"A stalk of wheat beaten down by a storm can spring up again, or rot where it lies," she says of her options following her brutal 2002 gang rape.

Mukhtar, as the world now knows, chose the former, defying tradition by speaking out against her attackers and refusing to drown in self-pity, subsequently emerging as one of South Asia’s most recognizable women’s rights advocates.

"I have become, in spite of myself, a symbol," the illiterate Pakistan Punjabi woman reveals in her new book with French author Marie-Therese Cuny.

In the Name of Honour dutifully follows Mukhtar’s improbable journey, opening with her infamous gang rape, which was ordered by a tribal jirga, in retaliation for her 12-year-old brother, who was wrongly accused of sexual misconduct with an adult woman from a higher-ranking clan.

Mukhtar first wrestles with suicidal thoughts, but is overcome by an unquenchable thirst for justice. She opens a school for girls and soon finds herself toe-to-toe with government officials while engaged in the lengthy legal battle with the 14 men responsible for her horrific assault.

Mukhtar’s story, which was devoured by the international press, doesn’t necessarily break new ground. There are no startling revelations and the narration is simple and sparse.

But the memoir’s poignancy lies in the small details of Mukhtar’s heartbreaking struggle and eventual triumph.  She succumbs to tears in the fourth or fifth day following the attack. She only cried this hard, she thinks, at the age of 10 when she saw a chick run into the fire where she cooked bread.

Ignored at the police station where she is to file a report on the crime, Mukhtar angrily concludes, "I don’t count for more than a goat here, even if I haven’t got a cord looped around my neck."

Mukhtar’s outrage over her rape and overall treatment of many Pakistani women simmers then boils. Her head spins with the cocky sneers of her attackers, her short-lived arranged marriage and an illegal feudal system where men "cut off a woman’s nose, burn a sister and rape a neighbour’s wife" for revenge.
"Knowledge must be given to girls, and as soon as possible, before their mothers bring them up the same way they were raised themselves," she says.

Mukhtar’s open-air school opened in late 2002, where dozens of students learn to read and write beneath the leafy shade of the trees. By 2005, there were 160 boys and more then 200 girls enrolled in her newly constructed building, where wronged women still come to her for assistance. "Watch out — I’ll go complain to Mukhtar Mai!" abused wives threaten their husbands.

Although the Pakistani government gave Mukhtar $8,500 in damages and the Fatima Jinnah gold medal for bravery and courage, she was initially banned from travelling overseas to protect the country’s image.

One female politician recommended she show more "modesty and discretion" by staying home, and Pakistan President of the day, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, in the Washington Post, said: "A lot of people say, ‘If you want to go abroad and get a visa for Canada or citizenship and be a millionaire, get yourself raped.’ "

Interestingly, Mukhtar tactfully attributes this repugnant quote to people "in high places" and not Musharraf himself. She is hopeful the statement was misinterpreted. Still she clarifies her mission and loyalty to those in doubt.

"I have fought for myself and for all the women victimized by violence in my country. I have no intention of leaving my village, my house, my family and my school," Mukhtar says. “Neither do I have the desire to give Pakistan a bad name abroad. Quite the contrary: By defending my right to be a human being, by struggling against the principal of a tribal justice that sets itself up against the official laws of our Islamic republic, I’m convinced that I am supporting the political wishes of my country."

Such confidence might seem irrelevant, but coming from a woman raised in a society where "submission is compulsory," it is inspirational.