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Metronidazole overexposure in children and its association with new-onset Crohn’s disease (IBD)
- Mudassir Nisar, Hamza Ashraf, Haider Ashfaq
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- Journal:
- Antimicrobial Stewardship & Healthcare Epidemiology / Volume 4 / Issue 1 / 2024
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 14 February 2024, e23
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Evaluating the impact of sprinkler cycle and flow rate on dairy buffalo performance during heat stress
- Syed I. Hussain, Nisar Ahmad, Saeed Ahmad, Maqsood Akhter, Muhammad Q. Shahid
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- Journal of Dairy Research / Volume 90 / Issue 4 / November 2023
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 08 January 2024, pp. 357-362
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- November 2023
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The aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of the sprinkler cycle and flow rate on physiological, behavioural, and productive responses in dairy buffaloes. Nine Nili Ravi lactating buffaloes were subjected to three sprinkler cycles and two flow rates using a double replicated 3 × 3 Latin square design. The flow rates were 1.25 and 2 l/min, and the sprinkler cycles (minutes water on/off, number of cycles/h) were: 3/3, 10 cycles; 3/6, 7 cycles and 3/9, 5 cycles. The showering was applied from 0800 till 1630 h daily. In the first square of 21 d, each of the three sprinkler cycles was applied using a 1.25 l/min flow rate for 7 d per cycle. In the later square, the same treatments (sprinkler cycles) were applied using the 2 l/min flow rate. The average temperature humidity index during the study period was 85.7 ± 3.8 (Mean ± sd). The result showed that the 3/3 treatment group had lower body temperature and respiration rate than the other groups. The buffaloes in the 3/3 group produced 0.5 and 0.7 kg more milk with 1.4 and 2.4% more fat than the 3/6 and the 3/9 treatment groups, respectively. Similarly, the 2 l/min flow rate had a lower core body temperate and respiration rate and higher milk yield than the 1.25 l/min group. The 3/3 showering cycle with a 2 l/min flow rate appeared effective in improving physiological responses and milk yield in dairy buffaloes.
Somalia's evolving political market place: from famine and humanitarian crisis to permanent precarity
- Susanne Jaspars, Nisar Majid, Guhad M. Adan
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- The Journal of Modern African Studies / Volume 61 / Issue 3 / September 2023
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 20 October 2023, pp. 343-366
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- September 2023
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Somalia has a long history of famine and humanitarian crisis. This article focuses on the years 2008–2020, during which governance and aid practices changed substantially and which include three crisis periods. The article examines whether and how governance analysed as a political marketplace can help explain Somalia's repeated humanitarian crises and the manipulation of response. We argue that between 2008 and 2011 the political marketplace was a violent competitive oligopoly which contributed to famine, but that from 2012 a more collusive, informal political compact resulted in a status quo which avoided violent conflict or famine in 2017 and which functioned to keep external resources coming in. At the same time, this political arrangement benefits from the maintenance of a large group of displaced people in permanent precarity as a source of aid and labour.
TOWARDS REMOTE CONTROL OF MANUFACTURING MACHINES THROUGH ROBOT VISION SENSORS
- Nourhan Halawi Ghoson, Nisar Hakam, Zohreh Shakeri, Vincent Meyrueis, Stéphane Loubère, Khaled Benfriha
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- Journal:
- Proceedings of the Design Society / Volume 3 / July 2023
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 19 June 2023, pp. 3601-3610
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The remote management of equipment is part of the functionalities granted by the design principles of Industry 4.0. However, some critical operations are managed by operators, machine setup and initialization serve as a significant illustration. Since the initialization is a repetitive task, industrial robots with a smart vision system can undertake these duties, enhancing the autonomy and flexibility of the manufacturing process. The smart vision system is considered essential for the implementation of several characteristics of Industry 4.0. This paper introduces a novel solution for controlling manufacturing machines using an embedded camera on the robot. This implementation requires the development of an interactive interface, designed in accordance with the supervision system known as Manufacturing Execution System. The framework is implemented inside a manufacturing cell, demonstrating a quick response time and an improvement between the cameras.
Validation of a body condition scoring system in Nili Ravi dairy buffaloes (Bubalus bubalis): inter- and intra-assessor variability
- Sayyad H. Magsi, Nisar Ahmad, Muhammad A. Rashid, Musa Bah, Maqsood Akhter, Muhammad Q. Shahid
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- Journal:
- Journal of Dairy Research / Volume 89 / Issue 4 / November 2022
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 21 November 2022, pp. 382-385
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- November 2022
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The aim of the research reported in this Research Communication was to apply the 5-point body condition scoring (BCS) system to dairy buffaloes and subjectively validate it by assessing the intra- and inter-assessor agreement. For this purpose, the BCS system developed for dairy cows was applied to buffaloes. A total of 230 Nili Ravi buffaloes of varying parity, lactation stages and pregnancy status were enrolled from the Buffalo Research Institute, Pattoki, Pakistan. Four observers independently assigned BCS values to each enrolled buffalo in two phases, as follows: (1) during phase I, the assessors were trained for BCS assessment using a BCS chart developed by Elanco Animal Health Ltd.; and (2) during phase II, the assessors were trained using live buffaloes for BCS assessment. Kappa statistics (kw) were used to determine the intra- and inter-assessor agreement. The results revealed that the exact overall inter- and intra-assessor agreement was moderate (kw = 0.48–0.55) and increased to substantial levels after training on live animals (kw = 0.63–0.87). Furthermore, the intra- and inter-assessor exact agreement was higher (kw = 0.57–0.58) for buffaloes tied to the mangers compared to the buffaloes standing in the loafing area (kw = 0.50). The inter-assessor agreements within 0.25 and 0.5 points were almost perfect (kw = 0.97–1.0). The current results suggested that the 5-point BCS system (using a scale from 1 to 5 with 0.25 increments) had substantial agreement for assessment and repeatability when applied to buffaloes.
Perceived Stress Among Students of Private and Public Sector Medical Colleges of Pakistan: A Cross Sectional Study
- M. Fatima, Z. Mehdi, S. Saeed, A. Nisar, M. Zain, J. Binte Shakir, I. Aamer, F. Arain, M. Jawad, N. Aziz
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- Journal:
- European Psychiatry / Volume 65 / Issue S1 / June 2022
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 01 September 2022, pp. S303-S304
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Introduction
Medical-education is associated with high overall stress and it is important to identify relevant factors.
ObjectivesThe study was aimed to discern the differences in perceived stress among the students of public and private medical colleges of Pakistan and to identify factors subservient to any hypothesized difference.
MethodsThis cross-sectional study was conducted at different private and public medical colleges of Pakistan using validated tools: PSS-14 (Perceived Stress Scale) to find out the levels of stress faced by each sector and MSSQ (Medical Student Stressor Questionnaire) to determine the factors associated with increased stress.
ResultsTotal of 424 medical students from various public and private medical colleges of Pakistan (212 each) filled the questionnaires. The mean score +/- SD of PSS-14 was 36.17 ± 6.096 for the public sector and 36.29 ±5.732 for the private sector. Hence, there was no difference between the two comparative means of PSS score, t(422)=-0.213,p=0.831.The results for both sectors were classified as high perceived stress (27-40 score is high perceived stress). Out of 40 individual stress-causing factors in MSSQ, the students from private-sector scored higher as compared to public-sector: Quota System in examination t(422)=-3.951,p=0.000, stress caused by lack of time for friends and family t(422)=-3.225,p=0.001, stress caused by Tests/Examination t(422)=-2.131,p=0.034, stress caused by the parental wish for them to study medicine t(422)=-2.346,p=0.019 and stress caused by fear of getting poor marks t(422)=-2.183,p=0.030.
ConclusionsThere exists no overall difference in the perceived-stress among the medical students of public and private medical colleges despite private-sectors having significantly more operational financial resources.
DisclosureNo significant relationships.
8 - Governing Thirdness at Work
- Muhammad Azfar Nisar, Lahore University of Management Sciences, Pakistan
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- Governing Thirdness
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- 10 December 2021
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- 16 June 2022, pp 134-152
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Summary
The question of earning money ultimately confronts everyone in society and the khawaja sira are no exception. In this chapter, I focus on the sources of income and economic inclusion of the khawaja sira, most of whom live in deep poverty. In line with my focus on governance and citizenship of the khawaja sira, I primarily focus on the experience of khawaja sira in formal workplaces in this chapter. Another reason for this analytical choice is that, with the exception of begging, the informal ways of making money are increasingly drying up in most urban centres of Pakistan. As I discuss in more detail in the next chapter, there is a set of bureaucratic apparatuses that limit the khawaja sira's ability to make money even through begging. Moreover, formal employment is often presented as the most effective way to ensure economic inclusion of the khawaja sira. However, as I discuss in this chapter, given the various ways in which they are governed, disciplined, and ostracized in the workplace, this is not a straightforward ‘solution’ for the khawaja sira and would require a lot of associated work on creating inclusive workspaces. However, for the sake of comprehensiveness, I first provide a brief overview of their traditional informal sources of income before analysing their experiences of formal employment.
Traditional Source of Income
Traditionally, the most legitimate source of income for the khawaja sira was collection of badhai: money given to the khawaja sira at festivities such as marriage or birth of a child, generally accompanied by a dancing and singing performance by them. Badhai, a seemingly innocuous ceremonial activity, has at its roots in multiple intersecting historical discourses. The khawaja sira are given badhai at marriage ceremonies primarily because of traditional notions of their ability to confer fertility upon newlywed couples (Nanda 1990; Reddy 2005). However, another reason to remain in the good books of the khawaja sira, especially at ceremonial events such as marriage and birth of a child, was the fear of their curses, which historically have been considered very potent (Nanda 1990). According to many members of the community, yet another important reason the khawaja sira were historically socially sanctioned to visit homes where a newborn was present was to facilitate the adoption of children born with ambiguous genitals by the khawaja sira community.
9 - Governing Thirdness on the Street
- Muhammad Azfar Nisar, Lahore University of Management Sciences, Pakistan
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- Governing Thirdness
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- 16 June 2022, pp 153-168
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Summary
If We Don't Beg, Should We Do Burglaries?
The governments are so arbitrary. They are creating strange laws. They may create a new strange law any day … Allah will hold them accountable one day. (Farzana)
The Department of Social Welfare, Women Development and Bait-ul-Maal, commonly called the Social Welfare Department (SWD), of the Government of Punjab launched a rehabilitation programme for beggars in 2014 to minimize begging in urban public spaces in Lahore. Under this programme, which was similar in its ambitions to the anti-panhandling and anti-homeless laws in multiple parts of the world, the individuals caught begging at urban public places were brought to the Beggars’ Home (also known as beggars’ rehabilitation center), a welfare facility established by the SWD where the beggars were detained for a few days and also provided medical and religious treatment and vocational training. According to the official website of the SWD, the khawaja sira were provided free medical, vocational, and religious treatment. However, in practice, no vocational or technical training is provided. Instead, the Beggars’ Home worked primarily as a detention centre where the beggars were kept hidden from the public eye under the guise of rehabilitation.
Since begging was the most common way the khawaja sira were able to eke out a living, they had been disproportionately affected by this programme.
They stop us from begging. What do we do if we don't beg? Look at our clothes, our shoes. The winter is coming. If we don't beg what do we do? (Nargis)
You tell us what we should do if we don't beg. Should we do burglaries? We have to beg to stay alive. They have created this new rule out of nowhere [that we can't beg]. They don't listen to anyone. One can't appeal to their decision. The people [begging] on the roads [at traffic signals] men, women, and us, we have to carve out a living by begging. We can't do daily wages labour; we don't have any family to support us. Should we just jump in water in die? (Rosy)
Indeed, given their trying financial situation, many considered begging to be one of their most fundamental rights in society.
This is so unfair that people from other cities can come to Lahore and earn a living but the khawaja sira who are descendants [jaddi] of the area are not allowed to beg. (Saeeda)
6 - Resisting Legal Thirdness
- Muhammad Azfar Nisar, Lahore University of Management Sciences, Pakistan
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- Governing Thirdness
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- 10 December 2021
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- 16 June 2022, pp 100-114
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Summary
There is no use of the third gender when one doesn't have any resources or [social] support … The Supreme Court had directed the government to give us all our rights, but their decision was not implemented. The government doesn't accept us … It [only] implemented the [part of the decision about] IDs so that it could claim it had done something for the khawaja sira. The ID doesn't provide us food or fulfill any of our basic needs. (Ashi, chose to register as a khawaja sira)
The government has done nothing for us. Allowing us to have IDs [as khawaja sira] is not a big deal. We don't even want to have IDs as khawaja sira because we can't do hajj [mandatory pilgrimage for Muslims] and then there are also other things [like share in inheritance] where we face hurdles [if we register as khawaja sira]. (Nadia, chose to register as a man)
While the Supreme Court decision and its subsequent implementation by NADRA was accompanied by much fanfare, the response of the khawaja sira to this new third gender category has been less than overwhelming, with most khawaja sira choosing to register as men instead of opting for the third gender categorization. According to a 2015 report, only 1,432 khawaja sira had opted for the third gender category introduced by NADRA (The News 2015). As the estimated number of khawaja sira in Pakistan ranges from 80,000 to 400,000 (Baig 2012; Ebrahim 2013) it implies that less than 2 per cent of the khawaja sira had registered under the third gender category since it became officially available to them in 2011. Most of my research participants who had IDs (as men) prior to the creation of the third gender category elected not to get their IDs as khawaja sira after the Supreme Court decision. More importantly, my interactions with the khawaja sira and the frontline workers of NADRA suggest that a considerable number of khawaja sira who got their IDs after the aforementioned decision still chose to register as men. Another indication of the limited appeal of the third gender category for the khawaja sira became apparent when the 2017 census of Pakistan found only 10,418 individuals in the category.
Index
- Muhammad Azfar Nisar, Lahore University of Management Sciences, Pakistan
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- Governing Thirdness
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Bibliography
- Muhammad Azfar Nisar, Lahore University of Management Sciences, Pakistan
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- Governing Thirdness
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- 16 June 2022, pp 204-221
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2 - Governing Thirdness through Religion, History, and Language
- Muhammad Azfar Nisar, Lahore University of Management Sciences, Pakistan
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- Governing Thirdness
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- 16 June 2022, pp 20-36
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Summary
There are multiple terms used to refer to the khawaja sira community in Pakistan, the most common in early academic literature being hijra, khusra, and khawaja sira. These terms have similar meaning in contemporary usage in Pakistani society and are generally considered umbrella terms that include all individuals who do not conform to their socially assigned gender or sexual identity. Within the khawaja sira community, however, these different terms are associated with significant internal discourses of authenticity that govern the identity, livelihood, and behaviour of the khawaja sira. As is documented most prominently by Faris Khan (2014) and Reddy (2005), there is a lot of internal tension within the khawaja sira community about their relative status vis-à-vis each other. As I discuss later, these terms are often used to communicate particular identity and status to both insiders and outsiders.
In terms of their usage within the khawaja sira community, the terms hijra and khusra are largely considered synonymous, with the latter being used more commonly by Punjabi speakers (most of my research participants). These terms are almost always invoked in comparison to the term zenana to claim authenticity and difference within the khawaja sira community. The label khusray (the plural of khusra) is usually reserved for individuals who have undergone surgical modification (generally genital excision of testicles and penis) of their body. This practice, which is increasingly becoming uncommon in Pakistan given the religious stigma associated with it, is much more common among Indian hijras (Reddy 2005) and considered a rite of passage to join the community. However, members of the khawaja sira community who identify as khusra generally claim to be born as intersex individuals and do not mention surgical modification of the body to outsiders. The khusray consider themselves to be the most authentic representatives of thirdness because they claim to be the only subgroup within the khawaja sira community that conforms to the traditional notions of authenticity and legitimacy about the khawaja sira identity. In doing so, the khusray reinforce the traditional notion that body is a major, if not the exclusive, site from which an authentic khawaja sira identity can be claimed.
11 - Waste, Governance, and Inclusion
- Muhammad Azfar Nisar, Lahore University of Management Sciences, Pakistan
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- Governing Thirdness
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- 10 December 2021
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- 16 June 2022, pp 186-199
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When I started my fieldwork, I was interested in investigating the multiple forms of governance that intersect with the lives of the khawaja sira and how this intersection influences social equity by creating, sustaining, or contesting conditions of living at margins of the state and society. Various chapters of this book are explorations of this main theme. From the informal institutions identifying and disciplining the khawaja sira, to the insistence of law to fix their fluid identity, and the frontline workers limiting their presence in the public space, it is easy to identify a unifying theme operating through all these disparate forms of governance. In this concluding chapter, I explain this central governing leitmotif through the metaphor of waste.
There are multiple reasons for choosing this metaphor. As Jacobsen and Poder (2008, 51) note, ‘[w]aste is a conceptual tool of thinking sociologically with negations’. There are multiple sister concepts like the homo sacer (Agamben 1998; Catlaw 2007), abject citizenship (Kristeva 1982; Sharkey and Shields 2008), and inexistence (Badiou 2009; Prozorov 2014a, 2014b) that speak to some aspects of the khawaja sira's social situation. However, the metaphor of waste, which combines the idea of being discarded with the emotion of disgust, not only communicates best their social standing but also helps explain bureaucratic framing of the khawaja sira as moral pollutants in the public space.
In this regard, Douglas’ (1966) watershed work on waste is insightful. While many researchers have noted the problems associated with categorization schemas of society, it was Douglas who most clearly articulated that things that cannot be categorized easily given the governing social norms and categorization schemas, ‘matter out of place’, are often deemed disgusting, impure, and, hence, classified as waste. In other words, ‘the origin of waste stems from a social bifurcation between integrated and repressed individuals’ (Jacobsen and Poder 2008, 51). While Douglas’ work focused on all things (and people) classified as waste, it was Bauman (2004) who enunciated the concept of human waste most clearly. Bauman's concept of human waste (or wasted humans) aims to capture the experiences of the others, the deviants and the minorities who represent the failure of the classifying and order-building business of the state.
7 - Governing Thirdness at the Bureaucratic Offices
- Muhammad Azfar Nisar, Lahore University of Management Sciences, Pakistan
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- Governing Thirdness
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- 10 December 2021
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- 16 June 2022, pp 120-133
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Following the global trend, and responding to the wave of terrorism since the start of the twenty-first century, there has been an increased focus by the state agencies in Pakistan to make sure that every citizen has a legal ID. This politico-legal environment has seen the khawaja sira—who traditionally did not have legal IDs—increasingly becoming concerned about having a legal ID. As mentioned in Chapter 5, a survey by the SWD found that only 16 per cent of the khawaja sira had legal IDs by 2019.1 While there were multiple factors due to which a very low percentage of khawaja sira had a legal ID, a major reason was that they seldom needed a formal ID in their routine lives. Shunned from formal institutions and workplaces, acquiring a legal ID rarely used to be a priority for them.
Owing to the mushrooming security checkpoints in all major urban centres of Pakistan and overall increased state surveillance, getting the legal ID has gradually become a major concern for the khawaja sira in recent years. For example, Rania, a khawaja sira rights advocate, mentioned that she had never felt the need to have a legal ID for anything until recently. However, due to the heightened security situation in Pakistan, she felt the obligation to acquire a legal ID. Similarly, another khawaja sira whose ID had been stolen a while back said that she never thought of applying for a new ID until recently as ‘one can't live without having a legal ID anymore’. Many other khawaja sira also reported increasingly being asked to prove their (legal and sexual) identity at security checkpoints by the police. Another factor contributing to the increased importance of legal IDs was the introduction of the legal third gender category by the government. As noted in the previous chapter, for some khawaja sira the legal ID represented a document that legitimized their unique identity.
While having a legal ID had become increasingly important for their everyday lives, at the time of my fieldwork most khawaja sira found it difficult to acquire it due to lack of cooperation by family members and harassment by cis-gender applicants at the frontline offices of NADRA.
1 - Governance, Thirdness, and the Khawaja Sira of Pakistan
- Muhammad Azfar Nisar, Lahore University of Management Sciences, Pakistan
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- Governing Thirdness
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- 10 December 2021
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- 16 June 2022, pp 1-19
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Summary
In 2009, a few khawaja sira returning from a private wedding were arrested, maltreated, and harassed by some local policemen in Taxila, Pakistan. This incident, although no different from many others in a long history of violence and exclusion faced by the khawaja sira in Pakistan, proved momentous. Moved by their plight, Aslam Khaki, a local jurist filed a writ petition in the Supreme Court of Pakistan about the legal rights of the khawaja sira (Redding 2015). From 2009 to 2011, the Supreme Court of Pakistan gave multiple directives regarding the social position and legal identity of the khawaja sira, the most prominent of which was the creation of a new gender category to recognize their unique identity. In the final decision, the Supreme Court declared that the khawaja sira
in their own rights are citizens of this country and subject to the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, 1973, their rights, obligations including right to life and dignity are equally protected. Thus, no discrimination, for any reason, is possible against them as far as their rights and obligations are concerned.
This decision was the first time that the historically marginalized khawaja sira community of Pakistan was recognized by the legal and administrative apparatus of the country.
After the Supreme Court decision, the National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA)—the public agency in Pakistan which issues legal IDs (known as Computerized National Identity Cards or simply CNIC)—created a third gender category, officially called ‘Khawaja Sira’, in its national registration system. Celebrated at the time as a watershed moment by human rights advocates, there were high hopes associated with the Supreme Court decision. It was assumed at the time that legal recognition would also result in better socioeconomic inclusion of the khawaja sira community of Pakistan. However, the subsequent limited impact of this case on the lives of the khawaja sira and the almost unanimous disavowalof the legal third gender category by the khawaja sira community tells a completely different story.
In this story, legal recognition of marginalized groups like the khawaja sira community, especially when done on the basis of problematic discourses, represents a minor part of the socio-administrative apparatus that governs their lives.
4 - Governance in the Khawaja Sira Community
- Muhammad Azfar Nisar, Lahore University of Management Sciences, Pakistan
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- Governing Thirdness
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- 10 December 2021
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- 16 June 2022, pp 60-78
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Summary
The subordinate status of a counterpublic does not simply reflect identities formed elsewhere; participation in such a public is one of the ways its members’ identities are formed and transformed. A hierarchy or stigma is the assumed background of practice. One enters at one's own risk (Warner 2002).
Individuals leaving or being thrown away from their families due to their perceived deviance from traditional notions of masculinity—whether that is because of their femininity, impotence, intersex characteristics, or some other reason—often end up joining the khawaja sira community soon afterwards. For a variety of reasons, the khawaja sira community is the only social group that welcomes them. Living alone is seldom an option for most individuals in Pakistan because society considers living as a family a normative ideal (Ebrahim 2013). This is especially the case for single women and the khawaja sira for whom renting rooms or apartments can be a nightmare given the reluctance of landlords and the (moral) suspicion with which they are viewed. Adult men in the vicinity can be a nightmare to deal with as a single woman or a khawaja sira, who often struggle to cope with the unwelcome advances of the men trying out their luck with what they often perceive as someone ‘open for business’. Moreover, as Cavalcante (2016) notes in the context of transgender lives, ‘[d]ue to the marginality and precariousness of gender variance, living a transgender life requires reliable structures of care and concern; structures that help to make the management of everyday life possible’ (118). The khawaja sira community through its extensive kinship system provides precisely this ‘structure of care’ where individuals discarded by their family find refuge.
For the khawaja sira, their community is a wide umbrella that gives shelter to all individuals who want to join them. Every new entrant, whether they are joining because of their femininity, impotence, or any other issue related to gender or sexuality, can find someone who can relate to their story within the khawaja sira community. In my observation, everyone appeared to be accepted with open arms within the community. There are certainly internal hierarchies and discourses of authenticity, especially between those who have undergone emasculation.
10 - Resisting Bureaucratic Governance of Thirdness
- Muhammad Azfar Nisar, Lahore University of Management Sciences, Pakistan
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- Governing Thirdness
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- 10 December 2021
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- 16 June 2022, pp 169-185
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Summary
The police stop us at the traffic signals. I beg them and beseech them to let me go. (Nazia)
When I go to beg somewhere [and any police officer sees me], they say, ‘What are you doing? Don't beg here, go there [out of our jurisdiction]’. If they try to detain me, I throw myself at their feet and implore them to leave me [which usually works]. Whatever money I have on me; they take that away. (Meera)
The khawaja sira often find themselves on the receiving end of disproportionate administrative burden, hyper-surveillance, and moral policing by frontline workers of government. An important consequence of these administrator–citizen interactions is the curtailment of their everyday citizenship and social inclusion. Although one can romanticize the idea of resistance and ‘speaking truth to power’ (Farmer 2003), and academics are perhaps guiltier of it than anyone else, the harsh reality of the lives of most marginalized individuals is that they have to enact ‘cost reduction’ strategies (Emerson 1962) when confronted by the threat of power by the state officials. As Scott (1992) argues, ‘[w]ith rare, but significant, exceptions the public performance of the subordinate will, out of prudence, fear and the desire to curry favor, be shaped to appeal to the expectations of the powerful’ (55). That is why various performative and verbal ‘gestures of submission’ (Held 1999) are often the typical response of the khawaja sira when they encounter bureaucrats with the power to detain or arrest them. These gestures of submission, often a combination of bodily and speech acts (such as falling to the feet or imploring loudly), are quite common among the individuals of lower socio-economic status when confronted by those in authority in Pakistan.
These gestures of submission are meant to reaffirm the status and self-image of the police officials. For the khawaja sira, these act as short-term rational cost strategies that minimize the cost of compliance to the ‘powerful other’ (Emerson 1962, 35), in this case the cis-gendered police officers acting on behalf of the state. However, as Emerson (1962) notes, cost-reduction strategies seldom act as balancing operations in asymmetric power relations.
Part III - Bureaucratic Governance
- Muhammad Azfar Nisar, Lahore University of Management Sciences, Pakistan
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- Governing Thirdness
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- 10 December 2021
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- 16 June 2022, pp 115-119
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Summary
It seems to me that the real political task in a society such as ours is to critique the working of institutions which appear to be both neutral and independent, to criticise them in such a manner that the political violence which has always exercised itself obscurely through them will be unmasked so that one can fight them. (Foucault and Chomsky 2006, 41)
While we often focus on what is written in laws and policies as an indicator of citizenship and rights of different groups, frontline offices of the government are the major sites where the classification regimes of the government actually come to fruition. From categorization at birth (through the birth certificate) to issuance of official identity (cards) and eligibility for various services of the state, frontline workers make most decisions that influence the lives of marginalized groups in many significant ways. This happens because identity in contemporary states is formed only when a citizen passes through the obligatory (bureaucratic) passage points (Callon 1986; Hardy 2003). Hence, the interaction between citizens and street-level bureaucrats—members of bureaucracy who directly deal with the public—represents this critical juncture where formal rules intersect with social power relations to form realized public policies.
The paradigmatic case of the classifying role of frontline bureaucrats is illustrative in this regard: Who gets classified as deserving and who does not—though partly determined by official policy (Schneider and Ingram 1993)—is influenced to a great degree by the choices of the frontline bureaucrats of different government departments. While one individual is given a verbal warning, another is given the full financial penalty under the given law for committing the same transgression (Epp, Maynard-Moody, and Haider-Markel 2014). Similarly, individuals applying for social welfare might be classified differently on the deserving–undeserving axis based on the discretion of the frontline workers (Maynard-Moody and Musheno 2003; Schram, Fording and Soss 2009). Frontline workers may also withhold services from transgender individuals considered ‘not normal’, sometimes with deadly consequences (Fernandez 1988; J. K. Taylor 2007). These multiple bureaucratic agential cuts (Barad 2003) influence individuals not just by defining who they are and what is socially acceptable but also by limiting and defining the possibilities open to them in life.
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- Muhammad Azfar Nisar, Lahore University of Management Sciences, Pakistan
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- Book:
- Governing Thirdness
- Published online:
- 10 December 2021
- Print publication:
- 16 June 2022, pp vii-viii
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3 - Governing Thirdness in the Family
- Muhammad Azfar Nisar, Lahore University of Management Sciences, Pakistan
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- Book:
- Governing Thirdness
- Published online:
- 10 December 2021
- Print publication:
- 16 June 2022, pp 42-59
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Summary
Family is an important informal boundary-making apparatus where individuals are classified along the normal–abnormal axis. This classification plays an important role in enforcing the social norms related to gender and sexuality (Feder 1997). Differences on these axes of identity are not taken lightly within Pakistani families and any individual deemed to be deviating from social norms is exposed to a range of disciplinary techniques aimed at correcting their socially defined deviant behaviour. The disciplinary practices and violence to which the young khawaja sira are exposed in their families seem to stem from two different impulses. On the one hand, parents are concerned for the safety and well-being of their child who, they correctly suspect, will be seen as deviant or abnormal, will face bullying and harassment at school, and will probably not find formal jobs later in life. On the other, they are also worried because the moral pollution associated with the khawaja sira is considered contagious; it infects their whole family, tainting their name and honour, and exposing all members of the family to harassment, teasing, and bullying. The institution of family is also exposed to disciplinary pressures mediated through extended kinship networks, neighbours, and friends of the family who make sure that the dominant gender norms are followed within each family. Overall, family and (significant) others play an important role in ensuring that children or young adults deviating from such norms either become ‘normal’ by conforming to their gender assigned at birth or get relegated to the formal and informal social institutions meant to ‘keep them in their place’ where it is ‘normal’ for such people to end up.
Categorization at Birth
As soon as a baby is born, the material-discursive apparatus comprising the parents, doctors, bureaucratic rules, social norms, and academic discourses declares whether ‘it's a girl!’ or ‘it's a boy!’ This declaration is supposed to decide the gender and sex identity of the newborn for its entire life and the infant is now supposed to spend life conforming to this declaration in which she/he had no choice.