Twenty years ago, Zhang Yufen found out that her husband was having an affair – and divorced him. After that, Zhang became China’s first female private detective – usually tracking down wealthy men who cheat on their wives.

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Kashmiri Muslim women laugh as they push each other playfully outside a polling station in Wattergam, some 75 Kilometers (47 miles) from Srinagar, India. @ AP Photo/Dar Yasin

Zakia Soman is a founder member of Bharatiya Muslim Mahila Andolan (BMMA), a mass organization of muslim women in India. According to a survey conducted by her organization, more than 90 percent of Muslim women surveyed in India want the “triple talaq” divorce ritual and polygamy banned from family civil law in the country.

“Isn’t she lovely,” I said. “Yes, she is, but you know, her mother is divorced,” came the reply. This was the first indirect introduction I got to a 30-year-old female colleague. What she does, who she is, became redundant when people spoke of her. That her mother was divorced was the key piece of information that defined her for others, at least when she was not part of the conversation. And I thought to myself, that is probably how people will introduce my daughter someday…