She’ll be first Pak Hindu senator

Lahore, February 21

Krishna Kumari Kolhi from Thar in Pakistan’s Sindh province will become the first-ever Hindu woman senator in the Muslim-majority country, the ruling Pakistan People’s Party said today.

The Election Commission of Pakistan has accepted the papers of 39-year-old Kolhi who was nominated by the ruling PPP for a senate seat on minority from Sindh Assembly. The election will take place on March 3. Kolhi’s caste is mentioned at No. 23 in the Pakistani Schedule Castes Ordinance-1957.

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“The honour to nominate first-ever non-Muslim Senator is also enjoyed by the PPP, which elected a Dalit, Dr Khatumal Jeewan, as senator in 2009 on a general seat. Likewise, Engineer Gianchand is the second Dalit to be elected as senator in 2015 by the PPP also on a general seat,” a PPP spokesman said.

Bilawal Bhutto Zardari-led PPP also nominated and got elected Hariram Kishorilal as senator on seat reserved for non-Muslims from Sindh in 2012. “With the election of Krishna Kolhi and Anwar Laldean, a Christian worker of the party, the number of non-Muslims elected so far as senators by the PPP would grow to six, an unmatched representation in the upper house for minorities by any other political parties in the 70 years history of Pakistan,” the spokesman added.

Kolhi belongs to a remote village in Nagarparkar district of Thar in Sindh province. Born to a poor peasant, Jugno Kolhi, in February 1979, Kolhi and her family members spent nearly three years in a private jail owned by the landlord of Kunri of Umerkot district. — PTI

Freedom fighter link

• A Dalit, Krishna Kumari Kolhi belongs to the family of freedom fighter Rooplo Kolhi, hanged by the British in 1858
• Her peasant family spent three years in captivity of a landlord in Umerkot, Krishna being a grade 3 student then
• Married off at 16, she did her master's degree in sociology from Sindh University in 2013