Satyarthi says will work together with ‘daughter’ Malala

Indian Nobel Peace Prize laureate Kailash Satyarthi on Tuesday said that he will work together with ‘his daughter’, Pakistani campaigner for girls’ education and the youngest-ever Nobel Peace Prize recipient Malala Yousafzai.

Kailash and Malala were speaking at a joint press conference at the Norwegian Nobel Institute organised for the winners of the prestige prize, a day before they receive the award at a formal ceremony at the Oslo City Hall on Wednesday.

Kailash, an Indian anti-child labour activist and head of the South Asian Coalition Against Child Servitude, has previously pledged to join hands with Malala “to fight for peace” between the two neighbouring nuclear-armed countries.

The Norwegian Nobel Committee announced the names of the two South Asian activists in October as joint Nobel Peace Prize laureates “for their struggle against the suppression of children and young people and for the right of all children to education.”

Malala, now 17, was shot in the head by a Pakistani Taliban gunman in Swat two years ago.

The young campaigner said she would be joined on Wednesday by five inspiring girl champions at the award ceremony – her school friends from Swat, Shazia Ramzan and Kainat Riaz, Kainat Soomro from Sindh, Mezon Almellehan from Syria and Amina Yusuf from Nigeria.

“We all are standing together and telling the world that we are here to fight for our rights; that it is alright to go to school. Why should it be neglected? Why are we fighting for something which we deserve?” she told a conference room in Oslo packed with journalists from around the world.

“In this world in which we are thinking we have achieved so much development, then why is it that there are so many countries where children are not asking for any iPads or computers…what they are for is just a book and just a pen?

“So why can’t we do that? Why can’t we just give a book and a pen to children? And why can’t we just give a school to children which can really change their future?” she said.

Answering a question, she said it was her belief that Islam is a religion of peace and humanity.

“Islam is all about getting knowledge and discovering the world. Unfortunately those people who stand against education, they themselves are uneducated,” she said.

“In Islam, education is not just a right, it is a duty. There is a specific Hadith. In Islam, [education] is a necessity of life,” she said.

Answering another question from a journalist, Malala said that Pakistan was her home, and that she would ‘definitely’ go back to her home one day.

“When I was in Swat, I used to see other children going to work in other people’s homes while I was going to school.

“It is my ambition, my dream, to see every child in Pakistan getting education. I will definitely go back to Pakistan,” she said, to which Kailash joking reminded her not to leave her ‘father’ behind when she goes to Pakistan.