Qandeel Baloch grew up in a conservative village in Pakistan called Shah Sadar Din, a place where it was shocking to see a woman swimming outdoors. She ran away from home, changed her name from Fouzia Azeem, auditioned for Pakistan Idol, and eventually became “Pakistan’s first social media star.” By 2015, she was reported to be one of the 10 most Googled people in Pakistan. As she became more famous, Qandeel Baloch also became more controversial. She received intense criticism when she posed for photos with a famous cleric named Mufti Abdul Qavi in his Karachi hotel room and later tweeted that he had behaved inappropriately, in June 2016. The next month, she was dead. Her brother, Waseem Azeem, confessed to her murder. He said, “She was bringing disrepute to our family’s honour and I could not tolerate it any further.” Because of a loophole in Pakistan’s laws regarding honor killings, he believed he would not be punished. Sanam Maher’s book is A Woman Like Her: The Story Behind the Honor Killing of a Social Media Star. Say hello on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Sign up for our occasional newsletter, The Accomplice. Follow the show and review us on Apple Podcasts: iTunes.com/CriminalShow. We also make This is Love and Phoebe Reads a Mystery. Artwork by Julienne Alexander. Check out our online shop. Episode transcripts are posted on our website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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There's this canal that ran outside of her home.
And the first time I went to her home in the village, I remember looking at that and someone told me a story about how she loved to swim in it.
And just the idea of even something like that, like a girl being allowed to swim or being allowed to be outdoors in that way, Kandeel really sort of, she stood out from the lot.
She really wanted to make something of herself.