LAHORE: In the first such case to be reported in Pakistan, a young woman has appealed to Islamabad’s top court to “disown her father” and remove his name from all official documents.
The woman, 22, whose name has been withheld for reasons of anonymity, said that she was unable to obtain a legal status as she had yet to apply for a national identity card or a passport – something which resulted from her father’s decision to disown her and abandon the family.
In a statement, detailing her experiences, she asked the court to “please remove my father’s name from my birth certificate and all of my educational degrees and other documents”, adding that she seeks “to renounce any association with her father’s name”. Joined by her mother, who spoke on her behalf, the woman lamented the law which allows fathers to disown children but not the other way around.
The fact that these laws do not exist is something which gives corporate lawyer Maria Tahir the hope that the issue might get an audience.
“This is an extremely interesting development because guardianship and disassociation in Pakistan are brought under Islamic Law and not under secular law. This is the first time that such a case has been brought to the supreme court …you can imagine how much difficulty she must have faced just trying to get basic documents,” she said.
Nadine Murtaza, a single mother, and educator living in Islamabad, has borne the brunt of not having a male guardian acting as a sponsor. Questioning the gender inequality in allotting a woman a legal and individual status, she said that if earlier she was “the child of my parents, once married I became the wife of my husband but he did not become my husband? Sometimes I think it’s so frustrating that I can’t be both parents for my children,” she said.
She narrates an experience where a friend went through a similar struggle.
“I have a colleague who left her husband because he was psychologically ill. Her daughter needed to take the SAT exams for which she needed a new passport. In order to get one, she needed the father’s approval. This is despite the fact that my friend supports the girl and does not receive any financial support from her husband. The father refused and withheld permission, just because he could. There is so much room for people to really abuse their position of power, and that position can be that of a biological father,” Murtaza said.
The case refused to see the light of day because it was never brought to court. However, in the case of the woman trying to disown her father, the hearing has been adjourned with the Director-General of Projects for Nadra, Zulfiqar Ali, summoned to track the father down.