Lajna Ima’illah Empowers Me

Munazzah Chou, Farnham

As a sister recently noted; the 1922 Committee of Conservative Party backbenchers, involved in the recent rapid turnover of British Prime Ministers has one thing in common with a group of pioneering Muslim women in rural India; a date. 100 years ago, on 25^th December 1922 Lajna Ima’illah was established. (The similarities between those women and the overwhelmingly male Tories possibly end there, and the 1922 committee was in fact formed in 1923) The aims of Lajna Imaillah were aspirational and inspirational, and included: religious and secular education for women, spreading of knowledge amongst all women through essays and lectures, helping those in need with practical assistance and creating unity through inclusivity.

To add some context to that time period, the very first female MP entered UK Parliament in 1919 while back in India, it was another 19 years before its first female MP was elected in 1938. So, 14 years prior to the election of India’s first female MP, in a small village in India 14 ladies signed up to join the all-female organisation, Lajna Ima’illah within the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community with ambitious plans for its members and their role in society.

Growing up 7 thousand kilometres away, and 7 decades later in Surrey, weekly classes were a fixture in my life as far back as I can remember. Every Friday evening my sister and I would attend lessons with our friends and learnt about our religious beliefs and practices. We took part in competitions involving public speaking, poetry, writing essays, and memorising chapters of the Holy Qur’an. We played in basketball, badminton and volleyball competitions. We walked to raise money for charities and made Christmas hampers for the homeless. We were given motivational talks by strong female role models such as Professor Amatul Majid Chaudry and encouraged to push ourselves academically and religiously. (Meanwhile, my sister and I were acutely aware that our brother did not appear to follow the same academically rigorous syllabus that we were.) Religious days were marked together with lectures; food for the soul and followed with homemade Pakistani delicacies; food for our gastric juices. And as we grew up we started to play our part in organising some of these events.

The origin of these activities and opportunities can be traced back to those 14 women 100 years ago and the establishment of Lajna Ima’illah in rural India by the second Khalifa of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community.  Hazrat Mirza Bashiruddin Mahmud Ahmad (may Allah be pleased with him) established Lajna Imaillah on the suggestion of his wife Hazrat Amatul Hai Sahiba to raise women’s ambitions and expectations of themselves religiously but also from a secular perspective. He wrote that, “In order to fulfil the aim and objective of the purpose of our creation, the efforts of women are as necessary as that of men. In my opinion, the perception of what Islam expects of women has not dawned upon them and how their lives should be spent whereby they can, attaining the pleasure of God, become the inheritors of the bounties of Allah Almighty, not only in the hereafter but in this world as well.”

He dismantled the misconception that the role of a woman in Islamic society is confined to the home when he observed that, “If one reflects, it will dawn upon them that most women do not have an understanding of whether they are capable of other work aside from daily chores.”

This situation is still a reality for many women throughout the world and was undeniably true of expectations of most women in 1922. But because of Lajna Ima’illah I have grown up believing that it is normal for women to host and organise large events, happily oblivious that this is not the experience of many girls and women throughout the world even now. In fact, I can’t find any other example of an event organised and run by women for women on a larger scale than Jalsa Salana or even a national ijtema.

The second Khalifa even linked the progress of the entire community to the progress of women. He wrote that, “besides their own spiritual and academic progress, the progress of the future Jamaat is mostly dependent upon the efforts of women.”

This progress cannot be achieved simply by being consumed in household chores or living a comfortable life of domesticity. He didn’t believe women should hide or be hidden in the home but that we should contribute to society, and in the process “… gain the lesson of enduring, with courage and resolve, various kinds of scorns and taunts or ridicule by the public.”

References

Tarikh-e-Ahmadiyyat, Vol. 4. Translation available at : https://www.alhakam.org/establishment-of-lajna-imaillah-and-its-glorious-outcomes/