Renowned actor and the National Goodwill Ambassador for UNHCR, Mahira Khan has ‘joined the chorus’ in an attempt to raise awareness about domestic and sexual violence. The campaign – initiated to prevent domestic abuse and sexual assault in the 54 countries of the Commonwealth – is being helmed by the No More Foundation, the Commonwealth Secretariat and Gentle Forces.
Sharing information about the same on her Instagram via a video message, Khan says, “Hi I’m Mahira Khan, an actor from Pakistan, and I invite you to ‘join the chorus’ and say ‘no more’ to domestic and sexual violence.” She captioned the video, “We either know of or have experienced firsthand, some sort of abuse or sexual/domestic violence. The more we speak up, the more we break the silence surrounding domestic and sexual violence.”
In a follow-up post, she reinstated, “Let’s break the culture of silence that has enabled domestic and sexual violence to persist for so long.” To caption this, she wrote, “The more we speak out against domestic and sexual violence, the more power we take from our abusers.”
According to the campaign’s website, #JoinTheChorus “aims to increase awareness of domestic and sexual violence and call for collective action”. This campaign is led by artist FKA twigs, who has been joined by renowned public figures such as Rose Byrne, Joselyn Dumas, Khan, and Thandiwe Newton.
As per the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), “32% of women have experienced physical violence and 40% of ever-married women have suffered from spousal abuse at some point in their life (The Pakistan Demographic and Health Survey)” in Pakistan.
The UN agency, that aims to improve reproductive and maternal health worldwide, further adds that “One in two Pakistani women who have experienced violence never sought help or told anyone about the violence they had experienced.”
