BETTER-KNOWN around the world as just Malala, it’s been quite the year for the 24-year old who continues to inspire and be active on issues close to her heart.
She waded into the controversy around the wearing of hijabs at colleges in the southern Indian state of Karnataka. The 2014 Nobel prize winner was emphatic in her opposition – colleges in the BJP-run state said that they would no longer admit women wearing hijabs. It was against the dress or uniform code and applied to everyone regardless of their faith or individual preferences.
Malala posted a statement on Twitter, in which she described the rule as “horrifying”, saying that it is unfair that girls wearing hijabs are being asked not to attend classes in Karnataka colleges and educational institutes.
“Refusing to let girls go to school in their hijabs is horrifying. Objectification of women persists — for wearing less or more. Indian leaders must stop the marginalisation of Muslim women,” she wrote on Twitter.
She showed that she had lost none of her fire for standing up for women and girls whom she believed were being discriminated against – but the authorities say it is nothing to do with religion, simply about the way they want students to dress when they are learning.
In November 2021, the Pakistan-born activist got married in a small ceremony in Birmingham, where she lives since settling in Britain in 2014. “Today marks a precious day in my life.
Asser (Malik) and I tied the knot to be partners for life. We celebrated a small nikkah ceremony at home in Birmingham with our families. Please send us your prayers. We are excited to walk together for the journey ahead,” she wrote on Twitter.
Asser is the general manager of the Pakistan Cricket Board’s high-performance centre. In July 2021, Malala told British Vogue magazine that she was not sure if she would ever marry. “I still don’t understand why people have to get married. If you want to have a person in your life, why do you have to sign marriage papers, why can’t it just be a partnership?” she said.
The comment drew criticism from many social media users in Pakistan at the time.
In March 2021, Malala partnered with Apple TV+ to produce dramas and documentaries that focus on women and children. In 2018, the iPhone maker teamed up with her on Malala Fund (her charity) that seeks to extend secondary education opportunities to girls’ across the globe. In January 2021, the Malala Yousafzai Scholarship Act came into force. Under the Act, the US Agency of International Development (USAID) will be awarding 50 per cent of the merit and needs-based scholarship programmes across a wide range of academic disciplines to Pakistani women who meet the existing eligibility criteria. There is also a school in Fort Bend, US, which bears her name and is known as Malala Elementary.
She graduated in 2020 from the University of Oxford with a degree in philosophy, politics and economics. Now 24 years old, she advocates for girls’ education, with her non-profit Malala Fund having invested more than £1.5 million in Afghanistan.
Yousafzai continues to use her platform for good. During her school holidays, she travels abroad to meet with disadvantaged women and girls. For her birthday, she urges people to donate to the Malala Fund to provide practical assistance to those who most need it.
Her 2019 book We Are Displaced: My Journey and Stories from Refugee Girls Around the World highlighted the refugee experience. The book included Malala’s own experiences of being displaced in Pakistan, as well as nine others with similar stories. It was described as “an eye-opener to the refugee crisis in the postmodern world”.
When she was 15, Malala was shot in the head by militants from the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, an offshoot of the Afghan Taliban, in her home town in the Swat valley while on a school bus in 2012.
She recovered after months of treatment at home and abroad before co-writing a best-selling memoir titled I am Malala.