This is biography of one of the true hero journalists of Pakistan. Without them and a few others Pakistan would have long eaten up by Generals and Politicians. Its the brave forces like these that truly possess the ability to convey the truth.
Truth hurts and hurts even more when you have been brainwashed by blood sucking generals, mullahs, bandits of ethnic and sectarian violence, guttery politicians etc.
It would be very hard for the minds to change in Pakistan. At least now the media has the ability to bring upon people that have the courage to face the tortures of the establishment and their dogs.
Read and learn below
Biography
Najam Sethi: Biography
Najam Sethi, 63, graduated from Government College, Lahore, Pakistan, in 1967. He was awarded the Presidents Gold Medal for standing first among 50,000 students of Punjab University.
He took an MA degree in Economics from Cambridge University, UK, in 1970 and was awarded the Davies Prize for Economics by Clare College. He was a PhD research student at Clare College from 1971 to 1972.
While in Pakistan to research his dissertation subject, he was detained as a political prisoner by the Zulfikar Ali Bhutto regime from 1975 to 1977 for protesting military action in Baluchistan province following the illegal dismissal of the elected governments in two provinces. Amnesty International included him among its list of political prisoners in Pakistan at that time. He was discharged honorably in 1978 when all political prisoners were freed.
In 1978 he established Vanguard Books, an independent, liberal, secular publishing house which has published over 400 titles since then in history, politics and economics.
In 1984 he was imprisoned by the military government of General Zia ul Haq for one month (preventive detention) without formally being charged for any crime. But the real reason was Gen Zias aversion to a book published by Vanguard Books. It was titled From Jinnah To Zia and authored by the former chief justice of the Supreme Court of Pakistan, Justice Mohammad Munir. The book was a sort of mea culpa in which the author had admitted his grave error in legitimizing the first martial law in Pakistan in 1958, thereby paving the way for Gen Zias martial law in 1977. It was very critical of Gen Zia.
In 1989, along with his wife Jugnu Mohsin, he launched The Friday Times (TFT), an independent national weekly paper which espouses secular internationalism, human rights, regional peace and democracy. Newsweek Magazine described him in the 1990s as a crusading editor for exposing corruption in government. He has unfailingly written the editorials of the paper every week since 1989.
In 1999 he was imprisoned by the government of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on trumped up charges of treason. The real reason was relentless exposure in The Friday Times of corruption in the Sharif family. The supreme court of Pakistan rejected the trumped up charges of treason and freed him after one month. While in detention he was tortured and suffered a heart attack, which necessitated heart surgery in 2000.
In 1999 the Nawaz Sharif government started to harass him by slapping over 50 income tax fraud cases. It also accused him of being a non-Muslim and tried to deprive him of his voting rights. But all the cases against him were rejected by the tax tribunals and high court of the country and all his rights were restored by the Chief Election Commissioner.
In 1999, he was awarded the JOURNALISM UNDER THREAT AWARD by Amnesty International, UK, and the INTERNATIONAL PRESS FREEDOM AWARD by the Committee to Protect Journalists, New York.
In 2002 he launched Daily Times, an independent national daily newspaper published from Lahore and Karachi and Islamabad. Like The Friday Times, this daily paper was an outspoken liberal humanist internationalist voice in the country. Its editorials constantly argued for peace with India, supported the war against Taliban-Al-Qaeda terror and opposed religious fundamentalism and extremism.
In August 2008, he launched AajKal, a national Urdu daily paper from Lahore, Karachi and Islamabad. Within a year, the paper became the most outspoken voice of rational discourse, internationalism and liberalism in the Urdu print media of Pakistan.
In 2007 he set up Beyond Borders, a public interest production company for South Asia television channels. The mission statement of this project is to promote South Asian cultures, build confidence and trust and sustain democracy, civil society and human rights in the region. The company has produced 13 short films on the partition of the subcontinent in 1947 based on the short stories of the grand literary masters of India and Pakistan. It is also producing a 13 part serial titled ROOTS, which is a compilation of interviews of famous Indians and Pakistanis who crossed over to the other country at the time of partition and have inspiring stories to tell of the warmth, love, humanity and affection of the other community. The aim of these projects is to build trust between Indians and Pakistanis, Hindus and Muslims, and promote the cause of peace in the region.
In 2007-8, he received open death threats from the Taliban-Al Qaeda for supporting the war against terrorism. The Talibans mouthpiece in Waziristan did a cover story in which it identified Najam Sethi as an enemy of Islam. Radical Islamists demonstrated against his papers in Islamabad and openly called for his elimination.
He was awarded the Golden Pen Press Freedom Award from the World Association of Newspapers in 2009 for courage in upholding secular values, human rights and press freedom.
Najam Sethi is the only journalist in Asia to receive three international press freedom awards in a decade.
Introduction
http://cpj.org/reports/1999/07/pakinewsprotests.php
1999 Awards Announcement
http://cpj.org/awards/1999/awards.php
1999 Press Freedom Awards Speeches
http://cpj.org/awards/1999/award-speeches.php
Pakistani Editor Awarded 2009 Golden Pen of Freedom
http://www.wan-press.org/pfreedom/articles.php?id=4006
Pakistan Editor Receives WAN-IFRA Golden Pen of Freedom
http://www.wan-press.org/article18329.html
Acceptance Speech by Najam Sethi, 2009 WAN-IFRA Golden Pen of Freedom Laureate
http://www.wan-press.org/pfreedom/articles.php?id=5105
Remarks by Xavier Vidal-Folch
http://www.wan-press.org/article18327.html
He is married to Jugnu Mohsin, Publisher and Managing Editor of The Friday Times, and Good Times. They have two children Ali Sethi (26) and Mira Sethi (23). Ali graduated from Harvard University in 2007 and his novel titled The Wish Maker has been published in English, Dutch, German and Italian. Mira graduated with honours from Wellesley College in the USA and is the Bartley Fellow at the Wall Street Journal in New York,
Najam Sethi has received written death threats from Al Qaeda and the Taliban Movement of Pakistan. He has accordingly been provided 24 hour armed security by the government of Pakistan. He has disregarded the advice of the authorities to leave the country and continues to edit his papers independently as well as anchor a popular TV show on Dunya TV.
Najam Sethi: A Resume
He is the Editor-in-Chief of The Friday Times, and Dunya TV, and the former Founding Editor-in-Chief of Daily Times and Daily Aajkal.
He has been the Pakistan Correspondent of The Economist, London, since 1990, and of The Economist Intelligence Unit from 1999-2005.
He is Chairman of the Pakistan Publishers and Booksellers Association, the countrys apex body of printers and publishers.
He is the Secretary General of the Pakistan International Book Fair Trust which organizes an international book fair annually in Lahore.
He is the Chairman of the Afro-Asian Book Council, the apex literary institution headquartered in New Delhi, India, for the promotion of the literature of the two continents.
He has served as senior Vice President of the Council of Pakistan Newspaper Editors, the apex body of national editors, and is on the standing committee of the All Pakistan Newspapers Society, the apex body of national newspaper publishers.
He was a Minister for Political Affairs & Accountability in the Federal Government of Pakistan (interim) in 1996-97.
In 2008 he was unanimously elected Secretary-General of the South Asia Media Commission to defend media rights.
He is on the Board of Governors of the South Asia Free Media Association (SAFMA) whose mission statement is to promote media cooperation in South Asia.
He is the Vice Chairman, South Asia Foundation, Pakistan.
He is on the Board of Directors of the International Copyright Protection Board of Pakistan established by the prime minister of Pakistan.
He is a regular commentator for various international radio and TV channels including BBC TV and Radio, Radio Deutchewelle, Zee TV, Star TV, VOA Radio, PBC, NDTV, CNN-IBN TV, ABC TV, Radio Australia, Radio Iran, NPR, ARY TV, GEO, etc.
He has made a documentary for BBC titled: The inside story of the coup in 1999. He was the correspondent in it.
He has lectured at the National Institute of Public Administration in Lahore, the National Defense College, Rawalpindi, the National Institute of Public Affairs, Lahore, and the Civil Services Academy, Lahore. All these national institutes are engaged in the task of educating the senior bureaucracy of Pakistan into issues of governance and accountability.
He has given inaugural lectures at the Eqbal Ahmad Foundation in Islamabad and the Asian College for Journalism in Chennai, India.
He has written for the Op Ed pages of The Wall Street Journal (USA), The International Herald Tribune, The Independent (UK), The Indian Express (India), The Telegraph (India), and his signed articles and editorials have been translated and published by international papers and magazines in Italy, Germany and France.
He is a frequent speaker at international conferences in London, Paris, Geneva, New York, Washington DC, Chicago, Germany, India, Italy, Thailand, on matters related to Press Freedom, Corruption, Nuclear Proliferation, CBMs and National Security Policy in South Asia.
He is an International Trustee of the ASIA SOCIETY in New York and of The Leaders Project, Washington DC, established by former US Defense Secretary Bill Cohen.
Najam Sethi is the only journalist in Asia to receive three international press freedom awards in a decade from Amnesty International, UK, Committee to Protect Journalists, New York, and World Association of Newspapers, Paris.
He continues to receive death threats from militant Islamic groups who are violently opposed to the liberal values and views that he espouses in his interviews, editorials and articles which are regularly published in English and Urdu papers.
His editorials in The Friday Times since 2001 can be accessed at www.thefridaytimes.com (username guest and password is abc234).
The editorials of Daily Times were either written by Najam Sethi or based on his exclusive briefings to his editorial writers and daily edited and subbed by him personally from April 2002 to October 2009. These are available at www.dailytimes.com.pk in the archives section.
Links to Najam Sethis last few opeds in the Wall Street Journal are given below:
Najam Sethi: The Road to Kabul Runs Through Islamabad WSJ.com
30 Jun 2010 In The Wall Street Journal, Pakistani journalist Najan Sethi writes that Pakistani leaders are desperate to broker a deal with Karzai and
online.wsj.com//SB10001424052748704103904575336551084011556.html Cached
Najam Sethi: Now India and Pakistan Can Get Down to Business WSJ.com7 Mar 2010 Najam Sethi, editor of Pakistans Friday Times, online.wsj.com//SB10001424052748703936804575106940181288162
Musharrafs second coup by Najam Sethi (WSJ, November 6, 2007)
http://www.ppp.org.pk/party/issues/p_articles116.html
Musharraf in the middle by Najam Sethi (WSJ, Oct 11. 2007)
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB119205245189655118.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
Pakistan in the balance by Najam Sethi (WSJ, June 16, 2007)
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2007\06\18\story_18-6-2007_pg3_2
Precariously perched by Najam Sethi (WSJ, April 15, 2007)
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2007\11\07\story_7-11-2007_pg3_2
There are over a dozen articles in the WSJ from 2001-2002 starting with the following:
Pakistans folly in Afghanistan by Najam Sethi (WSJ, Oct, 12, 2001)
http://www.saja.org/sethioped.html
Truth hurts and hurts even more when you have been brainwashed by blood sucking generals, mullahs, bandits of ethnic and sectarian violence, guttery politicians etc.
It would be very hard for the minds to change in Pakistan. At least now the media has the ability to bring upon people that have the courage to face the tortures of the establishment and their dogs.
Read and learn below
Biography
Najam Sethi: Biography
Najam Sethi, 63, graduated from Government College, Lahore, Pakistan, in 1967. He was awarded the Presidents Gold Medal for standing first among 50,000 students of Punjab University.
He took an MA degree in Economics from Cambridge University, UK, in 1970 and was awarded the Davies Prize for Economics by Clare College. He was a PhD research student at Clare College from 1971 to 1972.
While in Pakistan to research his dissertation subject, he was detained as a political prisoner by the Zulfikar Ali Bhutto regime from 1975 to 1977 for protesting military action in Baluchistan province following the illegal dismissal of the elected governments in two provinces. Amnesty International included him among its list of political prisoners in Pakistan at that time. He was discharged honorably in 1978 when all political prisoners were freed.
In 1978 he established Vanguard Books, an independent, liberal, secular publishing house which has published over 400 titles since then in history, politics and economics.
In 1984 he was imprisoned by the military government of General Zia ul Haq for one month (preventive detention) without formally being charged for any crime. But the real reason was Gen Zias aversion to a book published by Vanguard Books. It was titled From Jinnah To Zia and authored by the former chief justice of the Supreme Court of Pakistan, Justice Mohammad Munir. The book was a sort of mea culpa in which the author had admitted his grave error in legitimizing the first martial law in Pakistan in 1958, thereby paving the way for Gen Zias martial law in 1977. It was very critical of Gen Zia.
In 1989, along with his wife Jugnu Mohsin, he launched The Friday Times (TFT), an independent national weekly paper which espouses secular internationalism, human rights, regional peace and democracy. Newsweek Magazine described him in the 1990s as a crusading editor for exposing corruption in government. He has unfailingly written the editorials of the paper every week since 1989.
In 1999 he was imprisoned by the government of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on trumped up charges of treason. The real reason was relentless exposure in The Friday Times of corruption in the Sharif family. The supreme court of Pakistan rejected the trumped up charges of treason and freed him after one month. While in detention he was tortured and suffered a heart attack, which necessitated heart surgery in 2000.
In 1999 the Nawaz Sharif government started to harass him by slapping over 50 income tax fraud cases. It also accused him of being a non-Muslim and tried to deprive him of his voting rights. But all the cases against him were rejected by the tax tribunals and high court of the country and all his rights were restored by the Chief Election Commissioner.
In 1999, he was awarded the JOURNALISM UNDER THREAT AWARD by Amnesty International, UK, and the INTERNATIONAL PRESS FREEDOM AWARD by the Committee to Protect Journalists, New York.
In 2002 he launched Daily Times, an independent national daily newspaper published from Lahore and Karachi and Islamabad. Like The Friday Times, this daily paper was an outspoken liberal humanist internationalist voice in the country. Its editorials constantly argued for peace with India, supported the war against Taliban-Al-Qaeda terror and opposed religious fundamentalism and extremism.
In August 2008, he launched AajKal, a national Urdu daily paper from Lahore, Karachi and Islamabad. Within a year, the paper became the most outspoken voice of rational discourse, internationalism and liberalism in the Urdu print media of Pakistan.
In 2007 he set up Beyond Borders, a public interest production company for South Asia television channels. The mission statement of this project is to promote South Asian cultures, build confidence and trust and sustain democracy, civil society and human rights in the region. The company has produced 13 short films on the partition of the subcontinent in 1947 based on the short stories of the grand literary masters of India and Pakistan. It is also producing a 13 part serial titled ROOTS, which is a compilation of interviews of famous Indians and Pakistanis who crossed over to the other country at the time of partition and have inspiring stories to tell of the warmth, love, humanity and affection of the other community. The aim of these projects is to build trust between Indians and Pakistanis, Hindus and Muslims, and promote the cause of peace in the region.
In 2007-8, he received open death threats from the Taliban-Al Qaeda for supporting the war against terrorism. The Talibans mouthpiece in Waziristan did a cover story in which it identified Najam Sethi as an enemy of Islam. Radical Islamists demonstrated against his papers in Islamabad and openly called for his elimination.
He was awarded the Golden Pen Press Freedom Award from the World Association of Newspapers in 2009 for courage in upholding secular values, human rights and press freedom.
Najam Sethi is the only journalist in Asia to receive three international press freedom awards in a decade.
Introduction
http://cpj.org/reports/1999/07/pakinewsprotests.php
1999 Awards Announcement
http://cpj.org/awards/1999/awards.php
1999 Press Freedom Awards Speeches
http://cpj.org/awards/1999/award-speeches.php
Pakistani Editor Awarded 2009 Golden Pen of Freedom
http://www.wan-press.org/pfreedom/articles.php?id=4006
Pakistan Editor Receives WAN-IFRA Golden Pen of Freedom
http://www.wan-press.org/article18329.html
Acceptance Speech by Najam Sethi, 2009 WAN-IFRA Golden Pen of Freedom Laureate
http://www.wan-press.org/pfreedom/articles.php?id=5105
Remarks by Xavier Vidal-Folch
http://www.wan-press.org/article18327.html
He is married to Jugnu Mohsin, Publisher and Managing Editor of The Friday Times, and Good Times. They have two children Ali Sethi (26) and Mira Sethi (23). Ali graduated from Harvard University in 2007 and his novel titled The Wish Maker has been published in English, Dutch, German and Italian. Mira graduated with honours from Wellesley College in the USA and is the Bartley Fellow at the Wall Street Journal in New York,
Najam Sethi has received written death threats from Al Qaeda and the Taliban Movement of Pakistan. He has accordingly been provided 24 hour armed security by the government of Pakistan. He has disregarded the advice of the authorities to leave the country and continues to edit his papers independently as well as anchor a popular TV show on Dunya TV.
Najam Sethi: A Resume
He is the Editor-in-Chief of The Friday Times, and Dunya TV, and the former Founding Editor-in-Chief of Daily Times and Daily Aajkal.
He has been the Pakistan Correspondent of The Economist, London, since 1990, and of The Economist Intelligence Unit from 1999-2005.
He is Chairman of the Pakistan Publishers and Booksellers Association, the countrys apex body of printers and publishers.
He is the Secretary General of the Pakistan International Book Fair Trust which organizes an international book fair annually in Lahore.
He is the Chairman of the Afro-Asian Book Council, the apex literary institution headquartered in New Delhi, India, for the promotion of the literature of the two continents.
He has served as senior Vice President of the Council of Pakistan Newspaper Editors, the apex body of national editors, and is on the standing committee of the All Pakistan Newspapers Society, the apex body of national newspaper publishers.
He was a Minister for Political Affairs & Accountability in the Federal Government of Pakistan (interim) in 1996-97.
In 2008 he was unanimously elected Secretary-General of the South Asia Media Commission to defend media rights.
He is on the Board of Governors of the South Asia Free Media Association (SAFMA) whose mission statement is to promote media cooperation in South Asia.
He is the Vice Chairman, South Asia Foundation, Pakistan.
He is on the Board of Directors of the International Copyright Protection Board of Pakistan established by the prime minister of Pakistan.
He is a regular commentator for various international radio and TV channels including BBC TV and Radio, Radio Deutchewelle, Zee TV, Star TV, VOA Radio, PBC, NDTV, CNN-IBN TV, ABC TV, Radio Australia, Radio Iran, NPR, ARY TV, GEO, etc.
He has made a documentary for BBC titled: The inside story of the coup in 1999. He was the correspondent in it.
He has lectured at the National Institute of Public Administration in Lahore, the National Defense College, Rawalpindi, the National Institute of Public Affairs, Lahore, and the Civil Services Academy, Lahore. All these national institutes are engaged in the task of educating the senior bureaucracy of Pakistan into issues of governance and accountability.
He has given inaugural lectures at the Eqbal Ahmad Foundation in Islamabad and the Asian College for Journalism in Chennai, India.
He has written for the Op Ed pages of The Wall Street Journal (USA), The International Herald Tribune, The Independent (UK), The Indian Express (India), The Telegraph (India), and his signed articles and editorials have been translated and published by international papers and magazines in Italy, Germany and France.
He is a frequent speaker at international conferences in London, Paris, Geneva, New York, Washington DC, Chicago, Germany, India, Italy, Thailand, on matters related to Press Freedom, Corruption, Nuclear Proliferation, CBMs and National Security Policy in South Asia.
He is an International Trustee of the ASIA SOCIETY in New York and of The Leaders Project, Washington DC, established by former US Defense Secretary Bill Cohen.
Najam Sethi is the only journalist in Asia to receive three international press freedom awards in a decade from Amnesty International, UK, Committee to Protect Journalists, New York, and World Association of Newspapers, Paris.
He continues to receive death threats from militant Islamic groups who are violently opposed to the liberal values and views that he espouses in his interviews, editorials and articles which are regularly published in English and Urdu papers.
His editorials in The Friday Times since 2001 can be accessed at www.thefridaytimes.com (username guest and password is abc234).
The editorials of Daily Times were either written by Najam Sethi or based on his exclusive briefings to his editorial writers and daily edited and subbed by him personally from April 2002 to October 2009. These are available at www.dailytimes.com.pk in the archives section.
Links to Najam Sethis last few opeds in the Wall Street Journal are given below:
Najam Sethi: The Road to Kabul Runs Through Islamabad WSJ.com
30 Jun 2010 In The Wall Street Journal, Pakistani journalist Najan Sethi writes that Pakistani leaders are desperate to broker a deal with Karzai and
online.wsj.com//SB10001424052748704103904575336551084011556.html Cached
Najam Sethi: Now India and Pakistan Can Get Down to Business WSJ.com7 Mar 2010 Najam Sethi, editor of Pakistans Friday Times, online.wsj.com//SB10001424052748703936804575106940181288162
Musharrafs second coup by Najam Sethi (WSJ, November 6, 2007)
http://www.ppp.org.pk/party/issues/p_articles116.html
Musharraf in the middle by Najam Sethi (WSJ, Oct 11. 2007)
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB119205245189655118.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
Pakistan in the balance by Najam Sethi (WSJ, June 16, 2007)
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2007\06\18\story_18-6-2007_pg3_2
Precariously perched by Najam Sethi (WSJ, April 15, 2007)
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2007\11\07\story_7-11-2007_pg3_2
There are over a dozen articles in the WSJ from 2001-2002 starting with the following:
Pakistans folly in Afghanistan by Najam Sethi (WSJ, Oct, 12, 2001)
http://www.saja.org/sethioped.html
