The Women’s Action Forum, Lahore, and Aurat March Lahore have made a joint announcement that Aurat March 2025will take place in Lahore on February 12, the National Women’s Day. This year marks the eighth iteration of the march. The movement began when the first Aurat March was held on International Working Women's Day, March 8, 2018. The event has been taking place every year since in Karachi, Lahore, Islamabad, Multan and Hyderabad. Each chapter operates independently. The WAF has a longer, celebrated history. Formed in 1981 to protest the first conviction under Hudood Ordinance and the sentencing of Fehmida and Allah Bux who had married against their family’s wishes. WAF became the vanguard of defiance against the oppressive regime and has not stopped since.

Aurat March Lahore is a volunteer-run, feminist movement funded by donations. It maintains its independence through efforts of volunteers who dedicate their time and resources -- consciously distancing itself from political parties, businesses and other NGOs. Each year, the march attracts diverse participants, including women, workers, students, trade unions and transgender groups. An annual theme, such as khudmukhtari (2020), women's health (2021), and siyasat, mazahmat, azadi (2023), shapes the manifesto, demands and art. The theme for 2025 is Feminist History.

In a shift from the traditional date of March 8, this year’s march will be held in February, on Pakistan's National Women's Day. KhawarMumtaz, a founding member of the WAF Lahore, recalls, “Women faced lathi charge, teargas and arrests. It was a watershed moment for women's struggle. The WAF established its characteristic resistance and autonomy. This year, it [the march] is being observed jointly (in Lahore) by the Women's Action Forum and Aurat March, with a call to all women to participate.”

WAF’s legacy is one of unwavering defiance. It has been a movement built on sofprotest, of strategic legal battles, of a refusal to cede ground. It is a history of women standing in the face of power, refusing to be erased and knowing that every act of resistance carves space for those who will come after.

The shift also addresses structural barriers that limit participation. Ramzan, beginning late in February, increases women’s gendered labour burdens. Invisible burdens like cooking, caregiving and ensuring the spiritual well-being of the householdmake participation in public protest even harder. By holding the march earlier, AM Lahore hopes to ensure broader participation in what, for many, is a rare space of collective solidarity and resistance.

This year’s theme, Feminist History, extends beyond National Women’s Day, recognising that every struggle with feminist underpinnings builds on indigenous resistance. From Fatima Sughra’s bold defiance in raising Pakistan’s flag in 1947 to the khawajasira community’s fight against colonial erasurefeminist resistance has taken many forms. These histories are systematically erased from public memory, their movements treated as footnotes.

At 2pm on February 12, the marchers will gather outside the Lahore Press Club and march down Edgerton Road to the PIA Building. The march, a vocal assertion of joy as well as resistance, will feature speeches, art installations and performances that highlight the demands for gender justice, the protection of free expression and calls for economic and climate equity.

As an urban movement, Aurat March receives disproportionate attention in public discourse, while some of the larger grassroots strugglesremain underrepresented. Movements like SindhianiTehreek, a revolutionary collective started by women in rural Sindh, for instance, often get overlooked. By challenging this erasure, this year’s theme reclaims the feminist histories written by those on the margins. The theme also underscores that feminist resistance is deeply rooted in Pakistan’s history. A steady cleansing of women from official and popular history leads many to believe that feminist politics is an alien and recent imposition on Pakistani society. This year’s theme resists that, drawing attention to the women who have resisted in previous eras, and the shared politics with struggles ongoing today. It is an assertion that history is not only written by the powerful — it is also carried forward by those who refuse to be silenced.

At 2pm on February 12, marchers will gather outside the Lahore Press Club and march down Edgerton Road to the PIA Building. The march, a vocal assertion of joy as well as resistance, will feature speeches, art installations and performances that highlight the demands for gender justice, the protection of free expression and calls for economic and climate equity.

One of the most distinctive aspects of the Lahore March is its use of art as a form of resistance. Movements across the world, from Palestinian resistance art to Chile’s UnViolador en Tu Camino performance, have long recognised that art is a tool of political confrontation. Art, collectively made and publicly displayed, transforms the streets, forcing those who would otherwise be passive viewers into co-creators of protest. The experience creates shared spaces of learning, solidarity, reckoning and reflection.

Some of this year’s art installations will include a purple chadar, inscribed with women’s personal experiences and messages of resilience, hope and inspiration. The chadar is a reminder that women and transgender people’s disappointment, heartbreak and grief are intimately tied to their public selves and their feminist politics. Each inscription is an assertion that survival is not just private — it is a shared struggle and must be made visible.

Another installation will be a participatory voting display where protesters will vote on commonly heard patriarchal phrases, both at home and in public life, that enforce moral policing and gender control: “Larkikaasligharuskasusralhotahai” (A girl’s place is with her in-laws), “Shadikiumarguzargaihai” (You’ve passed marriageable age), and “Tum larki ho, tumhensabarkarnachahiye” (You are a girl, you should be patient). The participants will mark the ones they have personally heard, highlighting the insidious ways that patriarchy operates through everyday language. These seemingly harmless words shape how women are conditioned into submission.

The refusal of a no-objection certificate for Aurat March Lahore by the deputy commissioner’s office this year follows a consistent pattern of state suppression.

Like previous years, Aurat March Lahore has approached the Lahore High Court to protect the constitutional right to peaceful assembly. The case will be heard on Monday, February 3. "We have filed this petition with the expectation that the Honourable Lahore High Court will uphold its own ruling from previous years in both its letter and spirit," says Fatima Jaferi, an Aurat March volunteer and lawyer.

The battle in courts for protection of the right to assembly is just one reminder of the consistent need to resist, in manners public and private, against the erasure of women, transgender people and marginalised ethnicities and religions. Amid the expanding oppression of recent times, the 2025 theme is a poignant reminder that defiance must be constant, across generations and regions.

The writer,a feminist, is editor-in-chief at Culturico