Shahla Zia (12 February 1947 – 10 March 2005) also known as Shehla Zia, was a

Pakistani Pakistanis (, ) are the citizens and nationals of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. Pakistan is the fifth-most populous country, with a population of over 241.5 million, having the second-largest Muslim population as of 2023. As much as ...

lawyer and activist, known for her advocacy of

women's rights Women's rights are the rights and Entitlement (fair division), entitlements claimed for women and girls worldwide. They formed the basis for the women's rights movement in the 19th century and the feminist movements during the 20th and 21st c ...

Personal life

Zia was born into a

Punjabi Muslim Punjabi Muslims are Punjabis who are adherents of Islam. With a population of more than 112 million, they are the third-largest predominantly Islam-adhering Muslim ethnicity in the world, after Arabs and Bengalis. The majority of Punjabi Musl ...

family in

Lahore Lahore ( ; ; ) is the capital and largest city of the Administrative units of Pakistan, Pakistani province of Punjab, Pakistan, Punjab. It is the List of cities in Pakistan by population, second-largest city in Pakistan, after Karachi, and ...

. Her father Mahmood Ali Khan was an activist for the

Pakistan movement The Pakistan Movement was a religiopolitical and social movement that emerged in the early 20th century as part of a campaign that advocated the creation of an Islamic state in parts of what was then British Raj. It was rooted in the two-nation the ...

, whilst her mother Satnam Mahmood was an educationist. She attended the

University of the Punjab The University of the Punjab (UoP) is a public university, public research university in Lahore, Punjab, Pakistan, Punjab, Pakistan. Founded in 1882, its international influence has made it one of the most prestigious universities in South As ...

in the 1960s, from where she received her

bachelor's degree A bachelor's degree (from Medieval Latin ''baccalaureus'') or baccalaureate (from Modern Latin ''baccalaureatus'') is an undergraduate degree awarded by colleges and universities upon completion of a course of study lasting three to six years ...

in law, becoming one of the first Pakistani women to do so. She had two sons and three daughters. One of her daughters is Maliha Zia Lari, also a lawyer and

human rights Human rights are universally recognized Morality, moral principles or Social norm, norms that establish standards of human behavior and are often protected by both Municipal law, national and international laws. These rights are considered ...

activist. She died at the age of 58, after an illness.

Legal work and activism

Zia was one of the founders of the women's rights organization

Aurat Foundation Aurat Foundation, founded in 1986, is a women's rights organization based in Islamabad Islamabad (; , ; ) is the capital city of Pakistan. It is the country's tenth-most populous city with a population of over 1.1 million and is federall ...

along with Nigar Ahmed, as well as of the AGHS women's law firm and legal aid centre in 1980. In 1983, Zia was imprisoned along with several other women for protesting the 1983 Law of Evidence in front of the

Lahore High Court The Lahore High Court () is a provincial court house based in Lahore, Punjab, Pakistan. It was established as a high court on 21 March 1882. The Lahore High Court has jurisdiction over the province of Punjab. The High Court's principal seat is ...

, which had the effect of rendering the testimony of a male witness equal to that of two women under some circumstances. She was also active in the Women's Action Forum. Zia built a reputation for fighting laws that were discriminatory against women and religious minorities. Zia served on a commission examining the status of women in Pakistan, appointed by the government, and was a coauthor of a report that it authored in 1997. When the Pakistani National Assembly approved

Sharia law Sharia, Sharī'ah, Shari'a, or Shariah () is a body of religious law that forms a part of the Islamic tradition based on scriptures of Islam, particularly the Qur'an and hadith. In Islamic terminology ''sharīʿah'' refers to immutable, inta ...

in 1998 through the Fifteenth constitutional amendment, Zia was forced to resign her positions on several government bodies. Zia was the named plaintiff in a 1994 case in the Pakistani Supreme Court, in which the plaintiffs brought a legal challenge against the construction of an electric grid station, citing health risks. The ruling is considered a landmark in environmental law in Pakistan, because it held that the

right to a healthy environment The right to a healthy environment or the right to a sustainable and healthy environment is a human right advocated by human rights organizations and environmental organizations to protect the ecological systems that provide human health. The ri ...

was constitutionally protected, and fell within the right to life and dignity.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Zia, Shahla Pakistani women's rights activists Pakistani lawyers Pakistani women lawyers Pakistani women 1940s births Punjab University Law College alumni 2005 deaths 20th-century women lawyers