There is a lot common between Pakistan and India, after all the two nations have hundreds of years of shared history. But while partition of British India in 1947 gave India and Pakistan separate identities, 65 years later, the two nations are still striving to achieve a major goal: the protection of their women citizens from rape.

While activists in Pakistan mourned the recent killing of nurses carrying out a polio vaccination programme, the gang-rape of a 23-year-old medical student in a Delhi bus on December 16 has shaken the Indian nation and touched what the International Herald Tribune called the “deepest chord of discontent”.

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How much courage and determination does it take for a woman who has been scarred by an acid attack to get back on her feet and fight for justice? Women Talk blogger Roma Rajpal spoke to Oscar-winning filmmakers Daniel Junge and Sharmeen Obaid about their work on the subject.

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Darul Uloom Deobandi, an Islamic seminary in Uttar Pradesh, India, recently warned Muslim women not to work as receptionists by issuing a Fatwa (Islamic religious ruling) that terms of the the job are un-Islamic and against the Sharia (Islamic law).

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Women Talk Online contributor Soofia Asad from Pakistan complained against sexual harassment at the workplace and was asked instead to “apologize for instigating the incident.” But she has made up her mind to do something about it.

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What makes Malala Yousafzai stand out is not only her unwavering resolve to continue education, but the ambition to be a politician, which is quite an exception for most Pakistani women. One wonders, how come?

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Paradise has colours of its own, bright and rare! Kashmir has been called the paradise on earth so it sure does have colours. But what kind of colours are these? Conflict has ridden this place and the minds of its people into shades of anger, frustration and hopelessness. From nature’s golden greens to the black, grey and red shades of conflict, the paradise has had a paradigm shift.

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Love’s labour is lost in a country where many women feel that they are not treated equally and are even denied basic constitutional rights. Controversy is never far away because girls’ schools are burned down denying them education. A shot in the head as in the case of Malala is enough to kill off any revolution stirring a woman’s right to freedom of expression.

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