Introduction
I argue that in order to fully understand the current position of women in Pakistani society, one must look at the history of Pakistan and the role of the state in actively formulating and promoting a specific definition of womanhood. Obviously the experiences of Pakistani women vary depending on their social position. But generally speaking, one cannot deny that the position of women relative to men in Pakistani society is subservient.[1]
This communication piece is meant to reveal an aspect of historical research through a lens that has been purposefully obscured by the state. I have done by collating Pakistani feminist perspectives on the subject of how the intellectual elite and military have actively and historically colluded to subjugate female citizens of Pakistan through a predominantly patriarchy state. This collaboration prescribes an Islamic identity for women to collectively achieve the ultimate nationalistic purpose: which is the attainment of a traditional Pakistani marriage.
Society uses marriage in this way to police her access to acceptance (even within her family of birth), belonging (to her community of peers), basic rights (to resources) as a citizen. This is done through predetermining the gendered roles, responsibilities, and functions she needs to fulfill in order to attain access to these. Although, of course, none of these is ever guaranteed to her by as a citizen of the state; either by her family of birth or post-marriage.
A successful marriage according to Pakistan's current statist ideology, is primarily male-centrist, perpetuates patriarchal norms and coercive. This current system prevents cis-gendered female children from making decisions that prioritize her as an individual — with cis-gendered women being seen as failures and treated as emotionally deficient outcasts by their own family and community — for not conforming to this marital system. Such a woman then, is not accepted by society as a complete person and indeed belongs to her parents as their property, instead of her husbands, with her purpose being to fulfill their needs above her own as they make use of her as a resource, instead.
What is problematic about this kind of use of "women" as a group, as a stable category of analysis, is that it assumes an ahistorical, universal unity between women based on a generalized notion of (women’s) subordination...this analytical move limits the definition of the female subject to gender identity.[2]
The above quote illustrates what the state has actualized — a homogenous Islamic identity — to ensure subordination of women by perpetuating the universal unity of marriage as the main stable category of analysis for the reality of cis-gendered women’s identity in Pakistan.
The construct of the Pakistani society is unveiled here, where a dominant culture of patriarchy fosters a sense of inter-generational alienation for cis-gendered female children and cis-gendered women revealing itself through physical, emotional and spiritual disconnection. This stems from sidelining women in decisions and underestimating their lifelong contributions “...instead of analytically demonstrating the (active) production of women as socioeconomic political groups within particular local contexts,...”[3].
I also shed light on how marriage serves as a tool to homogenize Pakistan’s diverse ethnocultural identities under a unified Islamic identity and control sociocultural narratives using colonial patriarchy concepts in service of the intellectual elite and military state. The Pakistan-Muslim bride’s life post-marriage is used to transmit these ideologies, however:
Women are not a monolithic group. Neither are Muslims. To speak of "women in Islam" presupposes that there is an uncontested, universal understanding and implementation of Islam and that it affects all Muslim women, all over the world, similarly.[4]
The cis-Gendered Female Child: A Symbol of Patriarchal Unification
Globally, in every society, cis-gender women have been used as symbols of unification and centralization of a patriarchal statist ideology.[5] This means that the traditional roles and images of women have been used to support and reinforce a social system where men primarily hold power.[6]
For example, women are often portrayed as caregivers, mothers, or symbols of the nation, which can reinforce traditional gender roles and patriarchal values.[7] These roles can be used to unify a nation under a common identity or ideology, that is male-dominated or patriarchal where men have more opportunity or privilege than women in terms of resources, access and ownership collectively termed material base which is how men dominate and exploit women culturally, politically and materially to retain control.[8]
In this way for centuries, across the world, the social systems involved in rearing a cis-gendered female child have successfully reduced her to a mental, emotional, and physical resource, in line with sociocultural norms and expectations.[9] A longitudinal study found that middle-aged women who are full-time homemakers are five times more likely to have problems with their memory and thinking skills compared to women with different jobs.[10] Privately and publicly, families and society police a cis-gendered female child’s mind and body which continue to inform social conditions for women across the globe to this day.[11] In this way women have been coerced into unpaid domestic work and forced into reproductive caregiving since childhood — in service of societal and nationalistic capital — which is not something that they themselves can benefit from.[12]
A rudimentary indicator has been worked out by The World Bank as the average time females spend on household provision of unpaid domestic and care work services for consumption (% of 24 hour day) in many countries across the globe.[13] Currently domestic and care work measured by this only includes:
...food preparation, dishwashing, cleaning and upkeep of a dwelling, laundry, ironing, gardening, caring for pets, shopping, installation, servicing and repair of personal and household goods, childcare, and care of the sick, elderly or disabled household members, among others.[14]
It is interesting to note ‘among others’ as the author feels mental and emotional labour are not accounted for, showing that there is still work that is not identified or classified within this indicator rendering components of labour of girls and women in service of the economy and society invisible.
When it comes to productive and non-productive labour by girls and women, especially after marriage, it is essential to measure the indicator of whether a country’s law provides for the valuation of non-monetary contributions.[15] This measures if the law provides equitable division of property to the stay-at-home spouse based on non-monetary contributions regardless of the owner of the property. Legal recognition of non-monetary contributions include “...caring for minor children, taking care of the family home, or any other non-monetized contribution from a stay-at-home spouse”.[16]
The cis-Gendered Female Child: A Symbol of Statist Ideology
In Pakistan — to date — neither of the aforementioned gender data indicators have even begun to be identified, described, classified or understood, let alone measured.[17] This is due to the unified machinations of the colonial patriarchal statist ideology, denigrating the very nature of domestic and reproductive roles as well as any non-monetary contributions to the household, society and the country.[18] The burden of ignored and coerced unpaid work that both cis-gendered girl children and cis-gendered women experience globally, as multiple locally contextualized socioeconomic political groups, globally, is associated with a greater mental health burden and negative effects on the quality of our life, with the situation in Pakistan being no exception.[19]
The excerpt below which discusses Bangladesh’s context from 2009 holds true for the context of modern day Pakistan — formerly West Pakistan — by simply replacing Bangladesh with Pakistan. The context fits perfectly in terms of how religious-statist ideology is centralized through patriarchy in Pakistani society today:
In Bangladesh, men dominate, oppress and exploit women through private (patriarchy) and public patriarchy. Private patriarchy is maintained in the family through the misinterpretation of religion and the non-recognition of unpaid work done by women at home. In the family women are considered as passive dependents and property of their husbands. Women are also excluded from economic and political power through public patriarchy. In the public arena women are only considered as sexual objects and patriarchy is maintained through sexual harassment. Capital accumulation further strengthens patriarchy in Bangladesh. In Bangladesh, men's attitudes towards women are shaped by advertisements, films,... and pornography where women are used as sexual objects (for men) to accumulate capital. Increasingly, men have started to use the dowry system for capital accumulation. Thus men in Bangladesh accumulate capital through private and public patriarchy.[20]
Today, Pakistan is one of the few countries left in the world, where according to the social norms, a woman cannot obtain a judgment of divorce in the same way as a man does, due to collective societal power dynamics.[21] This means that the divorce process when it comes to how the power dynamics play out in terms of society is unequal for women and men and does not include additional protections for women, such as prohibiting a husband from initiating divorce proceedings while his wife is pregnant.[22] Further, when it comes to social norms and decision-making within society, a woman in Pakistan does not have the same rights to remarry as a man either.[23] Thus pointing to how colonial patriarchy is the key to nation-building ideology through gendered control.
Shaping Her Fate: The Muslim cis-Gendered Girl Child’s Independence
Zooming into the historical context I write from: Pakistan — even prior to independence — due to colonial patriarchy, non-religious Muslim men had more power, agency and political mobility they could have utilized to promote that of Muslim women.[24] However, during this time both the religionist (conservative) and the modernist (liberal) Muslim men agreed upon religious content and domestic training education for girls and women. Further, by actively voting against women’s education with the founder of Aligarh stating “there could be no satisfactory education for Muhammadan females until a large number of Muhammadan men had received a sound education,” historically modernist and religionist Muslim men actively and collectively denied prioritizing Muslim women’s education, choosing colonial patriarchy, and ensuring we were forced into becoming custodians of religion and a stable, practical resource for the lives of Muslim men.[25]
Pakistani Muslim men have since maintained this private patriarchal so women act/behave in manners which are subservient domestically, by ensuring a hold over women through the social order termed ‘patriarchal bargaining’ by withholding the public rights of Muslim women in Pakistan.[26] To this day, the men from all walks of life in Pakistan have kept up with the changes in global trends of Islamic modernization and secular nationalism, upholding global traditions of colonialism privately by shifting their own male Muslim identity and respectability onto the minds and bodies of cis-gendered girl children and women in the name of culture and tradition, both in the political and legal spaces, thereby keeping Pakistani Muslim women sheltered, separate and isolated.[27]
This shows how state-endorsed patriarchal institutions have been instrumental in the shared colonial and religious commodification of Muslim women throughout society in our history.[28] This is still being done in terms of our attire and our role within the home, emphasized during General Zia’s rule, where the concept of “Chadar aur chardewari” (translates into: the veil and the four walls of the home) was promoted, suggesting that women should primarily reside within the confines of our homes.[29] Although the origins of this concept is ascribed by neo-liberal Pakistanis to Zia, this reality was enforced prior to partition, with women’s experiences of societal institutions linked with Islam not being accounted, documented or recognized.[30] This further reiterates women being reduced to a resource in the hands of private patriarchy via the implementation of discrete ideologies where religious nationalism and colonial gendered commodification inform, shape, decide and control a cis-gendered female’s lived narrative, trajectory and worth, respectively.[31]
The Muslim-Pakistani Bride: Central to a Religious-Colonial Ideology
There’s no better way to talk about how marriage is socially characterized for women in Pakistan than these lines by Pakistani poet Parveen Shakir:
It seems,
that those around me
speak a very different language.
That wavelength
at which we had maintained communication
has shifted to some other range.
Either my lexicon has grown obsolete
or their idiom has changed.
The path on which way words take me,
for the meaning of that path,
they have a separate glossary.
I remain silent to preserve the sanity of words,
and the only conversation
possible for me is with walls, with my loneliness, or my shadow.
I dread that moment
when, shrivelling within myself,
I may forget even the frequency
that allows me to talk to myself
(keeps me in touch)
so that one day
I am left shouting only, “May Day, May Day! (from Tanhai mei Meray Saath)
As can be seen from the poetry, the key contours of colonial-statist ideology is apparent firstly in how a Muslim woman’s married life erases her experiential perspective and self-identity by being in service to those around her which shows statist machinations on female autonomy.[32] Secondly, one can see colonial ideology, in which girls are inculcated with gender roles, and expected to live according to the prescriptions of society’s definition of how a woman ought to appear and come across, thereby existing as a mere reflection of everyone around her, not expressing herself. Both of these naturalize an imagined religious-nationalist-patriarchal-colonial community through female identity shaped by Pakistan’s Islamic religious elite and liberal non-religious intellectual elite who control married women’s behaviour norms.[33]
Using Women for Hegemony: A Singular Statist Narrative
This universal state-sponsored Islamic identity is neither natural to the people of Pakistan whose roots lie in the sub-continent, nor coherent with what makes Islam a timeless and adaptable religion in terms of it’s pluralistic inclusivity.[34] Instead, by ‘cherry-picking’ patriarchy traditions from other Muslim countries for their own purposes — with neither context nor understanding — the state prescribes a singular identity of what a Muslim looks like. Such constructs of identity are not rooted in any internal narrative of what it means to be a Muslim in this post-colonial, post-partition sub-continent, which is what being a Pakistani is in of itself.
This imaginary identity of a Muslim is implemented by the religious-nationalist-patriarchal community — as it tries to delineate what Islamic identity looks like — in an attempt to divorce religion from culture to purposefully erase ethnic historical traditions we share with the Indian sub-continent: modern day India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh and instead align with Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Iran and even Turkey. This is one way that the elite religious and non-religious collective statist narrative wipes out ethnocultural diversity under an imported Islamic identity. This incorporation of a frail and brittle rigidity of how-to-be a Muslim is exclusionary of our own identity, which has weakened protections for small non-Muslim minorities in Pakistan and consequently, skepticism has arisen regarding their legitimate status as ‘true’ Pakistanis.[35]
By forcing this fixed and narrow idea of a collective identity, the state ensures that there is no space for the autonomy or individuality of cis-gendered girl children, nor for us, women, to connect with our own racial and ethnic heritage through our bodies, lives, roots or ancestors. Often anything we do for our own autonomy or individuality, is termed as being foreign, imported and leads to men and women in service of patriarchal state ideals to questioning our Pakistani identity. This is done whilst imposing foreign notions of Muslim identity upon us, collectively leading to inter-generational gaslighting of an entire gender across Pakistan:
When the dominant culture is an agent of disconnection, the resulting relational images are such that a healthy sense of a racial-ethnic self is undermined. It has been noted that this multi-leveled disconnection poses the most serious threat to empowering alliance among different race women.[36]
Our — Pakistani women’s — separate ethnocultural identities are taken away from developing naturally and intrinsically based on our own respective trajectories, as part of who we are. Instead daughters are trained to become a resource for their families: emotionally and in every way that society requires henceforth. Then these same girls become wives whose worth is solely based on what they can provide to those around them in public and private patriarchal systems, denounced by Jinnah in 1944:
It is a crime against humanity that our women are shut up within the four walls of the houses as prisoners. There is no sanction anywhere for the deplorable conditions in which our women have to live. Your should take your women along with you as comrades in every sphere of life.[37]
Patriarchal colonial ideologies have actively aligned with the singular narrative of the religious state, effectively gaslighting the plethora of narratives that exist therein by presenting a singular narrative of Pakistan externally rather than embracing plurality.[38] There has been a strong political focus by the state in utilizing ‘private patriarchy’ to define womanhood.[39] Using the same hegemonic culture, the ruling intellectual elite shapes society’s norms and values, and by doing so, they maintain their status and control over what people ‘should be’ normal and acceptable.[40]
This theory of ruling elite hegemony can also be applied to the role of a woman within the construct of a Pakistani marriage also naturalized visually on television, via advertisements and on social media in line with prevailing domesticity ideals. These are pervasive, ensuring women relate to each other only by conforming socially, politically and culturally to how the ideal woman should present herself as married women. Thereby this tricks us girls and women from different cultures, races, ethnicities, socioeconomic backgrounds and religions into holding ourselves hostage internally by externally enforcing a strict prescription of what our collective identity should look like. Leading us to use our own will and power as a individuals, as a tool complicit in the erasure of the possibility of our own sense of self independent of societal prescriptions, by actualizing the colonial-nationalist ideology of the resourceful, self-sacrificing stereotypical woman with no self outside of servitude.[41]
Another way that institutional nationalism is used both by intellectual elite liberals and religious groups is by preventing girls and women from sharing different social and cultural experiences that have common threads of oppression, women are unable to form a common alliance and shed the patriarchal norms that oppress our own thoughts, words and practices.[42] Women are thus taught that instead of advocating for our own self-interests, we should not take up space and try to shrink to accommodate and accept men, the family unit, and society.
Patriarchy also teaches women the they should prevent other women from speaking their own truths and actualizing their own identities as there are both limited space and resources for women to deviate from, as prescribed by patriarchal practices. By giving the impression that space for women is limited and constrained by another woman’s freedoms, both liberal and religious groups keep a plethora of identities suppressed, as women are allowed to remain only an expression of those around them.
In this way homogeneity is preserved at the expense of plurality as the priority for those in power is keeping their own self-interests at the forefront and preventing any changes in the status quo. In this way, instead of the institution of marriage evolving through the space created between different cultural narratives socially mingling, the marriage — which reflects the state — is a fixed, preconceived concept incapable of understanding the value of pluralism itself.[43]
Competing Interests: The author reports there are no competing interests to declare, funding or grants.
Notes on Contributer: Dr. Safieh Shah, a Shia Muslim, intersectional feminist, and woman of colour, is a first-generation academic with 19 years of global health experience. She specializes in public health, focusing on humanitarian issues, health, academia, and community development. Her work on the clitoris advocates for inclusive and accurate representation of female genitalia in medical discourse, in service of women's sexual autonomy, well-being and independence. She is a mixed-methods researcher, database architect, and author of study protocols and peer-reviewed manuscripts.
References
Jafar, Afshan (2005). Women, Islam, and the state in Pakistan. Gender Issues 22 (1):35-55.
Mohanty, C.T. (1991). Under Western Eyes: Feminist Scholarship and Colonial Discourses. In Third World Women and the Politics of Feminism, edited by C. T. Mohanty, A. Russo, and L. Torres. Bloomington: Indiana University.
Jafar, Afshan (2005). Women, Islam, and the state in Pakistan. Gender Issues 22 (1):35-55.
Ibid
Karima Omar (2004) National Symbolism in Constructions of Gender: Transformed Symbols in Post-Conflict States. Seton Hall Journal of Diplomacy and International Relations
Ibid
Morshadul Hoque (2021). Patriarchy: Meaning, Origin, Theories, and Relationship with SDG10. In: Leal Filho, W., Marisa Azul, A., Brandli, L., Lange Salvia, A., Gökçin Özuyar, P., Wall, T. (eds) Reduced Inequalities. Encyclopedia of the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Springer, Cham.
Ibid
Soraya Seedat and Marta Rondon (2021). Women’s wellbeing and the burden of unpaid work. Women’s Health and Gender Inequalities. British Medical Journal. BMJ 2021;374:n1972
Chung W, Kim R (2020). Which occupation is highly associated with cognitive impairment? A gender-specific longitudinal study of paid and unpaid occupations in South Korea. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health. 17:7749. doi:10.3390/ijerph17217749
Chowdhury, F. D. (2009). Theorising Patriarchy: The Bangladesh Context. Asian Journal of Social Science 37, 4, 599-622, Available From: Brill
https://doi.org/10.1163/156853109X460200 [Accessed 22 February 2024]
Ibid
Ibid
Shahnaz J.Rouse (2004). Shifting Body Politics: Gender, Nation, State in Pakistan. New Delhi: Women Unlimited.
Chung W, Kim R (2020). Which occupation is highly associated with cognitive impairment? A gender-specific longitudinal study of paid and unpaid occupations in South Korea. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health. 17:7749
Chowdhury, F. D. (2009). Theorising Patriarchy: The Bangladesh Context. Asian Journal of Social Science 37, 4, 599-622, Available From: Brill
https://doi.org/10.1163/156853109X460200 [Accessed 22 February 2024]
Shahnaz J.Rouse (2004). Shifting Body Politics: Gender, Nation, State in Pakistan. New Delhi: Women Unlimited.
Ibid
Ayesha Jalal (1991). The Convenience of Subservience: Women and the State in Pakistan, pp.77-114.
Amina Jamal (2010). Gender, Citizenship, and the Nation-State in Pakistan; Willful Daughters or Free Citizens? Pakistani Women: Multiple Locations and Competing Narratives, ed. Sadaf Ahmad (Karachi; OUP.), pp. 120-39.
Rubina Saigol (2013) The Pakistan Project: a feminist perspective on nation and identity. New Delhi: Women Unlimited.
Jafar, Afshan (2005). Women, Islam, and the state in Pakistan. Gender Issues 22 (1):35-55.
Kandiyoti, D. 1991. "Introduction." In Women, Islam and the State, edited by D. Kandiyoti. Philadelphia: Temple University.
Morshadul Hoque (2021). Patriarchy: Meaning, Origin, Theories, and Relationship with SDG10. In: Leal Filho, W., Marisa Azul, A., Brandli, L., Lange Salvia, A., Gökçin Özuyar, P., Wall, T. (eds) Reduced Inequalities. Encyclopedia of the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Springer, Cham.
Rubina Saigol (2013). Reconstructing Patriarchies: Nationalism, Religion and Women’s Education from Re-imagining Pakistan: In Search of a National Narrative, pages 72-73
Rubina Saigol (2013). Reconstructing Patriarchies: Nationalism, Religion and Women’s Education from Re-imagining Pakistan: In Search of a National Narrative, pages 80-81
Farzana Shaikh (2009). Making Sense of Pakistan. Columbia University Press, New York. ISBN 978-0-231-14962-4. Page 4
Farzana Shaikh (2009). Making Sense of Pakistan. Columbia University Press, New York. ISBN 978-0-231-14962-4. Page 4
Maureen Walker (1999). Race, Self, and Society: Relational Challenges in a Culture of Disconnection
Farhat Haq (1996). Women, Islam and the State in Pakistan. The Muslim World Vol. LXXXVI, No. 2, pg 162
Farzana Shaikh (2009). Making Sense of Pakistan. Columbia University Press, New York. ISBN 978-0-231-14962-4. Page 4
Rubina Saigol and Nida Usman Chaudhary (2020). Contradictions and Ambiguities of Feminism in Pakistan: Exploring the Fourth Wave. Page 3
Sumera Batool, Zaeem Yasin, Mehwish Islam (2021). Role of Instagram in Promoting Extravagant Wedding Trends: An Analysis of Social Pressures on the Middle Class. Journal of Management Practices, Humanities and Social Sciences. Vol 5 Issue 2 pp. 01-09
Huma Fatima, Aneela Sultana (2022). Gender Construct Through Visual Culture in Pakistan. Global Digital & Print Media Review, V(II), 1-10.
Rubina Saigol and Nida Usman Chaudhary (2020). Contradictions and Ambiguities of Feminism in Pakistan: Exploring the Fourth Wave.
Farzana Shaikh (2009). Making Sense of Pakistan. Columbia University Press, New York. ISBN 978-0-231-14962-4. Page 13
References
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- Karima OMAR (2004) National Symbolism in Constructions of Gender: Transformed Symbols in Post-Conflict States. Seton Hall Journal of Diplomacy and International Relations.
- Morshadul HOQUE (2021). Patriarchy: Meaning, Origin, Theories, and Relationship with SDG10. In: Leal Filho, W., Marisa Azul, A., Brandli, L., Lange Salvia, A., Gökçin Özuyar, P., Wall, T. (eds) Reduced Inequalities. Encyclopedia of the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Springer, Cham.
- Soraya SEEDAT and Marta RONDON (2021). Women’s wellbeing and the burden of unpaid work. Women’s Health and Gender Inequalities. British Medical Journal. BMJ 2021;374:n1972.
- Woojin CHUNG, Roeul KIM (2020). Which occupation is highly associated with cognitive impairment? A gender-specific longitudinal study of paid and unpaid occupations in South Korea. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health. 17:7749. [CrossRef]
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- World Bank’s Gender Data Portal Indicators. Available at: https://genderdata.worldbank.org/indicators/sg-tim-uwrk/?view=bar accessed on 21st February 2024 at 1426 hours.
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- Ayesha JALAL (1991). The Convenience of Subservience: Women and the State in Pakistan, pp.77-114.
- Amina JAMAL (2010). Gender, Citizenship, and the Nation-State in Pakistan; Willful Daughters or Free Citizens? Pakistani Women: Multiple Locations and Competing Narratives, ed. Sadaf Ahmad (Karachi; OUP.), pp. 120-39.
- Rubina SAIGOL (2013) The Pakistan Project: a feminist perspective on nation and identity. New Delhi: Women Unlimited.
- Deniz KANDIYOTI (1991). "Introduction." In Women, Islam and the State, edited by D. Kandiyoti. Philadelphia: Temple University.
- Rubina SAIGOL (2013). Reconstructing Patriarchies: Nationalism, Religion and Women’s Education from Re-imagining Pakistan: In Search of a National Narrative, pages 72-73.
- Farzana SHAIKH (2009). Making Sense of Pakistan. Columbia University Press, New York. ISBN 978-0-231-14962-4. Page 4.
- Maureen WALKER (1999). Race, Self, and Society: Relational Challenges in a Culture of Disconnection.
- Farhat HAQ (1996). Women, Islam and the State in Pakistan. The Muslim World Vol. LXXXVI, No. 2, pg 162.
- Rubina SAIGOL and Nida Usman CHAUDHARY (2020).Contradictions and Ambiguities of Feminism in Pakistan: Exploring the Fourth Wave. Page 3.
- Sumera BATOOL, Zaeem YASIN, Mehwish ISLAM (2021). Role of Instagram in Promoting Extravagant Wedding Trends: An Analysis of Social Pressures on the Middle Class. Journal of Management Practices, Humanities and Social Sciences. Vol 5 Issue 2 pp. 01-09.
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