the experience and expertise of retired judges, whose accumulated wisdom is dispensed with rather early under the Pakistani system compared to, for example, the US supreme court, which appoints its justices for life. Clearly, this proposal could have been considerably better received had it not seemed like yet another thinly disguised attempt to encroach upon the Supreme Court`s domain.

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The Islamabad Capital Territory has put down the rules for its Act on prohibiting corporal punishment for children at schools, including all educational institutions and has, in a major ceremony, announced that from now on children would be educated in a conducive and harmonious environment. The ceremony was a high-powered one, with former ministers and celebrities such as Shehzad Roy among those speaking at it. Around the world 62 states have so far universalized the prohibition of corporal punishment including at home. Corporal punishment outside of the home is prohibited by 135 states. Pakistan is one of the dwindling number of countries which have not totally banned corporal punishment at schools. The country also allows derogatory punishments at these institutions and, as a result, there have been cases in which children have been badly injured or in the very worst cases, even killed. It is imperative that we ban corporal punishment and lay out a new pedagogy for teaching that recognizes the rights of the child as laid down in international conventions that Pakistan has signed.

It should also be noted that we need similar rules across the country. Corporal punishment has been banned in Sindh since 2017. In Punjab, in December 2022 then chief minister Pervaiz Elahi had agreed that an act should be passed after being spoken to by Malala Yousafzai and promised that this would happen within the month. It did not happen. And of course we know the fate of the Elahi government in the weeks and months that followed. There is also a basic principle to the entire problem. In the first place, teacher training is essential so that they can learn to teach and where necessary, discipline children in a manner that does not cause them any harm or hurt them, in any way. Corporal punishment obviously needs to be banned. Unfortunately, however, in our schools and in many households, it is the only way parents and teachers know how to discipline or rebuke children for unfavourable behaviour. It has been more than 30 years since Pakistan ratified the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC). There has to be a change in the way in which we think and the way in which we act. First of all, the Child Protection Act that we have in our statute books needs to be implemented with more urgency and the Child Protection Bureaus, which exist in at least some of our provinces trained to carry out their work in a cohesive manner. We cannot have children being beaten up simply because they do not turn to their school books. This is all the more true given the way that children are taught at schools. There are other methods used all over the world which work much better and ensure the child is protected at all costs. This is something we need to bring into play in our country and we must hope that the implementation of the rules for the Islamabad Capital Territory leads to more action across the rest of the country to keep children safe in their educational institutions and finally put an end to corporal punishment.

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THE Industrial Relations Ordinance (IRO), 1969, is meant `to amend and consolidate the law relating to the formation of trade unions, the regulation of relations between employers and workmen and the avoidance and settlements of any differences or disputes arising between them`.

Earlier, the Industrial Relations Act, 1946, had a similar objective but specifically mentioned the establishing of a mechanism for regulating remuneration and conditions of employment. These are now settled through the bargaining process between the employer and Collective Bargaining Agent union under IRO 1969. Besides, there was the Industrial Relations Disputes Act, 1947, which provided for the settlement of any differences or disputes between the employer and CBA union.

The1960sisseenasthe decade ofindustrial progress but with a few exceptions, labour union activity remained dormant till around 1969. Retired Air Marshal Nur Khan, a cabinet minister under President Yahya Khan, had `labour` as one of his portfolios. He paid special attention to recognising the rights of labour unions and their federations. He was instrumental in promulgating IRO 1969, which contained wisely drafted provisions for congenial industrial relations.

At the same time, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto was also active in his election campaigning, promising to ameliorate the lot of peasants and labour. After coming to power, his PPP government introduced, through IRO 1969, the three new forums of shop stewards, management committee and the joint management board (JMB).

Shop stewards are `a link between the workers and the employer, [and] assist in the improvement of arrangements for the physical working conditions and production work` in the area they represent. They also help workers settle their problems.

In the management committee, at least one workers` representative is to be nominated by the CBA union to participate to the extent of 50 per cent in the management of the factory. Besides others, the management cannot take any decision without the advice in writing of the workers` representative in the following matters: `framing of service rules and policy about promotion and discipline of workers`; `regulation of daily working hours and breaks`; and `matters relating to the order and conduct of workers within the factory`, etc.

The JMB is the top forum represented by the directors and senior managers from the management. Workers` representation is 30pc and the board has look after `improvement in productivity`, `laying down the principles of remuneration` and `the provi-sion of minimum facilities` to contract workers, etc.

The first PPP government had taken the idea of these forums from the Scandinavian countries, where workers` participation in management is an important element of industrial democracy. It is a system where employees have a say in the management`s decisions. The Scandinavian countries have been maintaining a near 100pc literacy rate for long. This rate among Pakistan`s industrial workers, labouring under the employers` strict control, has been less than 50pc. Most employers would not allow trade union activities in their establishments.

When the CBA unions got these rights and liberties in 1972 through labour laws, they thought themselves the new owners of the factories and led the workers they represented through turmoil and violence.

Functions of the management committee and JMB overlapped with the CBA union`s domain of collective bargaining with the employer. Hence union leaders were not inclined to part with their powers and nom-inate their representatives to these two forums, which remained inoperational since the beginning.

Being a lawabiding organisation, an American company in Daharki, where I had worked in the late 1970s,formed the management committee and JMB. On persuasion, the CBA union nominated its workers` representative to the two forums. When we wanted the representative to agree to and sign the notification relating to revised Ramzan work timings, which were followed every year, he went into hiding. Ultimately, he was traced and we managed to get his signature just a day before Ramazan.

The two forums, which have not functioned in any organisation for more than 50 years, despite the sincere efforts of some, should have been taken out from the law by the government a long time back.

Meanwhile, the most useful forum of Works Council has been made complicated and unwieldy with the inclusion of the redundant functions of the management committee and JMB in the existing Industrial Relations Act of all the provinces. The respective provinces should take them out from the law in order to restore the effectiveness of the Works Council. • The wnter is a consultant in human resources at the Aga Khan University Hospital, Karachi.

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