The Global Neighbourhood for Media Innovation organized a poetry symposium (Mushaira) to commemorate International Women’s Day 2023 to acknowledge and celebrate the bravery, resilience, and courage of Pakistani women who have challenged societal stereotypes and fought for their rights and justice. Through this event, literature and poetry served as a platform to express the difficulties faced by women in Pakistan.
Najia Ashar, President of Global Neighbourhood for Media Innovation (GNMI), presented a holistic introduction of her organization. She said training media persons and journalists, advocacy on women rights, highlighting GBV and domestic violence are some prime objectives of GNMI. She also praised all poets and read two verses of urdu poetry before them.
The symposium was presided over by the esteemed poet Ms. Naheed Azmi and then senior poet
Ms. Rehana Rohi, while moderated by Ms. Hira Shabbir. The event featured distinguished poets,
Each of these had a unique style and captivating ability to engage the audience with their
astonishing couplets and verses, making the event both informative and entertaining.
The versifiers were requested to place themselves on stage while Senior anchorperson Masood
Raza, Senior journalist and poet Mr. Wajih Sani, President GNMI Najia Ashar with others sat next to the members of the audience.
Moderator of the event, Ms. Hira Shabbir invited the female poets at first to present their material, which they did, and they highlighted various aspects of women struggle in daily lives. They were Ms. Sadaf Bint e Izhar, Shahida Urooj Khan and Nawara Mukhtar Mana who were along with Ms. Hira instrumental in putting together the event.
The latter half of the programme focused on other verse-wielders. Some very interesting and high-
quality poems were presented before literature buffs — and they were very well received. Poets
like Ms. Naheed Azmi, Sehar Ali, Abdul Hakeem Nasif, Hira Shabbir, Shazia Alam Shazi, Jawed.
