BY ZAFFAR JUNEJO

Mbr-ncr lrUultu$
Nari Publications led the way in establishing
women's publishing house in Pakistan.

of us might have forgotten that one of the earliest editions of Jawaharlal Nehru's Discovery
of lndio was Published bY Nilima
Devi, who had founded Signet Press
in Kolkata in the late 1930s. One may
find a lot of women in journalism in
united lndia who worked at the editorial level. A few famous names are
Swarnakumari Devi, Hemant Kumari
Choudhrani, Muhammadi Begum and
Mrs. Khamosh.
After Partition, although there were
many publishing houses, none were
owned and led bY women. lt was not

till

1979 that Nazeer Naz established

the first such publishing house, Nari

Publications. The Year marked the
completion of two years of the military coup in which the elected Prime
Minister, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, was deposed by General Zia-ul-Haq. The year
also witnessed the SuPreme Court
judgment followed by the hanging of

Bhutto. Nazeer Naz, founder of Nari

Publications, says that military rule was
in full swing at the time, and many writers, trade unionists and political workers were booked on false charges, and

cruel punishments were meted out

publicly. She. says that at a personal
level, Bhutto's judicial murder created a sense of guilt and helplessness.
The void left by the event was filled by
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a sense of outrage' She reflects that

it may have been the Prime reason to
set up a women's publishing house. At
another level, it was done to encourage female writers by publishing their
works. She says that it was an attempt
to show the presence and point of view

of women at a time when there was

fear and darkness everywhere. Many
magazines and periodicals, including
literary journals, were banned. And
the few magazines that appeared irregularly were edited bY men' Some
of the editors were supportive of the
women's cause, but a few were known
to exploit young female writers, using
their power and position. Therefore,
it was decided at an early stage that a
magazine, aptly called Non, would also

e*.*.*-,*S.lF
was on grammar, Punctuation, construction of sentences and challenges
of writing in the first and third hand
forms.

Nori magazine set a new trend

as

each of its issues carried a detailed interview of a leading woman, and one

or two lines were picked as the story's

title. She wistfully recalls some lines
used as leads: 'Haven't eaten corn on
the cob this year,' and 'MY moist eYes.'
Khairunnisa Jaffari, Mehtab Akbar
Rashdi, Abida Parveen, Laila Bana and

Noorul Huda Shah were interviewed

for the earlier issues.
Later, an attempt'was made to cre-

be launched by Nari Publications. The

publishing house offered voluntary edi-

ate a conducive literary environment.

Thus, Nari Sangat was formed' Some

torial assistance to polish young writers' works. She recalls that the focus

of its founding

members were

Dr.

Mumtaz Bhutto, Zahida Thebo, Surraya

Soz

Mughal; Najam Abbasi'strans-

Diplai, Um-e-Salma Qadri,

of

Rubina Rajput, Shagufta Shah,

lation

Naseem Shaikh and Ariba

Noor. The purpose was to or-

His Father's Wife entitled

Zilzilo; Sitorn Moin Likhiyol

ganise book launches and literary discussions. Nari Sangat

Suki li Kahoni; Munawar Butt's

Sindhi translation of Written
in the Stors: The Story of Suki
by Erna lngeborg Moen; and
Hatheen Hath Korrol, the jail
dairy of Tariq Ashraf, a wellknown publisher and editor of Sohni magazine. She

succeeded in organising some

successful events, but there

was a shortage of resources,

and also, the team realised

that event management and
publishing required a different mindset. "On the other

Iikes them because there are

hand, some male writers tried

to degrade our publications,"

Naz recalls. "Some of them
tried to find sexist interpretations of the word 'nori' and
'inade
fun of it." But among

Nazeer Naz admits that Nari

Publication may have failed as a
commercial venture, but as an idea,
it has inspired countless others.

the menfolk, there were some

who believed in the equal status of men and women. She fondly recalls the names of Zafar Hassan Sayyed
and Tariq Ashraf Shah who supported
her in bringing out publications.

She believes that Nori was successfully emerging as an alternative magazine, with

Day Keene's novel

special focus on women's

writings, buttheteam soon faced some

practical problems. The foremost was

irregular submissions by female writ-

ers; secondly, the pieces submitted

required massive editing; and lastly,
publishing the magazine on time was

challenge. As female writers were not

forthcom ing with regu lar write-u ps, the
editorial team decided'to publish male
writers as well, which led to some female writers complaining that the magazine had been hijacked by male writers. Responding to a question a bout the

dominant narrative of those times, she

recounts that in the early 1980s, women's rights and using gender as an analytical tool had not yet entered the so-

cio-political discourse. "Our discourse

was predominately nationalist, mingled
with anti-military and class issues," she
says. Nazeer has published 60 titles so
fal including books and magazines and

as many as 20 are in the queue. The

range of her publications covers fiction,
non-fiction, anthologies, children's lit-

strong protagonists in the

books who strive to survive
and challenge the status quo.

ln the case of the jail diary, it

is a narration of the suffering
and loneliness of an individual, who languished behind
bars for an important cause:

erature and public education material

on health and hygiene.

On the question of

publishing

books in the Urdu language as well, she

states that her primary education was

in Urdu. She was married at the age of

13 years, and after the birth of her first
child, she restarted her education and
earned a Bachelor of Arts degree with
Urdu as the medium of instruction. She
continues that Urdu language was her
instant love and Sindhi language her
mother tongue, thus she promoted

both with responsibility and respect.

She concluded

that

books appearing

the right of expression.

Naz admits that Nari Publications
may have failed as a commercial venture, but as an idea, it has inspired
countless others. lt gave a platform
to many new women writers to pub-

lish their stories, poems and articles.

Shabnum Gul (short story writer, novelist, TV show host, poet and artist),
shagufta shah (illustrator, artist and
novelist) and Sumera Mughal (short
story writer and essayist) were regular

contributors. Their submitted works

were uptothe markand all of them just
needed a space where they could be
published.

in Urdu could be seen as a resurgence

Nazeer Naz is confident that new

of an old love. She recalls her child-

reading devices will not replace printed

hood days when her first story, 'Mqkna

Hathi,'was published in the daily Jong's

would like to take her publishing house

books, magazines and newspapers and

children's section. She tells me about

two of her recent Urdu publications,
Adhoori Chahtoon Main Ghiri Adhori

further, although financial

Larki, a book of poetry by Zona Rao Ali;

With unfinished tasks ahead, sometimes her poor health is a source of

worry. But she assures herself that the
publishing house
.was a dream, and
someone will take it forward, even in
her absence. She jokingly says, "l am

and lJmeed-e-Sohor, an Urdu translation of Akhtar Baloch's jaildiary.

As a publisher and voracious reader,
she listed some of her favourite books

among those she published: Aseen

Jeearo Aohiyoon, the Sindhi translation of Piers Paul Read's Alive: The Story
of the Andes Survivors by Mahmood

manage-

ment and marketing skills remain stumbling blocks

happy to head the first and only women's publishing house - but it is high
time others came forward."

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