Married at 17, mother at 18, destitute at 19 – how Qandeel Baloch fought back before she was cut short

July 16, 2016, NewsCrunch

Most people especially in India may remember Qandeel Baloch, 26, as a Pakistani Poonam Pandey, who would occasionally act crazy.

There was more to Qandeel Baloch than offering her hand to Imran Khan or Virat Kohli or threatening to strip if Pakistan won a cricket game.

This week she had spoken to Dawn after a man called Ashiq Hussain had surfaced claiming that he had married her in 2008 and that the couple had a son, who now lived with him.

In the long interview, Qandeel Baloch had given her side of the story.

Born as Fouzia Azeem to a middle-class rural Baloch family, Qandeel Baloch was married off to Ashiq Hussain, against her wish. She said Ashiq Hussain was uneducated and physically abusive. She never connected to him.

Qandeel Baloch got pregnant in no time and the child made her stay in a forced marriage for a year and half. She would have walked out of the marriage otherwise in a month, she had said. 

She wanted to study, get a job and stand on her own feet, and Ashiq Hussain reportedly said he would burn her beautiful face with acid, if she did any of that.

So, she ran away, along with her child. After her family refused to support her, she took refuge in a local branch of Darul Aman, a government run home for destitute women.

Darul Amans are notorious in Pakistanand frequently compared to prisons. Her son fell sick there forcing her to give him up to his father. She was never allowed to interact with her son again. 

She got out of Darul Aman and did odd jobs including a bus hostess. She also did her 10^th and later did her Bachelors in private.

Qandeel Baloch’s job choices improved, after stints in Daewoo and Lever Brothers, she started working in showbiz in 2012.

 She started with small fashion shows, small photoshoots, TV shows that gave her visibility.

Then she discovered Internet, YouTube, controversies, which made her a widely reviled yet watched figure in Pakistan.

If gossip is to be believed, she was to appear in Big Boss 10, and that would have got her into big league.

Qandeel Baloch used her money to help her parents, buying them a home in Multan. She helped her sister marry, paying a big dowry. She had gone home to celebrate Eid, when her brother shot or strangled her to save ‘family honour’.

Qandeel Baloch had two regrets. One, she had been cut off from her son, who she hoped would understand as he grew old. 

Second, she felt Pakistan had never given her what was due. She had said she was a fashion icon, a feminist and a symbol of woman power.

She also told Dawn that she was consciously defying the patriarchal norms of the society acting the way she did.

She had told Dawn’s woman journalist, “This mardon ki society is bad. You probably know this already, think about the problems you face yourself.”

She continued: “I have struggled through difficulties to make a place for myself in showbiz. It was very difficult. What kind of problems I have faced, I don’t think anyone can understand.”

Those were among her last words.