Every morning, women in Pakistan step out to earn a living and negotiate a map of hazards that men rarely see. They weigh the risk of a supervisor’s “joke,” of a client’s unwanted touch, of a commute that can turn hostile. They do this in an economy where the female labour force participation rate hovers near one in four women of working age, among the lowest in South Asia, according to World Bank and ILO estimates. The wider gender context is stark. In June, the World Economic Forum ranked Pakistan last of 148 countries on its Global Gender Gap Index, with 56.7 per cent parity across economic, education, health and political indicators.
That is the landscape against which the K-Electric case must be read. On July 31, 2025, the Sindh Ombudsperson for Protection Against Harassment of Women at the Workplace found the utility’s chief executive, Moonis Alvi, guilty of harassment of a senior colleague, ordered his immediate removal and directed payment of Rs2.5 million as compensation under Section 4(4)(ii)(c) of the 2010 Act. The next day, the Sindh High Court suspended the removal order while it examines jurisdiction and other grounds, and later extended the stay into August. The legal process will take its course. What is not a matter of law is the decision of K-Electric’s board to keep its CEO in place during the appeal.
When the only people around the table are men, and when the executive under sanction sits on the committee charged with safeguarding the workplace, women employees read the message clearly: hierarchy is the shield, and they must fend for themselves.
The choice alone speaks louder than any policy manual. K-Electric’s own website lists a board without a woman director and shows the CEO as a member of the Board Human Resource and Remuneration Committee, the forum that sets the tone on culture and conduct. An independent scorecard that reviewed company disclosures recorded that, as of June 30, 2023, the board comprised ten men and no women. This runs against the spirit of Pakistan’s Code of Corporate Governance, which requires every listed company to have at least one woman director when a board is reconstituted. When the only people around the table are men, and when the executive under sanction sits on the committee charged with safeguarding the workplace, women employees read the message clearly: hierarchy is the shield, and they must fend for themselves.
Implications go beyond optics. Pakistan’s harassment law, enacted in 2010 and strengthened in 2022, obliges employers to constitute credible inquiry committees and guarantees complainants access to the ombudsperson. The Federal Ombudsperson’s secretariat reported 673 harassment cases disposed of in 2024, a figure that reflects rising recourse to formal remedies but also limited faith in internal systems. When a chief executive found guilty by a statutory forum continues to preside over the workplace during appeal, the deterrent value of the law is blunted.
Unfortunately, there’s nothing new here.
The University of Balochistan scandal in 2019, where a vice chancellor stepped aside after an FIA probe into harassment and blackmail allegations, showed that recusal can protect institutional credibility while investigations proceed. In aviation, Pakistan International Airlines announced inquiries into in-flight harassment complaints as recently as 2023, again highlighting how women face risk even in highly regulated environments. The most high-profile #MeToo case in the country, Meesha Shafi’s allegations against Ali Zafar and the ensuing defamation actions, underscored the chilling effect that litigation can have on complainants and witnesses who speak publicly. Each episode is different, but the pattern is the same: women who come forward face institutional headwinds that men do not.
K-Electric is not a marginal enterprise. It supplies power to millions of customers in Karachi and adjoining areas and functions as a monopoly distributor in the country’s financial hub. The company itself cites a customer base in the millions and a critical public mandate. In such a utility, leadership must be unimpeachable. By allowing the CEO to remain while contesting a harassment conviction, the board has chosen continuity over credibility. That choice carries costs. Women inside the organisation will be less likely to report, attrition risk will rise, and external trust will erode.
Corporate Pakistan knows what compliance requires. The law is clear, and public guidance is plentiful. What has been missing is the will to act when action is inconvenient. Evidence from regulators and researchers shows that diverse boards strengthen oversight and culture; Pakistan’s own rules on women directors were framed to move companies in that direction, yet enforcement has been inconsistent and representation remains thin. Businesses cannot claim alignment with modern environmental, social and governance standards while preserving all-male sanctuaries at the top.
The remedy in this case does not prejudge the appeal. It rests on a principle of stewardship that every board understands. A chief executive who has been ordered removed for harassment by a statutory forum should step aside until the court concludes. The board should invite independent women directors who are empowered to influence decisions, publish disaggregated statistics on complaints and outcomes, and ensure that inquiry committees are insulated from management. Regulators should verify compliance with the 2010 law and its 2022 amendment in practice rather than on paper and should hold companies to their disclosure duties.
There is a wider cultural undertaking that no court can deliver. Women will continue to enter the workforce in greater numbers. They will continue to file complaints when wronged. Institutions can either keep pace or fall behind. The path to credibility in corporate Pakistan begins not with statements but with decisions that put safety and dignity above convenience. The law gave K-Electric a moment to demonstrate that. However, the court’s stay did not take that moment away. The board did. If corporate leaders choose differently now, they can still send a signal that matters to every woman who leaves home tomorrow to work.
The writer is a freelance columnist.