Dawn Images

An Urdu edition of Swat’s Nobel Peace Prize winner Malala Yousafzai’s book entitled May Hoon Malala was launched in Lahore recently but despite efforts so far neither the book nor a Pashto edition of it could be launched in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

Prof Khadim Hussain, head of Bacha Khan Education Trust, who attended launch of the Urdu edition of I am Malala in Lahore by Mashal Publishers, regretted that there was no edition of the book in Pakistan in Malala’s mother tongue so that her people could know about her side of the story.

“The Urdu edition would somewhat help to remove misperceptions about what Malala stands for,” he said. He added that a Pashto edition of the book was published in Afghanistan. He feared that many Pakhtuns in Pakistan might not be able to get a copy of the book or properly comprehend the Pashto read and written in Afghanistan.

Prof Khadim said that Urdu edition of the book would be helpful in explaining who really Malala was to those who spread stories and conspiracies against her.

“Malala’s story and her struggle is for enlightenment and love for humanity. She initiated a movement to educate every child and spend on education than military or defence,” he added.

Prof Hussain believed that her thoughts could bring about a change in the world about spending funds on human development and education instead of wars. He said that Malala belonged to a province where during the last few decades war had destroyed the society’s ability to hold discourse and its ability of free thinking slowly so it needed to hear her side of the story.

“If you remember, in 2015 Area Study Centre and BKET wanted to collaborate the launch of Malala’s book but provincial government intervened and stopped us from holding the event due to security reasons,” said Prof Hussain when asked if he would be holding any activity to launch the book in Peshawar.

The launch of a book was banned in a university as the provincial government feared it would invite trouble and create security issue back in 2015.

“Since Urdu is a national language and many can read and write it so it would help people to read about Malala’s philosophy. Those, who are extremists and want to impose their own opinion, and those, who are unable to access information due to such elements, would get their answer if they are able to read this book,” said Prof Khadim.

He said that it would remove many misconceptions but only if people would read the book. “However, a Pashto edition of the book in Pakistan is definitely needed so that her people could read about Malala in their own mother tongue,” he added.

Originally published in Dawn, November 24th, 2017