Copies of the book I am Malala, written by the teenage girl seriously injured after being shot by the Taliban in 2012, have been banned by Pakistani private school authorities.
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Kashif Mirza, chief of the All Pakistan Private Schools Federation, stated that the book contains anti-Islamic and anti-Pakistani content.
Private schools in Pakistan are not allowed to include I am Malala in their libraries. Malala is thought by education officials in the country to be a figure “promoted by Western powers for their own interests”.
Pakistani officials believe Malala’s book does not show appropriate respect for the Prophet Muhammad. I am Malala is also regarded as a book that portrays novelist Salman Rushdie in a positive light.
Rushdie is accused by Pakistani extremists of blasphemy for his 1980s book The Satanic Verses.