The Institute of Politics celebrated International Women’s Day with a conversation centered on the #StandWithHer movement, a global initiative inspired by the Academy Award-winning film “To Kill a Tiger.” Held on March 11, the event spotlighted stories of resilience, gender justice, and the role of solidarity in addressing gender-based violence.
The panel brought together voices from various fields: Canadian filmmaker Nisha Pahuja, whose documentary explores change in the face of injustice; Amita Vyas, a public health professor at George Washington University specializing in global gender equity; and Ziauddin Yousafzai, co-founder of the Malala Fund and an advocate for girls’ education. Moderated by Harvard Medical School professor Atul Gawande and four-time Canadian Screen Award-winning actor and Harvard undergraduate Saara Chaudry ’26, the conversation underscored a pressing question: what does it take to challenge perpetuating cultural norms that enable violence against women?
“To Kill a Tiger” follows the story of a low-income man in rural India who defies societal norms to seek justice for his teenage daughter, Kiran, after she is brutally assaulted—a narrative that emphasizes the challenges of confronting gender-based violence in deeply patriarchal cultures.
Though released in 2022, this film has become increasingly topical. Gender discrimination has been a highly debated issue in recent months, with certain women’s rights initiatives now facing opposition from President Donald Trump’s administration. From a rural village to a global conversation, “To Kill a Tiger” seeks to challenge cultural norms around gender-based violence and accountability.
The panelists, drawing from their work amplifying women’s rights, discussed the unique role masculinity plays in feminist activism. Rather than solely blaming current gender-based discrimination on male prejudice, their discourse highlighted how men can be a driver against violence toward women worldwide. For instance, Yousafzai, father of Nobel Laureate Malala Yousafzai, described how his transformation began internally.
“The first person I came across was myself…the old Ziuaddin who was [raised in a] patriarchy. And to defeat that old Ziauddin…once you change yourself, then [you change] the family, and that change spreads all around,” he shared.
The film captures this seemingly revolutionary perspective. For Pahuja, the essence of “To Kill a Tiger” lies in its commentary on men’s influence in driving progress.
“I still think this film is about masculinity. What happened to her—a teenage daughter who was brutally raped and who ‘To Kill a Tiger’ is based on—was done by men,” she explained. “And the antidote came from her father, an extraordinary man who had the courage to go against his culture and rewrite cultural norms to become this amazing ally and supporter.”
Yousafzai approached the role of masculinity in the women’s rights movement from a personal lens. After his daughter was fiercely targeted and shot by a Taliban gunman in retaliation for advocating for girls’ rights to education in Pakistan, Yousafzai assisted her in founding the Malala Fund. Yousafzai has since become personally committed to the fight for women’s rights, and he emphasizes in his work the importance of a male perspective in feminist activism, both due to its rarity and its challenge to stereotypical male roles.
“One thing that men and boys can do is to revisit their masculinity—redefine for themselves their
manhood. I’m a man, that’s fine. But what kind of man am I? That’s very important,” he said.
Female figures also play a vital role in breaking down stereotypical domestic structures in “To Kill a Tiger,” according to Yousafzai. “We should not ignore the role of Kiran’s mom,” he said. “She is amazing. We should not be patriarchal here. The power of a mother, the way she stands behind her husband and daughter, is incredibly powerful.”
Yousafzai noted the parallels between the film and his daughter’s own experience, praising its portrayal of household dynamics.
“The most important thing that I see in this family is their values,” he said. “They are a poor family, like my family, but they are very rich in values. They have this freedom of expression in the family, they talk to one another.” Much like the father in the film, he, too, had to defy societal expectations to support his daughter’s right to education.
This focus on family values and personal connection extended into the panel’s broader discussion on activism, with Vyas addressing the challenges faced by on-the-ground work addressing violence and gender equity. She stressed her frustration with the short-term impact of traditional public health projects, which may improve conditions immediately but fail to transform long-standing gender norms.
“I had spent about more than a decade of my time working in the area of sexual and reproductive health and women’s health across the globe, and I had sort of constantly been frustrated that, so many of our interventions on the ground, they had some impact, but generally that impact was short-term impact,” Vyas said. “If we cannot really address the underlying causes of why women and girls are not healthy, none of this amazing work that happens on the ground is going to flourish.”
These shortcomings motivated her involvement in the film industry, particularly her role in the documentary “Girl Rising.” “We have now taken the film and created a curriculum,” Vyas said. “We are now in 17 countries where young people, particularly adolescent boys and girls, are going to school and are engaged in this curriculum.”
Chaudry then turned the conversation’s focus to how filmmakers can preserve their authorial integrity when shedding light on injustice through films and media.
“I think my approach as a filmmaker is very much aligned with empathy,” Vyas explained. “I tend to go into situations without any judgment, with really sort of a desire to try to understand the other perspective, because I think creating empathy is very important.”
Yet, to Chaudry, the impact of such storytelling is contingent on the allocation of resources necessary for these projects to be carried out. Massive cuts to foreign aid have undermined many efforts—particularly those focused on addressing gender disparities both abroad and domestically. The panelists agreed that the current political climate has affected modern women’s rights activism.
“We refuse to change the language, we refuse to not talk about gender-based violence,” Nisha said. “We have lost some partners as a result because they can’t align with us because it would impact their funding.”
“We should not be self-censoring ourselves,” Amita added. “Nobody has asked us to censor ourselves just yet, so we should not be proactively self-censoring. We need to keep telling those stories because stories change people’s brain chemistry.”
The urgency of the panelists’ messages was reinforced by sobering statistics. Despite the sensitive nature of discussions surrounding gender-based violence, Gawande acknowledged the human impact behind these conversations and emphasized the importance of having them. In 2023, approximately 51,000 women and girls globally were killed by their intimate partners or other family members. In recent years, climate, health, and humanitarian crises have intensified violence against women and girls.
“Having this conversation can seem really hard. But we are talking about the violent rape of a child, the attempted murder of a child, for seeking basic rights like education or simply going to a wedding and feeling safe,” Gawande said.
The group finally turned their attention to a pressing question: how can we ensure a future where all communities, particularly South Asians, can feel protected?
“There are some incredible South Asian leaders, like Atul Gawande, who were in the previous administration, who will come back in future administrations. What we can do now is continue to support South Asian leaders at local levels as well as state and federal levels who align with our values,” Vyas said.
Gawande stressed the importance of connecting with vulnerable communities and building bridges. While political polarization may seem like an obstacle to the progress of marginalized communities, there are always ways to overcome it. “There is no monopoly on empathy in either party and there is plenty of toxicity in either party.”
Nashla Turcios ’28 (nashlaturcios@college.harvard.edu) writes News for the Harvard Independent.
The Institute of Politics celebrated International Women’s Day with a conversation centered on the #StandWithHer movement, a global initiative inspired by the Academy Award-winning film “To Kill a Tiger.” Held on March 11, the event spotlighted stories of resilience, gender justice, and the role of solidarity in addressing gender-based violence.
The panel brought together voices from various fields: Canadian filmmaker Nisha Pahuja, whose documentary explores change in the face of injustice; Amita Vyas, a public health professor at George Washington University specializing in global gender equity; and Ziauddin Yousafzai, co-founder of the Malala Fund and an advocate for girls’ education. Moderated by Harvard Medical School professor Atul Gawande and four-time Canadian Screen Award-winning actor and Harvard undergraduate Saara Chaudry ’26, the conversation underscored a pressing question: what does it take to challenge perpetuating cultural norms that enable violence against women?
“To Kill a Tiger” follows the story of a low-income man in rural India who defies societal norms to seek justice for his teenage daughter, Kiran, after she is brutally assaulted—a narrative that emphasizes the challenges of confronting gender-based violence in deeply patriarchal cultures.
Though released in 2022, this film has become increasingly topical. Gender discrimination has been a highly debated issue in recent months, with certain women’s rights initiatives now facing opposition from President Donald Trump’s administration. From a rural village to a global conversation, “To Kill a Tiger” seeks to challenge cultural norms around gender-based violence and accountability.
The panelists, drawing from their work amplifying women’s rights, discussed the unique role masculinity plays in feminist activism. Rather than solely blaming current gender-based discrimination on male prejudice, their discourse highlighted how men can be a driver against violence toward women worldwide. For instance, Yousafzai, father of Nobel Laureate Malala Yousafzai, described how his transformation began internally.
“The first person I came across was myself…the old Ziuaddin who was [raised in a] patriarchy. And to defeat that old Ziauddin…once you change yourself, then [you change] the family, and that change spreads all around,” he shared.
The film captures this seemingly revolutionary perspective. For Pahuja, the essence of “To Kill a Tiger” lies in its commentary on men’s influence in driving progress.
“I still think this film is about masculinity. What happened to her—a teenage daughter who was brutally raped and who ‘To Kill a Tiger’ is based on—was done by men,” she explained. “And the antidote came from her father, an extraordinary man who had the courage to go against his culture and rewrite cultural norms to become this amazing ally and supporter.”
Yousafzai approached the role of masculinity in the women’s rights movement from a personal lens. After his daughter was fiercely targeted and shot by a Taliban gunman in retaliation for advocating for girls’ rights to education in Pakistan, Yousafzai assisted her in founding the Malala Fund. Yousafzai has since become personally committed to the fight for women’s rights, and he emphasizes in his work the importance of a male perspective in feminist activism, both due to its rarity and its challenge to stereotypical male roles.
“One thing that men and boys can do is to revisit their masculinity—redefine for themselves their
manhood. I’m a man, that’s fine. But what kind of man am I? That’s very important,” he said.
Female figures also play a vital role in breaking down stereotypical domestic structures in “To Kill a Tiger,” according to Yousafzai. “We should not ignore the role of Kiran’s mom,” he said. “She is amazing. We should not be patriarchal here. The power of a mother, the way she stands behind her husband and daughter, is incredibly powerful.”
Yousafzai noted the parallels between the film and his daughter’s own experience, praising its portrayal of household dynamics.
“The most important thing that I see in this family is their values,” he said. “They are a poor family, like my family, but they are very rich in values. They have this freedom of expression in the family, they talk to one another.” Much like the father in the film, he, too, had to defy societal expectations to support his daughter’s right to education.
This focus on family values and personal connection extended into the panel’s broader discussion on activism, with Vyas addressing the challenges faced by on-the-ground work addressing violence and gender equity. She stressed her frustration with the short-term impact of traditional public health projects, which may improve conditions immediately but fail to transform long-standing gender norms.
“I had spent about more than a decade of my time working in the area of sexual and reproductive health and women’s health across the globe, and I had sort of constantly been frustrated that, so many of our interventions on the ground, they had some impact, but generally that impact was short-term impact,” Vyas said. “If we cannot really address the underlying causes of why women and girls are not healthy, none of this amazing work that happens on the ground is going to flourish.”
These shortcomings motivated her involvement in the film industry, particularly her role in the documentary “Girl Rising.” “We have now taken the film and created a curriculum,” Vyas said. “We are now in 17 countries where young people, particularly adolescent boys and girls, are going to school and are engaged in this curriculum.”
Chaudry then turned the conversation’s focus to how filmmakers can preserve their authorial integrity when shedding light on injustice through films and media.
“I think my approach as a filmmaker is very much aligned with empathy,” Vyas explained. “I tend to go into situations without any judgment, with really sort of a desire to try to understand the other perspective, because I think creating empathy is very important.”
Yet, to Chaudry, the impact of such storytelling is contingent on the allocation of resources necessary for these projects to be carried out. Massive cuts to foreign aid have undermined many efforts—particularly those focused on addressing gender disparities both abroad and domestically. The panelists agreed that the current political climate has affected modern women’s rights activism.
“We refuse to change the language, we refuse to not talk about gender-based violence,” Nisha said. “We have lost some partners as a result because they can’t align with us because it would impact their funding.”
“We should not be self-censoring ourselves,” Amita added. “Nobody has asked us to censor ourselves just yet, so we should not be proactively self-censoring. We need to keep telling those stories because stories change people’s brain chemistry.”
The urgency of the panelists’ messages was reinforced by sobering statistics. Despite the sensitive nature of discussions surrounding gender-based violence, Gawande acknowledged the human impact behind these conversations and emphasized the importance of having them. In 2023, approximately 51,000 women and girls globally were killed by their intimate partners or other family members. In recent years, climate, health, and humanitarian crises have intensified violence against women and girls.
“Having this conversation can seem really hard. But we are talking about the violent rape of a child, the attempted murder of a child, for seeking basic rights like education or simply going to a wedding and feeling safe,” Gawande said.
The group finally turned their attention to a pressing question: how can we ensure a future where all communities, particularly South Asians, can feel protected?
“There are some incredible South Asian leaders, like Atul Gawande, who were in the previous administration, who will come back in future administrations. What we can do now is continue to support South Asian leaders at local levels as well as state and federal levels who align with our values,” Vyas said.
Gawande stressed the importance of connecting with vulnerable communities and building bridges. While political polarization may seem like an obstacle to the progress of marginalized communities, there are always ways to overcome it. “There is no monopoly on empathy in either party and there is plenty of toxicity in either party.”
Nashla Turcios ’28 (nashlaturcios@college.harvard.edu) writes News for the Harvard Independent.