Kitabiyyah Mother and Ḥaḍanah of the Muslim Child: Religious and Legal Practices in Pakistan

The article attempts to analyze the religious and legal practices inside Pakistan regarding the issue of the kitabiyyah mother and ḥaḍanah of any Muslim child. The discussion primarily addresses the major issues emphasizing kitabiyyah mother and her relatives’ right to retain the custody of the Muslim child, and duration of ḥaḍanah under the supervision of kitabiyyah mother in shari‘ah and Pakistani Family Laws. Furthermore, it argues that kitabiyyah mother is permitted to raise the Muslim child according to her faith under both Islamic and Pakistani Family Laws. The article is delimited to the opinions of four Sunni schools of thoughts, Statute law, and Case laws. Nonetheless, in-depth comparative analysis has been carried out in most persuasive way to examine the rules related to kitabiyyah mother in custody of Muslim child after divorce under both Islamic Law, and Case Laws in Pakistan. Additionally, the existing similarities and differences consequent to religious differences have also been appropriately figured out to point out plausible way forward to address prevailing schism. Contradictions between the legal practices and Islamic law need keen attention Islamic and legal scholars to carefully craft to harmonize both in the best interest of child.

Social Media and Youth: Uses, Problems and Prospects A Case Study of Southern Punjab

The current study aimed to explore and investigate the social media uses and gratifications among youth of Southern Punjab, Pakistan with regard to problems and prospects. The researcher aimed to investigate the social media usage behavior, preferences, gratification and motives of the youth aged between 17-25 years to measure the prospects and problems of social media usage patterns. It also aimed to investigate the dependency of the youth in terms of seeking relaxation, information, knowledge or other entertainment through different website of social media on internet. It was also measured that the level of impact of social media on social interactions, on religious information and level of trust and reliability over the information provided by social media websites. Survey research design has been utilized as a data collection tool by using pre constructed questionnaire screened after pilot study. A total of 1200 respondents were selected by purposive sampling technique from the three selected districts which are divisional headquarters of Southern Punjab, Pakistan as per population statistics given by Federal Bureau of Statistics and Punjab Development Statistics for probability of sample. Out of 1200 respondents 1000 respondents responded to questionnaire. The findings indicate that almost most of the respondents were having social media accounts but Facebook users were dominant as compared to other social networking sites. Most of the respondents shared to use social media between 2-4 hours per day. There was significant association between education and consideration of social media as a major source of information about different events and happenings. The photo sharing activity was the preferred activity by the majority of the youth groups as compared to other activities like accessing poetry, videos and quotations. The results supported the both theories Uses and Gratification and Social Learning as there was significant difference of usage patterns among youth belonging to different socio-demographic characteristics. They were interpreting social media contents differently for the sake of their gratifications by using social media. Similarly, the learning patterns through social media and getting its impact on the lifestyles, attitudes, and interaction patterns were significant. The hypotheses of the study were also cheeked through the statistical test chi-square. The study also identified a few areas for future researchers.