Women Empowerment in Pakistan with Special Reference to Islamic Viewpoint: An Empirical Study

Women empowerment is one of the most debatable issues in the development circles now-a-days. Pakistan being a democratic and an Islamic state, the issue of women empowerment faces new challenges. Considering its multidimensional nature and to give an empirical aspect to this study, an index is developed about the knowledge of true Islamic teachings and values. In this paper, an attempt is made to remove the miss-conception that ‘Islam ’ as a religion hinders the way of women empowerment, using regression analysis based on the primary data from a district of Southern Punjab. The results show that Islamic concept of women empowerment strengthened by the women’s education, education of her household members, access to media, health facilities, less no of household members along with no fear of violence. Finally, it is concluded that Islam as a religion ensures maximum women’s rights. It is our typical social norms, old traditions imported from other religions and ignorance from the true teachings of Islam, which has made today’s women vulnerable