When I cried as a child, my parents put on Aamir Liaquat's TV show, says MNA's new wife Syeda Dania Shah
Aamir Liaquat announced his third marriage on Thursday and no one has been able to talk about anything else ever since. Be it Twitter or Instagram, people can't help but talk about the unexpected union that became public shortly after his estranged wife Syeda Tuba Anwar announced news of their divorce. While their videos on Instagram have made many people feel slightly uncomfortable with their PDA, a recent interview shed some light on their relationship.
Forty-nine-year-old Liaquat and his 18-year-old wife Syeda Dania Shah made their first public appearance on a podcast.
In the beginning of the interview, host Nadir Ali interrogated the PTI MNA and asked something that has been on everyone's minds — will this union be his last? Liaquat hopes so. He reasoned that Islam allows multiple marriages, and said he didn't understand why people were so against multiple marriages.
"We were very influenced by Hindu culture and that's why we live in the fear of the first wife. There could be a lot of troubles but they are scared of the first wife and think they will rip apart their family. How would your family be torn apart? Your family is thriving! Your family will only be torn apart if you tear it apart. A man can tear it apart," he said. The host then interjected, "no, a man doesn't tear about a family, a woman is a woman's enemy."
"That's true," replied Liaquat to the host's snickers. "The man can tear it apart with divorce," he said. "But when he is not giving a divorce and she [the first wife] is not taking a khula, then the family is not being torn apart," he reasoned, rather illogically.
"Why are you so bent on getting a divorce? Why do you want to get a khula?" he asked, ignoring the fact that it is a woman's right to get a divorce if she wants one. Liaquat seems to believe that being married to him is quite the feat and cannot understand why women would want to divorce him.
He used this point — that a woman would want to divorce him — to "prove" the host's point that "a woman's true enemy is another woman". "They don't care if you go cheat on them but you must not remarry," Liaquat claimed.
There were several other questionable statements in the interview — such as the host asking what gifts Liaquat had gotten Shah (a car), and who was the most beautiful of his three wives (what answer could he have given other than Shah?) — Liaquat also clarified that the reason he finds Shah beautiful isn't because of her looks, it's because of her behaviour. "She respects her husband a lot and it's not because she's 18 years old," he said. "It's because she has a lot of love for her husband and that love is still growing. She's still young, so with time that love will grow."
Liaquat also claimed that he hadn't divorced anyone. "Nor have I divorced Bushra, nor have I given a khula to Tooba," he said, claiming that he hasn't signed anything nor has he been to court. "God told me to get married, not get divorced or give khulas," he said. He later clarified that both his ex-wives had gotten divorces themselves.
He also had issues with the rule that the first wife's permission must be taken for a second marriage. "What does permission have to do with this? Bus shaadi hogai, hogai [A wedding happened so it happened]," said the MNA.
But that wasn't where the strangeness ended. His wife revealed that she has loved him since her childhood. "I fell in love with him [Liaquat] in my childhood. When I was younger, my parents would put one of his shows on TV whenever I would cry. So yes, I've loved him since I was young," said the 18-year-old, who can still be considered rather young.
Liaquat qualified her statement and said she would stop crying when he recited naats on screen. She said it didn't hit her that she had married Liaquat until very recently. "It's only now that it hit me that Aamir Liaquat is really mine," she said. "Jo jal rahein hain, woh jalein," Shah said to the people she believes are jealous of her marriage.
From everything being posted online, it seems no one is jealous of their union. Most people are instead concerned about the age difference between the couple and that this is Liaquat's third marriage. All we can say is that we hope that Shah went into this marriage well-informed and with her eyes wide open.