Jashn-e-Azadi: freedom is complete only when it belongs to everyone

This Independence Day, Gender Interactive Alliance (GIA) joins the country in celebrating Jashn-e-Azadi — and we do so with a simple commitment: freedom is complete only when it belongs to everyone.

Our Instagram message this year asked Pakistan to build a country where diversity is embraced and fundamental human rights are not rationed by gender, class, or who a family will still claim.

That is not a slogan for one day. It is the through-line of work our community has been doing in public, on our own terms.

Visibility as practice, not permission

On Transgender Day of Visibility, we named the programmes that keep khawaja sira, trans, and gender-diverse people in the room:

• Sarfarosh, a leadership, media, and self-protection camp that gathered trans women in Hunza
• Begum Bazaar, which turns public visibility into dignified income
• Transcend, kathak training led by Sheema Kirmani that ended in performance
• Binax, space for ordinary trans girlhood online

We exist loudly, creatively, and without waiting for permission. Independence Day is a reminder that the same dignity we claim in Hunza, in a bazaar stall, or on a stage in Karachi belongs in every CNIC queue, hospital ward, and classroom.

Today, let's commit to building an inclusive Pakistan where diversity is embraced and fundamental human rights belong to all.

From the team at Gender Interactive Alliance.

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