Ary Digital is set to unveil its latest drama that focuses on the foray of women in the army in various categories. This comes on the tails of the telefilm ‘Aik Thi Nigar’ which details the life and achievements of Lt. Gen. Nigar Johar. This seems to notify a shift in the marketing strategy that the army seems to use, as both of these media pieces where produces in collaboration with the media wing of the armed forces, ISPR. The question remains, does this signify a change towards a more women-centric approach whereby women are included more directly in the narrative of service and sacrifice to country rather than the previous roles of secondary characters, as mothers, daughters, wives, and sisters of the brave men who performed the primary act of service and sacrifice? While it is certainly true that women in these dramas are seen, perhaps for the first time on our TV screens, to engage directly with themes of service and nationalism in manner that was previously reserved only for the menfolk. However, the fact remains that women’s role in the Pakistani armed forces has almost exclusively been supplementary to main fighting force which is made entirely of men. Women serve in roles of doctors, nurses, teachers, technicians, lawyers etc, all of which are essentially support branches to the main elements of the armed forces, which is the operations branch, into which till date there has been little to no foray by the ‘fairer’ sex. The fact that women are restricted to these auxiliary and supported positions in an increasingly mechanized army also ties in with the traditional roles of women being considered as a support of their male peers. Thus, the question remains, to what extent are these portrayal of women in the armed forced a deviations from the created script of ‘acceptable’ roles for women in our society?
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