New Delhi, April 27 A petition challenging Pakistan’s taxation of menstrual products as "luxury products" has drawn national attention but campaigners opined that a court victory may not by itself deliver a meaningful, lasting change, a new report has said.
"Taxing menstrual products compounds inequality by attaching a recurring cost to a biological function that affects women and gendered bodies almost exclusively," the report from Express Tribune said, particularly calling out Pakistan’s tax system that relies heavily on consumption taxes, which disproportionately burden lower-income households.
Pakistan has left wealth, land, and high incomes relatively undertaxed, it pointed out the irony. The tax burden intensifies during floods, inflation spikes, and displacement, when disposable income shrinks, and prices rise.
The lawyer‑activist Mahnoor Omer has filed a petition in the Lahore High Court seeking to overturn Pakistan’s “period tax” -- the classification of sanitary pads and related items as a “luxury” subject to consumption tax.
The government has placed these products in the same fiscal category as discretionary consumer goods.
"The classification does more than raise prices; it sends a symbolic message about whose needs are considered essential," the report said.
“Treating menstruation as a moral issue rather than a public health reality allows institutions, families, schools, and the state to evade responsibility. In this economy of shame, the costs are borne by those who menstruate, especially young girls,” it added.
Nearly half of girls in Pakistan lack information before their first period, and only a small minority have consistent access to sanitary products, the report noted.
The report cited data by the Dastak Foundation that 44 per cent of menstruating people lack adequate menstrual‑hygiene facilities, and only 17 per cent had proper access to sanitary napkins.
"While economic pressures, early marriage, and domestic labour are often cited as primary drivers of dropout, menstruation operates as a silent enabling condition in Pakistan. In schools without functional toilets, running water, or disposal facilities, managing periods becomes a monthly, unannounced test," the report said.
Studies cited in the report said over half of girls in some districts miss school during menstruation and in flood‑affected areas, organisers recounted women reusing soaked cloth and digging holes to sit to manage periods.
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