Dr. Naila discussed the works of Fatima Mernissi, Amina Wadud, and Saba Mahmood who have stressed the importance of continuous interpretations of Quran and Hadith in order to maintain its relevance to contemporary times and situations, and have questioned the secular left’s concepts of agency and convictions of progressive vision as the only politics of liberation when the language of Islam is coming to apprehend the aspirations of so many Muslim women around the world. She discussed ways in which these women scholars challenge the patriarchal exegesis and chart the modes of defiance through which Muslim women reclaim agency within the framework of religion thus posing a challenge to the stereotypical perceptions portrayed by contemporary western scholarship about Muslim women. 

Dr. Naila did her PhD as a Fulbright scholar at State University of New York, Buffalo in the department of English. She has worked with different universities as a faculty member such as Government College University, Forman Christian College, and is now working as Assistant Professor at English department in University of Management and Technology (UMT). Her research interests include Feminist studies, Gender studies, Gendered religious nationalism, South Asian studies and postcolonial studies.