Bangladeshi Student To Portray Malala Yousufzai

A 16-year-old Bangladeshi student named Fatima Sheikh has been confirmed by Indian filmmaker Amjad Khan to portray the role of Pakistani schoolgirl and activist Malala Yousufzai in his forthcoming film ‘Gul Makai’.

Fatima Sheikh is from Dhaka and will play Pakistan’s teenage activist Malala Yousufzai who was shot in neck by a Taliban gunman last October and was carried to UK for life-saving surgery. Bollywood director Amjad Khan had been inspired by Malala’s efforts for the girls right in Swat Valley, Pakistan and he was busy to shortlist a child actor to act as Malala Yousufzai.

Fatima Sheikh’s identity is not disclosed yet for security reasons and the shoot will begin in the middle of July.

“She is a student too. She looks like Malala. But there are security issues. Filming will take place in London, Pakistan, Iran and India,” said film director Amjad Khan in a newspaper.

Malala Yousafzai (born 12 July 1997) is a school student and education activist from the town of Mingora in the Swat District of Pakistan's Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province. She is known for her education and women's rights activism in the Swat Valley, where the Taliban had at times banned girls from attending school. In early 2009, at the age of 11/12, Yousafzai wrote a blog under a pseudonym for the BBC detailing her life under Taliban rule, their attempts to take control of the valley, and her views on promoting education for girls. The following summer, a New York Times documentary was filmed about her life as the Pakistani military intervened in the region, culminating in the Second Battle of Swat. Yousafzai began to rise in prominence, giving interviews in print and on television and taking a position as chairperson of the District Child Assembly Swat. She has since been nominated for the International Children's Peace Prize by Desmond Tutu and has won Pakistan's first National Youth Peace Prize. A number of prominent individuals, including the Canadian Minister of Citizenship, are supporting a petition to nominate Yousafzai for the Nobel Peace Prize.
On 9 October 2012, Yousafzai was shot in the head and neck in an assassination attempt by Taliban gunmen while returning home on a school bus. In the days immediately following the attack, she remained unconscious and in critical condition, but later her condition improved enough for her to be sent to a hospital in the United Kingdom for intensive rehabilitation. On 12 October, a group of 50 Islamic clerics in Pakistan issued a fatwā against those who tried to kill her, but the Taliban reiterated its intent to kill Yousafzai and her father, Ziauddin.

Former British Prime Minister and current UN Special Envoy for Global Education Gordon Brown launched a United Nations petition in Yousafzai's name, using the slogan "I am Malala" and demanding that all children worldwide be in school by the end of 2015. Brown said he would hand the petition to Pakistan's President Asif Ali Zardari in November. UN secretary general Ban Ki-Moon has announced that November 10 will be celebrated as Malala Day.