Pakistan gets superwoman
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Islamabad: Pakistan has now its own indigenous superwoman — Burka Avenger — one who shows a lot less skin than her Western counterparts.
Burqa Avenger is a mild-mannered teacher with secret martial arts skills who uses a flowing black burqa to hide her identity as she fights thugs seeking to shut down the girls’ school where she works. Sadly, it’s a battle Pakistanis are all too familiar with in the real world. Action in the Burqa Avenger cartoon series, which is scheduled to start running on Geo TV in early August, is much more light-hearted.
The bungling bad guys evoke more laughter than fear and are no match for the Burqa Avenger, first South Asian ninja who wields books and pens as weapons.Â
The Urdu language show is the brainchild of one of Pakistan’s biggest pop stars, Aaron Haroon Rashid — known to many as simply Haroon — who conceived of it as a way to emphasise the importance of girls’ education and teach children other lessons, such as not discriminating against others (religions) .Â
“Our episodes send strong messages to kids,” Rashid said. “But it is cloaked in pure entertainment, laughter, action and adventure. Since she is a woman, we could have dressed her up like Catwoman or Wonder Woman, but that wouldn’t have worked out in Pakistan.” He true identity is Jiya, whose father taught her karate.Â
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