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Life in the city of Bombay
Sunday, June 07, 2009
Aakar Patel
Bombay has been a professional city for 300 years and that gives it a culture that is unique. The British came here in the 17th century and set it up as their centre for trade. Because it faced the west, and Europe, the port city soon became as powerful as the political capital of Calcutta, whose port faced east, and then eclipsed it as power shifted to Delhi from Calcutta after 1911.
About half the people in Bombay are Marathi-speaking, but even so four of its six members of parliament are not Marathis. The other half of Bombays citizens speaks mainly Hindi and Gujarati, but the operative language of business is English. One can get by anywhere in this city even if one knows to speak only English and thats why its popular with Europeans.
The thing that one notices about the citizens of Bombay is their independence. In this they are unlike other Indians. There is no dependence on community and very little on family as they go about life. Even very young children in the city have to make their way to school alone. Even when people first arrive in Bombay, they are rarely met at the station and must find their way to their relatives flats by themselves. This is because people are generally believed to be busy in Bombay, and they have no time for anything other than work.
Bombay is a narrow city, hemmed in by the Arabian sea to its west and the mountains and marshland on its east. The city runs north to south and that is the workingmans commute. Because the city is linear rather than spread out, it has been able to sustain an efficient local train system. It has a disciplined system of public transport, including the best government-run bus system in India and by-the-meter taxis and auto-rickshaws.
Auto-rickshaws are not allowed to run on the island city, which includes South Bombay. The island city starts at the Parsi stronghold of Colaba and ends with the Muslim area of Mahim. Autos, as they are called, ply only in the suburbs, which start with the Catholic neighbourhoods of Bandra. This gives South Bombay traffic a discipline and order that is not present in the rest of Bombay or the rest of India. It is the only part of the city that the British built, and it is the best part of the city. It has some superb buildings, the best of which is the Victoria Terminus, a train station built in the Gothic style with gargoyles sticking out of its walls.
People board the train to head to town as South Bombay is referred to. This is the business district and where the stock market, the banks, the courts and all the corporate offices used to be. The institutions are all still there, but the corporate offices have begun moving out into the suburbs.
Bombay has a vibrant cultural life, if you are looking for low culture. There are a dozen plays running in any given week, mostly Gujarati though also in Marathi and Hindi. The plots are bedroom comedy or thriller in the mode of James Hadley Chase, many of whose books have been converted to plays.
It has many bars and women are as likely to be found in them as men.
The cheaper bars are filled in the evening with men returning from work who get off the train with their briefcases and have a quick one, or two, before they walk home. Till five years ago, Bombay had dance bars of the type seen in Bollywood movies, where professional dancers, mostly women but also some cross-dressers, would perform while men, and often women, sat along the wall enjoying a drink. Dance bars were shut down in the city five years ago by a Congress government that is run mainly by the peasant caste. Democracy has meant that often the moralism of Indias majority is imposed on the liberal minority.
And then of course there is Bollywood and most families see a movie every weekend. This became the primary weekend activity after Bombay developed many excellent multiplexes, the name used for multi-screen cinema halls. Tickets begin at Rs100 but may go up to Rs350 depending on the time of week and time of day. The liberal climate of Bombay produced Bollywood, which has made movies here for 96 years.
Bombay also has high culture, but it is fragmented. There is regular weekend activity for both Carnatic, which is the traditional music of South India, and Hindustani. The music of the south is organised in halls built by the sanghas or groups of Kannada-speaking and Tamil-speaking Brahmins who live in the area of Matunga.
North Indian music, khayal, dhrupad, ghazals and qawwali, is organised more professionally because it has a wider audience. Classical music can be heard in February as the Symphony Orchestra of India arranges its annual concerts. The orchestra is comprised mainly of Kazakh musicians and is in its sixth year. The music is first rate, and managed by the SOIs director, the violinist Marat Bisengaliev. Often the conductor, and the first violin, is German. Bombay has also begun to organise opera and all shows are sold out.
South Bombay is where all of the citys art galleries are, and in the 1950s the area spawned an original movement of the progressives led by Husain, Raza and Souza. Art is now in decline in Bombay, and the big artists are still those who painted decades ago.
Bombay does not have as many bookstores as Delhi. It has perhaps six large ones and a few dozen smaller ones. But it does have a culture of reading, even if this is mainly popular fiction. Many of these books are published without license. Every traffic light has urchins loaded with copies of Paulo Coelho and Robert Ludlum and Malcolm Gladwell.
Bombay has a lot of spiritual and religious activity from the weekly Gita class to the annual Sunni ijtema, but Bombay is not particularly religious when compared with other cities. The disciplined and unrelenting nature of life in the city leaves no room for dogmatism and little time for devotion, and normally it is done on the fly.
The most difficult part of living in Bombay is finding a place to stay. Middle-class flats are small in Bombay and average about 700 square feet of carpet space and have two bedrooms, a living room, a kitchen and two bathrooms, one of which is inside one of the bedrooms.
Depending on which part of the city this property is in, the flats cost between Rs2.5 million and Rs25 million (Rs2.5 crore). The four-bedroom flats of the rich in South Bombay are between Rs50 million and may go up to Rs150 million (Rs15 crore).
Very few people in Bombay have independent houses, or bungalows, though of course the Quaid-e-Azam built his in 1936. Jinnah House sits on top of Malabar Hill, the most expensive part of the city and the property is worth over Rs2 billion (Rs200 crore). Many people in South Bombay live in flats that were rented decades ago and they cannot now be evicted because of arcane laws.
In the 1990s, the rent act was amended and now flats may be leased for fixed periods with relative ease. The rent is between Rs15,000 and Rs200,000 (Rs2 lakh) a month for the two-bedroom flats and more for the larger ones.
This year, rents have fallen as the recession has knocked out two large constituencies of house-hunters: merchant bankers and expatriates.
Bombay is the best place to work in India for women. In the middle class, both men and women work and the majority of homes in this city have working women. This is for economic reasons, naturally, but also cultural. Because of its corporate, trading and legal offices, the city has had many thousands of women doing secretarial work since the turn of the last century. Though office culture is still male, women have more opportunity with each passing year.
Politically the city is liberal and the Congress party swept the last elections in the city, winning every seat along with its allies. The Shiv Sena, the party of Marathi nationalism, is in decline in the city as the Thackeray family has split.
Bombay is one of the hardest cities in the world to live in. There is very little private space, and unmarried couples meet by the sea, sitting on the rocks or on motorcycles because there are no parks or gardens. The traffic is almost unmoving (though not undisciplined by Indians standards), and there is plenty of urban poverty of the sort shown well in Slumdog Millionaire. It is also a very competitive city and there is always someone brighter than you around the corner.
But it is the city of dreams.
In the 19th century, as they marvelled at what they had created, the British called Bombay Urbs Prima in Indis, the premier city of India. It still is.
The writer is director with Hill Road Media in Bombay.
Sunday, June 07, 2009
Aakar Patel
Bombay has been a professional city for 300 years and that gives it a culture that is unique. The British came here in the 17th century and set it up as their centre for trade. Because it faced the west, and Europe, the port city soon became as powerful as the political capital of Calcutta, whose port faced east, and then eclipsed it as power shifted to Delhi from Calcutta after 1911.
About half the people in Bombay are Marathi-speaking, but even so four of its six members of parliament are not Marathis. The other half of Bombays citizens speaks mainly Hindi and Gujarati, but the operative language of business is English. One can get by anywhere in this city even if one knows to speak only English and thats why its popular with Europeans.
The thing that one notices about the citizens of Bombay is their independence. In this they are unlike other Indians. There is no dependence on community and very little on family as they go about life. Even very young children in the city have to make their way to school alone. Even when people first arrive in Bombay, they are rarely met at the station and must find their way to their relatives flats by themselves. This is because people are generally believed to be busy in Bombay, and they have no time for anything other than work.
Bombay is a narrow city, hemmed in by the Arabian sea to its west and the mountains and marshland on its east. The city runs north to south and that is the workingmans commute. Because the city is linear rather than spread out, it has been able to sustain an efficient local train system. It has a disciplined system of public transport, including the best government-run bus system in India and by-the-meter taxis and auto-rickshaws.
Auto-rickshaws are not allowed to run on the island city, which includes South Bombay. The island city starts at the Parsi stronghold of Colaba and ends with the Muslim area of Mahim. Autos, as they are called, ply only in the suburbs, which start with the Catholic neighbourhoods of Bandra. This gives South Bombay traffic a discipline and order that is not present in the rest of Bombay or the rest of India. It is the only part of the city that the British built, and it is the best part of the city. It has some superb buildings, the best of which is the Victoria Terminus, a train station built in the Gothic style with gargoyles sticking out of its walls.
People board the train to head to town as South Bombay is referred to. This is the business district and where the stock market, the banks, the courts and all the corporate offices used to be. The institutions are all still there, but the corporate offices have begun moving out into the suburbs.
Bombay has a vibrant cultural life, if you are looking for low culture. There are a dozen plays running in any given week, mostly Gujarati though also in Marathi and Hindi. The plots are bedroom comedy or thriller in the mode of James Hadley Chase, many of whose books have been converted to plays.
It has many bars and women are as likely to be found in them as men.
The cheaper bars are filled in the evening with men returning from work who get off the train with their briefcases and have a quick one, or two, before they walk home. Till five years ago, Bombay had dance bars of the type seen in Bollywood movies, where professional dancers, mostly women but also some cross-dressers, would perform while men, and often women, sat along the wall enjoying a drink. Dance bars were shut down in the city five years ago by a Congress government that is run mainly by the peasant caste. Democracy has meant that often the moralism of Indias majority is imposed on the liberal minority.
And then of course there is Bollywood and most families see a movie every weekend. This became the primary weekend activity after Bombay developed many excellent multiplexes, the name used for multi-screen cinema halls. Tickets begin at Rs100 but may go up to Rs350 depending on the time of week and time of day. The liberal climate of Bombay produced Bollywood, which has made movies here for 96 years.
Bombay also has high culture, but it is fragmented. There is regular weekend activity for both Carnatic, which is the traditional music of South India, and Hindustani. The music of the south is organised in halls built by the sanghas or groups of Kannada-speaking and Tamil-speaking Brahmins who live in the area of Matunga.
North Indian music, khayal, dhrupad, ghazals and qawwali, is organised more professionally because it has a wider audience. Classical music can be heard in February as the Symphony Orchestra of India arranges its annual concerts. The orchestra is comprised mainly of Kazakh musicians and is in its sixth year. The music is first rate, and managed by the SOIs director, the violinist Marat Bisengaliev. Often the conductor, and the first violin, is German. Bombay has also begun to organise opera and all shows are sold out.
South Bombay is where all of the citys art galleries are, and in the 1950s the area spawned an original movement of the progressives led by Husain, Raza and Souza. Art is now in decline in Bombay, and the big artists are still those who painted decades ago.
Bombay does not have as many bookstores as Delhi. It has perhaps six large ones and a few dozen smaller ones. But it does have a culture of reading, even if this is mainly popular fiction. Many of these books are published without license. Every traffic light has urchins loaded with copies of Paulo Coelho and Robert Ludlum and Malcolm Gladwell.
Bombay has a lot of spiritual and religious activity from the weekly Gita class to the annual Sunni ijtema, but Bombay is not particularly religious when compared with other cities. The disciplined and unrelenting nature of life in the city leaves no room for dogmatism and little time for devotion, and normally it is done on the fly.
The most difficult part of living in Bombay is finding a place to stay. Middle-class flats are small in Bombay and average about 700 square feet of carpet space and have two bedrooms, a living room, a kitchen and two bathrooms, one of which is inside one of the bedrooms.
Depending on which part of the city this property is in, the flats cost between Rs2.5 million and Rs25 million (Rs2.5 crore). The four-bedroom flats of the rich in South Bombay are between Rs50 million and may go up to Rs150 million (Rs15 crore).
Very few people in Bombay have independent houses, or bungalows, though of course the Quaid-e-Azam built his in 1936. Jinnah House sits on top of Malabar Hill, the most expensive part of the city and the property is worth over Rs2 billion (Rs200 crore). Many people in South Bombay live in flats that were rented decades ago and they cannot now be evicted because of arcane laws.
In the 1990s, the rent act was amended and now flats may be leased for fixed periods with relative ease. The rent is between Rs15,000 and Rs200,000 (Rs2 lakh) a month for the two-bedroom flats and more for the larger ones.
This year, rents have fallen as the recession has knocked out two large constituencies of house-hunters: merchant bankers and expatriates.
Bombay is the best place to work in India for women. In the middle class, both men and women work and the majority of homes in this city have working women. This is for economic reasons, naturally, but also cultural. Because of its corporate, trading and legal offices, the city has had many thousands of women doing secretarial work since the turn of the last century. Though office culture is still male, women have more opportunity with each passing year.
Politically the city is liberal and the Congress party swept the last elections in the city, winning every seat along with its allies. The Shiv Sena, the party of Marathi nationalism, is in decline in the city as the Thackeray family has split.
Bombay is one of the hardest cities in the world to live in. There is very little private space, and unmarried couples meet by the sea, sitting on the rocks or on motorcycles because there are no parks or gardens. The traffic is almost unmoving (though not undisciplined by Indians standards), and there is plenty of urban poverty of the sort shown well in Slumdog Millionaire. It is also a very competitive city and there is always someone brighter than you around the corner.
But it is the city of dreams.
In the 19th century, as they marvelled at what they had created, the British called Bombay Urbs Prima in Indis, the premier city of India. It still is.
The writer is director with Hill Road Media in Bombay.
A
arshad_lahore
Guest
Remembering Babar my friend
Sunday, June 07, 2009
Dr Pervez Tahir
Babar was in Islamabad in the week before his death in Karachi left many in terrible grief. As had become usual after he was moved to Islamabad, he called after work to find out whether I was in Islamabad or Lahore. I have been dividing time between the two cities for the past two years. Luckily I was in Islamabad. The effort always was to go to a different eatery for gup shup. This time we had gone to a restaurant named Tiramisu in the Blue Area. If we were in Lahore, we would go to the places we used to frequent in our college days, mostly in areas in and around Nai and Purani Anarkali, lamenting always the end of Pak Tea House, the Tangiers Bar in Tollinton Market and Lords on the lawns of the Museum, or was it National College of the Arts, one could never really tell.
Mr Justice Sabihuddin Ahamad, lately of the Supreme Court and earlier the chief justice of the Sindh High Court, was known as Babar to his near and dear ones. In that beautiful late night of Islamabad, the dinner table was laid out in the open. I could never imagine this would be our last meeting. He was at his normal best, chain-smoking, laughing his unstoppable laughter, musing about the issues emerging after the restoration of Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, saying that he now needed samajdars rather than janisars. Remember that his own son, Barrister Salahuddin Ahmad, was among the more resolute of the janisars. He himself had remained steadfast during the movement for restoration. At some point he even considered resignation. Known for his independence of views even when he was at the bar, he experienced quite a hit-and-miss affair before his elevation to the bench in Sindh. That is why he was never able to understand what prompted his elevation to the Supreme Court. All he could remember was the grant of relief for medical treatment to the top man in authority during the days of his elongated confinement. But then Babar was known for granting it to all and sundry, without any discrimination. In keeping with his laid back style, the truth is that he laughed all the way to the Supreme Court.
So nothing unusual about the dinner and the dinner talk that fateful night of the spring. But Babar also said something which, looking back now, turns out to be grimly prophetic. I had started writing for newspapers during our student days. Occasionally I would also indulge in public speaking at Kishwar Naheeds National Centre in Al-Falah, Lahore. Babar used to chide me that knowing me gave him, and some other friends, Khalid Saeed the psychologist in particular, the comfort that there was somebody to reminisce about them when they were gone. Babar reminded me of this statement of his and laughed.
In the days of anti-Ayub movement, students when not agitating on the roads would gather in small groups on their campuses to discuss the brewing political storm. The country was in a state of socio-economic ferment. One morning I was sitting in one such group in Government College, Lahore when I saw everyones Professor of English, Eric Cyprian, approaching me along with a tall handsome boy. "I want you to meet Sabih. He is seeking admission to GC. You would like him," he said in his familiar high-pitched voice. This was my first encounter with Babar. Soon we were shouting hai, hai together on The Mall. In one such procession, a press photographer was taking a picture of some of us chanting slogans when Babar pulled me back. All those in the picture were arrested the next day!
He was in the English department and I was in economics department. Academic departments in those days were not the watertight compartments they have become nowadays. We became great friends as I quickly discovered that he had an acute sense of humour, his laughter unstoppable and louder than the loudest. The typical Lahori expression for making fun of others, rikard shikard lagana, was his favourite. We had left-liberal leanings but were often inclined to make fun of those who took their leftism a bit too seriously. We thus had our informally formed Rikard International, with a Rikardist Manifesto opening like this: All history hitherto is the history of the struggle between the rikarders and the rikarded, etc, etc. We watched all night the election results on PTV in 1970 and did Bhangra when ZABs landslide was described by the venerable A.T. Chaudhry as the Emperors defeat at the hands of foot soldiers.
Babar was very good at coming out with labels that fitted the bill. A cousin of mine from Military College at Jhelum, who was part of police group scheme for training officers at GC, joined a group of revolutionary intellectuals rather than preparing himself to enforce the riot act. Babar quickly dubbed him as military intellectual. Budding young writers and poets were never able to read their poetry, plays or short stories to us before serving sumptuous tea. We would offer such silly critiques that some would stop talking to us. When serious, he would surprise established critics by his masterly social comment. No wonder, he was the grand son of Maulana Salahuddin Ahmad, the founder-editor of Adabi Dunya, which he claimed to be the lowest priced Urdu journal of the world. I do not, however, recall him ever indulging in namedropping.
The illustrious inheritance did not stop there. He was the son of Wajihuddin Ahmad, CSP, a nephew of the celebrated lawyer Khalid Ishaque and Malik Ghulam Jilani of the Asma Jilani case fame. In Lahore, he lived in Malik Sahibs house near the Liberty Market in Gulberg. While gup-shupping in the large veranda in late summer evening, we would also chat up young Asma (now Jahangir) and Hina. Mr Bhutto also stayed in the same house when many would dare not host him. Baqi Baluch, a fiery member of the West Pakistan Assembly, suffered a murder attempt in the same house. Babar would have been happy spending all his life as a lecturer in English literature, had he been given the chance. He moved to Karachi and did his law. But he was a reluctant lawyer, spending most of his time on debating the issues of the day. His small room in Khalid Ishaques house was the scene of some heated encounters between Karamat Ali, Sheema Kirmani, Usman Baloch, Rafiq Safi and Babar Ayaz. His serious practice began only after his marriage to Neelo, who I must say were to play the main role in disciplining a person who relished to see order in chaos. This woman of substance stood by him through thick and thin.
He was a reluctant judge, too, bored with the pomp and the aura of aloof authority attached to it. A most uncomfortable period was when he had to act as governor. But he took writing of his judgments very seriously. A founder of the Human Rights Commission, he viewed law as being more effective in securing rights than mere advocacy. Alternative dispute resolution was also his forte. He wondered how privatization and nationalization could be defended by the same public interest argument. He was also struggling with a profound thought: it is illegal to take ones own life, but is it legal to allow poverty to cause death and suffering. A landmark judgment required compensation to be paid for illegal detention.
He was very forgetful as well. Once he promised to take Javed (now Jusice Buttar), late Zahurul Haq Sheikh (DMG) and myself to a movie. He made advanced booking, but could not remember where he had kept the tickets. Later on, they were found in his socks! It is still a mystery how the tickets got into the socks. But this is not the only mystery he left behind. Many wondered how he followed the arguments being presented when everyone thought he was sleeping! His judgments never showed that he had missed even a minor point.
The writer is a former chief economist of the Planning Commission.
Sunday, June 07, 2009
Dr Pervez Tahir
Babar was in Islamabad in the week before his death in Karachi left many in terrible grief. As had become usual after he was moved to Islamabad, he called after work to find out whether I was in Islamabad or Lahore. I have been dividing time between the two cities for the past two years. Luckily I was in Islamabad. The effort always was to go to a different eatery for gup shup. This time we had gone to a restaurant named Tiramisu in the Blue Area. If we were in Lahore, we would go to the places we used to frequent in our college days, mostly in areas in and around Nai and Purani Anarkali, lamenting always the end of Pak Tea House, the Tangiers Bar in Tollinton Market and Lords on the lawns of the Museum, or was it National College of the Arts, one could never really tell.
Mr Justice Sabihuddin Ahamad, lately of the Supreme Court and earlier the chief justice of the Sindh High Court, was known as Babar to his near and dear ones. In that beautiful late night of Islamabad, the dinner table was laid out in the open. I could never imagine this would be our last meeting. He was at his normal best, chain-smoking, laughing his unstoppable laughter, musing about the issues emerging after the restoration of Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, saying that he now needed samajdars rather than janisars. Remember that his own son, Barrister Salahuddin Ahmad, was among the more resolute of the janisars. He himself had remained steadfast during the movement for restoration. At some point he even considered resignation. Known for his independence of views even when he was at the bar, he experienced quite a hit-and-miss affair before his elevation to the bench in Sindh. That is why he was never able to understand what prompted his elevation to the Supreme Court. All he could remember was the grant of relief for medical treatment to the top man in authority during the days of his elongated confinement. But then Babar was known for granting it to all and sundry, without any discrimination. In keeping with his laid back style, the truth is that he laughed all the way to the Supreme Court.
So nothing unusual about the dinner and the dinner talk that fateful night of the spring. But Babar also said something which, looking back now, turns out to be grimly prophetic. I had started writing for newspapers during our student days. Occasionally I would also indulge in public speaking at Kishwar Naheeds National Centre in Al-Falah, Lahore. Babar used to chide me that knowing me gave him, and some other friends, Khalid Saeed the psychologist in particular, the comfort that there was somebody to reminisce about them when they were gone. Babar reminded me of this statement of his and laughed.
In the days of anti-Ayub movement, students when not agitating on the roads would gather in small groups on their campuses to discuss the brewing political storm. The country was in a state of socio-economic ferment. One morning I was sitting in one such group in Government College, Lahore when I saw everyones Professor of English, Eric Cyprian, approaching me along with a tall handsome boy. "I want you to meet Sabih. He is seeking admission to GC. You would like him," he said in his familiar high-pitched voice. This was my first encounter with Babar. Soon we were shouting hai, hai together on The Mall. In one such procession, a press photographer was taking a picture of some of us chanting slogans when Babar pulled me back. All those in the picture were arrested the next day!
He was in the English department and I was in economics department. Academic departments in those days were not the watertight compartments they have become nowadays. We became great friends as I quickly discovered that he had an acute sense of humour, his laughter unstoppable and louder than the loudest. The typical Lahori expression for making fun of others, rikard shikard lagana, was his favourite. We had left-liberal leanings but were often inclined to make fun of those who took their leftism a bit too seriously. We thus had our informally formed Rikard International, with a Rikardist Manifesto opening like this: All history hitherto is the history of the struggle between the rikarders and the rikarded, etc, etc. We watched all night the election results on PTV in 1970 and did Bhangra when ZABs landslide was described by the venerable A.T. Chaudhry as the Emperors defeat at the hands of foot soldiers.
Babar was very good at coming out with labels that fitted the bill. A cousin of mine from Military College at Jhelum, who was part of police group scheme for training officers at GC, joined a group of revolutionary intellectuals rather than preparing himself to enforce the riot act. Babar quickly dubbed him as military intellectual. Budding young writers and poets were never able to read their poetry, plays or short stories to us before serving sumptuous tea. We would offer such silly critiques that some would stop talking to us. When serious, he would surprise established critics by his masterly social comment. No wonder, he was the grand son of Maulana Salahuddin Ahmad, the founder-editor of Adabi Dunya, which he claimed to be the lowest priced Urdu journal of the world. I do not, however, recall him ever indulging in namedropping.
The illustrious inheritance did not stop there. He was the son of Wajihuddin Ahmad, CSP, a nephew of the celebrated lawyer Khalid Ishaque and Malik Ghulam Jilani of the Asma Jilani case fame. In Lahore, he lived in Malik Sahibs house near the Liberty Market in Gulberg. While gup-shupping in the large veranda in late summer evening, we would also chat up young Asma (now Jahangir) and Hina. Mr Bhutto also stayed in the same house when many would dare not host him. Baqi Baluch, a fiery member of the West Pakistan Assembly, suffered a murder attempt in the same house. Babar would have been happy spending all his life as a lecturer in English literature, had he been given the chance. He moved to Karachi and did his law. But he was a reluctant lawyer, spending most of his time on debating the issues of the day. His small room in Khalid Ishaques house was the scene of some heated encounters between Karamat Ali, Sheema Kirmani, Usman Baloch, Rafiq Safi and Babar Ayaz. His serious practice began only after his marriage to Neelo, who I must say were to play the main role in disciplining a person who relished to see order in chaos. This woman of substance stood by him through thick and thin.
He was a reluctant judge, too, bored with the pomp and the aura of aloof authority attached to it. A most uncomfortable period was when he had to act as governor. But he took writing of his judgments very seriously. A founder of the Human Rights Commission, he viewed law as being more effective in securing rights than mere advocacy. Alternative dispute resolution was also his forte. He wondered how privatization and nationalization could be defended by the same public interest argument. He was also struggling with a profound thought: it is illegal to take ones own life, but is it legal to allow poverty to cause death and suffering. A landmark judgment required compensation to be paid for illegal detention.
He was very forgetful as well. Once he promised to take Javed (now Jusice Buttar), late Zahurul Haq Sheikh (DMG) and myself to a movie. He made advanced booking, but could not remember where he had kept the tickets. Later on, they were found in his socks! It is still a mystery how the tickets got into the socks. But this is not the only mystery he left behind. Many wondered how he followed the arguments being presented when everyone thought he was sleeping! His judgments never showed that he had missed even a minor point.
The writer is a former chief economist of the Planning Commission.
A
arshad_lahore
Guest
Over the top
Case of the white tigers
Sunday, June 07, 2009
Masood Hasan
I am now utterly convinced that the more some of us try to reform the zoo at Lahore, the more spectacular will be our failure. After years of writing, serving on the Zoo Management Committee, lobbying with chief secretaries, governors and chief ministers, raising public awareness and highlighting what goes on behind those iron gates, we have failure slapped in our faces. Nothing it seems can probe, evaluate and resolve the terrible affairs that continue to flourish in the Zoo. The scandals multiply, the amounts of commissions, grafts and corruption rise like space probes, the animals continue to be at the receiving end and life carries on. The only victims of all these horrible practices are the animals voiceless, powerless and friendless. They are totally at the mercy of selfish, unfair, cutthroat career opportunists and money seekers. What will it take to set the balance right, I havent a clue but for starters it might not be a bad idea to transfer all the animals to the offices of the zoo caretakers and put all the officials inside cages? Visitors should be encouraged to throw stones, burning cigarette butts and plastic trash at the hapless officials who might find defending themselves a bit of a problem. The animals have coped with these insults for years. Let them try and emulate them for a change.
Many people will feel that a discussion on the welfare of the animals is pointless since the people of this land superior beings supposedly, fare no better. This is fallacious thinking. If a country has allowed its people to descend into hell why must the animals follow suit? They are absolutely innocent which you cannot say for many people who have ensured that the system of exploitation endures and flourishes as long as they can get a whopping profit for themselves. I think it was Mr Gandhi who said that a nations worth can be measured by the way it looks after its animals. So with the beards audaciously changing the very way we live, defiant and fearless, their shallow perceptions of faith affecting closure of schools and colleges and spreading a tidal wave of terror through this country and its sorry citizens, why should animals receive any importance at all? And for that I am afraid one has to listen to what Mr Gandhi said a long time ago.
So what is wrong with the Lahore Zoo, other than the fact that it propagates a concept of keeping animals in captivity that globally finds less and less support. The concept of caged animals is at variance with this apparently enlightened age of mankind. There are of course zoos but then those are designed, managed and maintained by people who genuinely care for animals and are acutely aware of their wellbeing. Not here, where all that the animals mean to their keepers are a source of power and money. And the Lahore Zoo has been flush with money for years, in spite of large-scale cases of corruption and financial scams. That a miniscule amount of this has found its way to genuine uplift of the animals, their diet, habitat, medical care and general wellbeing, is established beyond any doubt. The money earned putting these animals on display has gone into long-term investments and open pockets of whoever has half a chance to pilfer a note. Simply stated, the Lahore Zoo has more revenue than expenses and is cash rich. To find a post at the Zoo is fiercely fought for. Everyone sees a golden goose here and wants a piece of the action. While financially the Zoo has made great progress, it has nothing but failure in everything else it has touched.
There is no adequate medical cover for animals. There is no sick bay, no examination room, no diagnostics, no medical record, no pharmacy, and no system that can remotely handle the smallest of emergencies, no trained animal handlers (the security guards have taken this task over by default) and no plan worth the name that promises to make things better. The much-touted Master Plan has more holes in it than a leaking piss pot. In any event, if and when it is implemented it will be no more than a grotesque parody of what it should be, but no heads will roll. They never have and they never will. Accountability in Pakistan is a leper. Over 80 per cent animals suffer from TB but nothing has been done to combat the disease. Animal mortality is at an all time high which is why many people think this is not a zoo but a morgue. And over all this hell sit a band of petty officials, ill-trained, ill-qualified and ill-motivated to rise above themselves. The last thing on their minds is animal welfare. The first thing is to grab a ride on the gravy train and make a tidy sum before being shunted to some obscure department and an obscure existence. The Zoo has financial scandals that run from here to Buner but no has ever been apprehended. It is like the FM Radio Station in Swat which no one can seem to find and which remains one of lifes great mysteries.
A Karachi-based national newspaper has unearthed another killer scandal. This one relates to the import of two white tigers in the absence of any kosher paperwork or required permissions. Four rare white tigers (their trans-boundary movement is very restricted and requires a great deal of genuine paperwork before it can happen), were imported from Indonesia through Allama Iqbal International Airport where they were detained and the traffickers (a well-connected mafia operating without fear in Lahore, Karachi and God else knows where) were accosted. Enter a Lahore-party aka another crook and hey presto, the Lahore Zoo management buys two of the tigers without so much as obtaining any permission. It later approached the Feds for permission to import the animals without revealing that the two tigers were already in the zoo and money had changed hands. The zoos complicity was revealed by the media which continued to pursue leads. Lahore Customs too initiated an enquiry which continues. Last month, the Lahore Zoo broke more rules and using the good offices of a federal secretary sought Islamabads permission for an NOC conveniently bypassing the Punjab Wildlife Department. In the meantime, the animal smuggler in connivance with the Lahore Zoo attempted to mislead the customs in order to regularise the smuggling of a rare species. The media once again exposed this and the NOC was hastily withdrawn. The latest czar of the zoo is now looking after things whatever that means. His predecessor, who has disappeared into the twilight after being charged with the illegal import of the white tigers has been transferred or in Paki-speak, absolved of any misdoings. The service always closes ranks when a comrade is in trouble.
If all this is not fraud and misuse of office, I honestly dont know what is. This is not the only scandal but the most recent one but no one has been taken to the cleaners ever and no one is likely to be ever indicted. Who are these people that the government cannot touch? Is everyone on the take? What magic potion, do the crooks, the cheats and the frauds have that makes them invincible? The Zoo will lurch from one scandal to another unless, as is very much permissible under the law, the Zoos nomenclature is changed and it is made into an autonomous corporation with a proper representative board comprising members in good standing from civil society and some sprinkling of officials so that the Zoo and all it does is finally accountable. The former chief secretary, Mr Randhawa, told me that it required a two line note to do this since it was all laid out but he was moved before he could do anything and I wonder the present CS can make this historic move. Nothing else will change any thing and animals will die in vain.
The writer is a Lahore-based columnist.
Case of the white tigers
Sunday, June 07, 2009
Masood Hasan
I am now utterly convinced that the more some of us try to reform the zoo at Lahore, the more spectacular will be our failure. After years of writing, serving on the Zoo Management Committee, lobbying with chief secretaries, governors and chief ministers, raising public awareness and highlighting what goes on behind those iron gates, we have failure slapped in our faces. Nothing it seems can probe, evaluate and resolve the terrible affairs that continue to flourish in the Zoo. The scandals multiply, the amounts of commissions, grafts and corruption rise like space probes, the animals continue to be at the receiving end and life carries on. The only victims of all these horrible practices are the animals voiceless, powerless and friendless. They are totally at the mercy of selfish, unfair, cutthroat career opportunists and money seekers. What will it take to set the balance right, I havent a clue but for starters it might not be a bad idea to transfer all the animals to the offices of the zoo caretakers and put all the officials inside cages? Visitors should be encouraged to throw stones, burning cigarette butts and plastic trash at the hapless officials who might find defending themselves a bit of a problem. The animals have coped with these insults for years. Let them try and emulate them for a change.
Many people will feel that a discussion on the welfare of the animals is pointless since the people of this land superior beings supposedly, fare no better. This is fallacious thinking. If a country has allowed its people to descend into hell why must the animals follow suit? They are absolutely innocent which you cannot say for many people who have ensured that the system of exploitation endures and flourishes as long as they can get a whopping profit for themselves. I think it was Mr Gandhi who said that a nations worth can be measured by the way it looks after its animals. So with the beards audaciously changing the very way we live, defiant and fearless, their shallow perceptions of faith affecting closure of schools and colleges and spreading a tidal wave of terror through this country and its sorry citizens, why should animals receive any importance at all? And for that I am afraid one has to listen to what Mr Gandhi said a long time ago.
So what is wrong with the Lahore Zoo, other than the fact that it propagates a concept of keeping animals in captivity that globally finds less and less support. The concept of caged animals is at variance with this apparently enlightened age of mankind. There are of course zoos but then those are designed, managed and maintained by people who genuinely care for animals and are acutely aware of their wellbeing. Not here, where all that the animals mean to their keepers are a source of power and money. And the Lahore Zoo has been flush with money for years, in spite of large-scale cases of corruption and financial scams. That a miniscule amount of this has found its way to genuine uplift of the animals, their diet, habitat, medical care and general wellbeing, is established beyond any doubt. The money earned putting these animals on display has gone into long-term investments and open pockets of whoever has half a chance to pilfer a note. Simply stated, the Lahore Zoo has more revenue than expenses and is cash rich. To find a post at the Zoo is fiercely fought for. Everyone sees a golden goose here and wants a piece of the action. While financially the Zoo has made great progress, it has nothing but failure in everything else it has touched.
There is no adequate medical cover for animals. There is no sick bay, no examination room, no diagnostics, no medical record, no pharmacy, and no system that can remotely handle the smallest of emergencies, no trained animal handlers (the security guards have taken this task over by default) and no plan worth the name that promises to make things better. The much-touted Master Plan has more holes in it than a leaking piss pot. In any event, if and when it is implemented it will be no more than a grotesque parody of what it should be, but no heads will roll. They never have and they never will. Accountability in Pakistan is a leper. Over 80 per cent animals suffer from TB but nothing has been done to combat the disease. Animal mortality is at an all time high which is why many people think this is not a zoo but a morgue. And over all this hell sit a band of petty officials, ill-trained, ill-qualified and ill-motivated to rise above themselves. The last thing on their minds is animal welfare. The first thing is to grab a ride on the gravy train and make a tidy sum before being shunted to some obscure department and an obscure existence. The Zoo has financial scandals that run from here to Buner but no has ever been apprehended. It is like the FM Radio Station in Swat which no one can seem to find and which remains one of lifes great mysteries.
A Karachi-based national newspaper has unearthed another killer scandal. This one relates to the import of two white tigers in the absence of any kosher paperwork or required permissions. Four rare white tigers (their trans-boundary movement is very restricted and requires a great deal of genuine paperwork before it can happen), were imported from Indonesia through Allama Iqbal International Airport where they were detained and the traffickers (a well-connected mafia operating without fear in Lahore, Karachi and God else knows where) were accosted. Enter a Lahore-party aka another crook and hey presto, the Lahore Zoo management buys two of the tigers without so much as obtaining any permission. It later approached the Feds for permission to import the animals without revealing that the two tigers were already in the zoo and money had changed hands. The zoos complicity was revealed by the media which continued to pursue leads. Lahore Customs too initiated an enquiry which continues. Last month, the Lahore Zoo broke more rules and using the good offices of a federal secretary sought Islamabads permission for an NOC conveniently bypassing the Punjab Wildlife Department. In the meantime, the animal smuggler in connivance with the Lahore Zoo attempted to mislead the customs in order to regularise the smuggling of a rare species. The media once again exposed this and the NOC was hastily withdrawn. The latest czar of the zoo is now looking after things whatever that means. His predecessor, who has disappeared into the twilight after being charged with the illegal import of the white tigers has been transferred or in Paki-speak, absolved of any misdoings. The service always closes ranks when a comrade is in trouble.
If all this is not fraud and misuse of office, I honestly dont know what is. This is not the only scandal but the most recent one but no one has been taken to the cleaners ever and no one is likely to be ever indicted. Who are these people that the government cannot touch? Is everyone on the take? What magic potion, do the crooks, the cheats and the frauds have that makes them invincible? The Zoo will lurch from one scandal to another unless, as is very much permissible under the law, the Zoos nomenclature is changed and it is made into an autonomous corporation with a proper representative board comprising members in good standing from civil society and some sprinkling of officials so that the Zoo and all it does is finally accountable. The former chief secretary, Mr Randhawa, told me that it required a two line note to do this since it was all laid out but he was moved before he could do anything and I wonder the present CS can make this historic move. Nothing else will change any thing and animals will die in vain.
The writer is a Lahore-based columnist.
A
arshad_lahore
Guest
Capital suggestion
Clear, hold, build
Sunday, June 07, 2009
Dr Farrukh Saleem
Insurgents -- both domestic and imported -- are bent upon capturing Pakistani territory. Our soldiers are now laying down their lives to keep Pakistan intact. Many powerful armies have in the past taken years to beat back much weaker insurgents. The Huk Rebellion -- the communist insurgency against the Philippine government -- lasted for eight years. The British army (147,000 strong) along with the territorial and special police forces fought Irish insurgents for 30 long years. The Bolshevik Red Army fought for six long years. The Angolan Civil War went on for 27 years. The Somali Civil War has been going on since 1991.
Why is Pakistan facing an insurgency? In a nutshell, consecutive leadership failures created gaps, both security gaps and capacity gaps. In Swat, for instance, the state of Pakistan failed to provide security -- personal security, economic security and political security -- to Swats residents. Then there were capacity gaps -- dispensation of justice, food, health and education gaps. The Taliban slipped into these gaps and marginalised the state.
How can Pakistan fight this insurgency? Abraham Lincoln fought -- and won -- the American Civil War by making the presence of his troops so "pervasive that there simply was no place left for insurgents to hide." General Franco repeated the Lincoln-model and brought down the Spanish Republic.
In Pakistans case, Swat, Chitral, Dir, Shangla, Hangu, Lakki Marwat, Bannu, Tank, Khyber, Kurram, Bajaur, Mohamand, Orakzai, North Waziristan and South Waziristan all put together come to over 56,000 sq km -- and with 7 Indian Corps on our eastern border -- we dont have the surplus troops to replicate either the Lincoln or the Franco model.
How can Pakistan then fight this insurgency? The American Enterprise Institutes Iraq Planning Group developed a comprehensive counterinsurgency strategy. The strategy calls for clear, hold and build. Here are the five phases of the strategy: Phase 1: preparations -- putting all the "necessary forces and equipment on the ground." Phase 2: intelligence building -- gathering intelligence on the size, strength and the command and control (C&C) structure of the enemy. Phase 3: clearing -- the actual military operation, disrupting supply lines, dismantling C&C and seizing munitions. Phase 4: holding -- troops to "take up residence in temporary military headquarters" and the police to be re-equipped. Phase 5: building -- the civilian administration to inject large amounts of capital to restore basic services like water, electricity, sewer, dispensation of justice, etc.
Mao Tse-tung once wrote "the guerrilla must swim in the people as the fish swims in the sea." The current operation in Swat, in counterinsurgency lingo, is referred to as "draining the swamp"; forced relocation of Swatis in order to isolate the insurgents. The insurgent infrastructure is now being disrupted, dismantled and defeated (or triple D) -- separating the fish from the people. In that sense the Pakistan army is going by the book. This separation process, however, requires superb intelligence. And, intelligence is what the Pakistan army is short on.
Time is on the side of the guerrillas. They mean to demoralise our troops through sneak attacks. As long as insurgents have popular support they have the advantages of "mobility, invisibility and legitimacy". The Pakistan army will have to show some tangible proof of success in the immediate future.
As per Captain Liddell Hart Model, the "key to a successful counterinsurgency is the winning-over of the occupied territorys population. If that can be achieved, then the rebellion will be deprived of its supplies, shelter, and, more importantly, its moral legitimacy."
One of the most successful of counterinsurgency campaigns was undertaken by the Syrian army and air force. When Syria had become overly committed in Lebanons Civil War (20,000 troops deployed) the Muslim Brotherhood -- sensing a weak state apparatus -- launched an insurgency. In 1979, insurgents killed seven dozen military cadets followed by a series of car bomb attacks in Damascus. In 1980, insurgents made a near-successful attempt to assassinate President Assad. The Muslim Brotherhood then took over Hama, the provincial capital, and began massacring residents. In 1982, the Syrian air force indiscriminately bombarded the town of Hama. According to Amnesty International, the "Syrian military bombed the old streets of the city from the air to facilitate the introduction of military forces and tanks through the narrow streets, where homes were crushed by tanks during the first four days of fighting. They also claim that the Syrian military pumped poison gas into buildings where insurgents were said to be hiding."
The good news is that the whole world is on the side of our troops. The government now needs to set up a Provisional Reconstruction Authority and massively beef up the Swat police (to prepare them to hold the cleared territories).
PS: According to David Kilcullen, one of the worlds top counterinsurgency experts, America spent 99.9 per cent on Pakistans military and 0.4 per cent on the police.
The writer is the executive director of the Centre for Research and Security Studies (CRSS).
Clear, hold, build
Sunday, June 07, 2009
Dr Farrukh Saleem
Insurgents -- both domestic and imported -- are bent upon capturing Pakistani territory. Our soldiers are now laying down their lives to keep Pakistan intact. Many powerful armies have in the past taken years to beat back much weaker insurgents. The Huk Rebellion -- the communist insurgency against the Philippine government -- lasted for eight years. The British army (147,000 strong) along with the territorial and special police forces fought Irish insurgents for 30 long years. The Bolshevik Red Army fought for six long years. The Angolan Civil War went on for 27 years. The Somali Civil War has been going on since 1991.
Why is Pakistan facing an insurgency? In a nutshell, consecutive leadership failures created gaps, both security gaps and capacity gaps. In Swat, for instance, the state of Pakistan failed to provide security -- personal security, economic security and political security -- to Swats residents. Then there were capacity gaps -- dispensation of justice, food, health and education gaps. The Taliban slipped into these gaps and marginalised the state.
How can Pakistan fight this insurgency? Abraham Lincoln fought -- and won -- the American Civil War by making the presence of his troops so "pervasive that there simply was no place left for insurgents to hide." General Franco repeated the Lincoln-model and brought down the Spanish Republic.
In Pakistans case, Swat, Chitral, Dir, Shangla, Hangu, Lakki Marwat, Bannu, Tank, Khyber, Kurram, Bajaur, Mohamand, Orakzai, North Waziristan and South Waziristan all put together come to over 56,000 sq km -- and with 7 Indian Corps on our eastern border -- we dont have the surplus troops to replicate either the Lincoln or the Franco model.
How can Pakistan then fight this insurgency? The American Enterprise Institutes Iraq Planning Group developed a comprehensive counterinsurgency strategy. The strategy calls for clear, hold and build. Here are the five phases of the strategy: Phase 1: preparations -- putting all the "necessary forces and equipment on the ground." Phase 2: intelligence building -- gathering intelligence on the size, strength and the command and control (C&C) structure of the enemy. Phase 3: clearing -- the actual military operation, disrupting supply lines, dismantling C&C and seizing munitions. Phase 4: holding -- troops to "take up residence in temporary military headquarters" and the police to be re-equipped. Phase 5: building -- the civilian administration to inject large amounts of capital to restore basic services like water, electricity, sewer, dispensation of justice, etc.
Mao Tse-tung once wrote "the guerrilla must swim in the people as the fish swims in the sea." The current operation in Swat, in counterinsurgency lingo, is referred to as "draining the swamp"; forced relocation of Swatis in order to isolate the insurgents. The insurgent infrastructure is now being disrupted, dismantled and defeated (or triple D) -- separating the fish from the people. In that sense the Pakistan army is going by the book. This separation process, however, requires superb intelligence. And, intelligence is what the Pakistan army is short on.
Time is on the side of the guerrillas. They mean to demoralise our troops through sneak attacks. As long as insurgents have popular support they have the advantages of "mobility, invisibility and legitimacy". The Pakistan army will have to show some tangible proof of success in the immediate future.
As per Captain Liddell Hart Model, the "key to a successful counterinsurgency is the winning-over of the occupied territorys population. If that can be achieved, then the rebellion will be deprived of its supplies, shelter, and, more importantly, its moral legitimacy."
One of the most successful of counterinsurgency campaigns was undertaken by the Syrian army and air force. When Syria had become overly committed in Lebanons Civil War (20,000 troops deployed) the Muslim Brotherhood -- sensing a weak state apparatus -- launched an insurgency. In 1979, insurgents killed seven dozen military cadets followed by a series of car bomb attacks in Damascus. In 1980, insurgents made a near-successful attempt to assassinate President Assad. The Muslim Brotherhood then took over Hama, the provincial capital, and began massacring residents. In 1982, the Syrian air force indiscriminately bombarded the town of Hama. According to Amnesty International, the "Syrian military bombed the old streets of the city from the air to facilitate the introduction of military forces and tanks through the narrow streets, where homes were crushed by tanks during the first four days of fighting. They also claim that the Syrian military pumped poison gas into buildings where insurgents were said to be hiding."
The good news is that the whole world is on the side of our troops. The government now needs to set up a Provisional Reconstruction Authority and massively beef up the Swat police (to prepare them to hold the cleared territories).
PS: According to David Kilcullen, one of the worlds top counterinsurgency experts, America spent 99.9 per cent on Pakistans military and 0.4 per cent on the police.
The writer is the executive director of the Centre for Research and Security Studies (CRSS).
A
arshad_lahore
Guest
To turn the corner
Sunday, June 07, 2009
Ghazi Salahuddin
Let me begin with a confession: I sat through the live coverage of President Barack Obamas address to the Muslim world on Thursday with rapt attention and felt convinced of his sincerity and good intentions. This, without any doubt, is a great initiative. Yes, considering the raw winds that are blowing across our troubled lands, the promise of a new beginning is potentially breakable. But the spectacle of an American president saying what Obama did in Cairo was in itself a source of considerable delight.
So, what happens now? The point that one speech cannot make the difference has repeatedly been stressed. As it is, the wars that are fought in the minds of human beings do linger until some kind of a paradigm shift manifests itself with the acceptance of new realities and new ideas. What Obamas remarkable speech prompts us to do in Pakistan is to carefully take stock of our relationship with and feelings towards not just the United States of America but also the phenomenon of Islamic militancy in all its manifestations.
This exercise would naturally confront us with some difficult questions about our national sense of direction and the challenges that have paved the way for our survival. It may be instructive, in this context, to review the entire exercise that was conducted by the Obama administration in formulating the ideas and the messages that are contained in Thursdays historic oration. Indeed, an American commentator may even write a book on the making of this speech and of Obamas new policy towards Muslim countries. A separate study could review the massive operation that was conducted to promote and disseminate the speech.
We should also be mindful of the fact that Obama must represent Americas national interests as well as its public opinion. A popularly elected leader does not enjoy the power of a dictator or a military ruler to arbitrarily execute a U-turn in his countrys policies. Yes, the electoral victory of Obama is a dazzling illustration of how a nation can rise to a higher level of maturity and fairness through democracy. Still, Obama is the legitimate personification of America and there are bound to be limits to how far he can satisfy the expectations of the different sections of opinion in the Muslim world, particularly when America is a country that many Muslims love to hate.
Now, it is all right for the Muslim world to expect America to erase the general perception that its war against terror is a reflection of some kind of Islamophobia, though Obama has expunged this term from Americas diplomatic lexicon and there was no mention of the words terrorism and terrorists in his Cairo speech. But what does the Muslim world, or any specific Muslim country, propose to do to improve the global image of Muslims?
After all, when Obama announces his resolve to seek a new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world, the Muslims not only have to assess the validity of this resolution but to also carefully examine their thoughts and feelings on what kinds of relations they want to foster with the United States. This issue is of particular significance for us in Pakistan. And its complexity is deepened by the burden of history that we carry. What is incontrovertible is that the American influence impinges on so many aspects of our national and foreign affairs.
This means that we must do some serious thinking on how we want this relationship to evolve. The irony here is that at the popular level, there is great distrust about American intentions and designs in this region. And such perceptions become hard to change even when the dynamics of a situation is changing at a quick pace. I say this not just with reference to the new language that Obama has adopted to talk to the Muslims, raising high expectations for policy action. Our own military action in Malakand and the humanitarian crisis that this has spawned is bound to have an impact on what we think of the Taliban and on Americas role in our emerging crises.
This was a critical time for US special envoy Richard Holbrooke to visit Pakistan. He announced increased US assistance for the internally displaced people and also visited a camp. On Friday, concluding his three-day visit, he said that the Pakistan armed forces have "turned the corner" in the present military offensive, successfully clearing several areas. Holbrooke repeatedly underlined the dominant US share in humanitarian assistance given to Pakistan and seemed anxious for its appreciation by the people of Pakistan.
If we have genuinely turned the corner in our campaign against the Taliban, or militants, or violent extremists, many things are likely to change. However, terrorist attacks and suicide bombings have continued. Fridays suicide attack on a Dir mosque, just before the afternoon prayers, is the latest reminder of the immense potential for violence in our society. Reports said that twelve children were included in the large number of fatalities between 30 and 40.
Coming back to Obamas Cairo speech, we will need some early evidence of how America now interacts with Muslim countries to reduce tensions and promote peace, particularly in the Middle-East. After violent extremism that Obama chose as his first issue to confront, he gave priority to "the situation between Israelis, Palestinians and the Arab world". It was refreshing to see an American president asserting that the Palestinians "have suffered in pursuit of a homeland". He added: "So let there be no doubt: the situation for the Palestinian people is intolerable".
It is not possible in this space to review the entire speech that had quotations from the holy books of the three Abrahamic faiths. The essential message was that we should forget the past and try to understand an opposing view. This will be very difficult for us to do, given our emotional and intellectual proclivities. For instance, revenge is the overriding instinct in our tribal culture that some of us want to romanticize. Obama also spoke about womens rights and in this area, too, we have serious problems to contend with.
Finally and irrespective of whether we want to look at Obamas address as a point of reference or not we must think of making a new beginning in Pakistan. What seems necessary, to quote Obama, is "that in order to move forward, we must say openly the things we hold in our hearts, and that too often are said only behind closed doors". Ah, but that would demand peace and tolerance and respect for dissident views. America should have nothing to do with how we build such an environment. And no amount of financial assistance or military hardware can help us in this struggle for Pakistans survival.
The writer is a staff member.
Sunday, June 07, 2009
Ghazi Salahuddin
Let me begin with a confession: I sat through the live coverage of President Barack Obamas address to the Muslim world on Thursday with rapt attention and felt convinced of his sincerity and good intentions. This, without any doubt, is a great initiative. Yes, considering the raw winds that are blowing across our troubled lands, the promise of a new beginning is potentially breakable. But the spectacle of an American president saying what Obama did in Cairo was in itself a source of considerable delight.
So, what happens now? The point that one speech cannot make the difference has repeatedly been stressed. As it is, the wars that are fought in the minds of human beings do linger until some kind of a paradigm shift manifests itself with the acceptance of new realities and new ideas. What Obamas remarkable speech prompts us to do in Pakistan is to carefully take stock of our relationship with and feelings towards not just the United States of America but also the phenomenon of Islamic militancy in all its manifestations.
This exercise would naturally confront us with some difficult questions about our national sense of direction and the challenges that have paved the way for our survival. It may be instructive, in this context, to review the entire exercise that was conducted by the Obama administration in formulating the ideas and the messages that are contained in Thursdays historic oration. Indeed, an American commentator may even write a book on the making of this speech and of Obamas new policy towards Muslim countries. A separate study could review the massive operation that was conducted to promote and disseminate the speech.
We should also be mindful of the fact that Obama must represent Americas national interests as well as its public opinion. A popularly elected leader does not enjoy the power of a dictator or a military ruler to arbitrarily execute a U-turn in his countrys policies. Yes, the electoral victory of Obama is a dazzling illustration of how a nation can rise to a higher level of maturity and fairness through democracy. Still, Obama is the legitimate personification of America and there are bound to be limits to how far he can satisfy the expectations of the different sections of opinion in the Muslim world, particularly when America is a country that many Muslims love to hate.
Now, it is all right for the Muslim world to expect America to erase the general perception that its war against terror is a reflection of some kind of Islamophobia, though Obama has expunged this term from Americas diplomatic lexicon and there was no mention of the words terrorism and terrorists in his Cairo speech. But what does the Muslim world, or any specific Muslim country, propose to do to improve the global image of Muslims?
After all, when Obama announces his resolve to seek a new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world, the Muslims not only have to assess the validity of this resolution but to also carefully examine their thoughts and feelings on what kinds of relations they want to foster with the United States. This issue is of particular significance for us in Pakistan. And its complexity is deepened by the burden of history that we carry. What is incontrovertible is that the American influence impinges on so many aspects of our national and foreign affairs.
This means that we must do some serious thinking on how we want this relationship to evolve. The irony here is that at the popular level, there is great distrust about American intentions and designs in this region. And such perceptions become hard to change even when the dynamics of a situation is changing at a quick pace. I say this not just with reference to the new language that Obama has adopted to talk to the Muslims, raising high expectations for policy action. Our own military action in Malakand and the humanitarian crisis that this has spawned is bound to have an impact on what we think of the Taliban and on Americas role in our emerging crises.
This was a critical time for US special envoy Richard Holbrooke to visit Pakistan. He announced increased US assistance for the internally displaced people and also visited a camp. On Friday, concluding his three-day visit, he said that the Pakistan armed forces have "turned the corner" in the present military offensive, successfully clearing several areas. Holbrooke repeatedly underlined the dominant US share in humanitarian assistance given to Pakistan and seemed anxious for its appreciation by the people of Pakistan.
If we have genuinely turned the corner in our campaign against the Taliban, or militants, or violent extremists, many things are likely to change. However, terrorist attacks and suicide bombings have continued. Fridays suicide attack on a Dir mosque, just before the afternoon prayers, is the latest reminder of the immense potential for violence in our society. Reports said that twelve children were included in the large number of fatalities between 30 and 40.
Coming back to Obamas Cairo speech, we will need some early evidence of how America now interacts with Muslim countries to reduce tensions and promote peace, particularly in the Middle-East. After violent extremism that Obama chose as his first issue to confront, he gave priority to "the situation between Israelis, Palestinians and the Arab world". It was refreshing to see an American president asserting that the Palestinians "have suffered in pursuit of a homeland". He added: "So let there be no doubt: the situation for the Palestinian people is intolerable".
It is not possible in this space to review the entire speech that had quotations from the holy books of the three Abrahamic faiths. The essential message was that we should forget the past and try to understand an opposing view. This will be very difficult for us to do, given our emotional and intellectual proclivities. For instance, revenge is the overriding instinct in our tribal culture that some of us want to romanticize. Obama also spoke about womens rights and in this area, too, we have serious problems to contend with.
Finally and irrespective of whether we want to look at Obamas address as a point of reference or not we must think of making a new beginning in Pakistan. What seems necessary, to quote Obama, is "that in order to move forward, we must say openly the things we hold in our hearts, and that too often are said only behind closed doors". Ah, but that would demand peace and tolerance and respect for dissident views. America should have nothing to do with how we build such an environment. And no amount of financial assistance or military hardware can help us in this struggle for Pakistans survival.
The writer is a staff member.
A
arshad_lahore
Guest
Karachi: law and order
By Ardeshir Cowasjee
Sunday, 07 Jun, 2009
To continue to harp on the subject, to continue to be a bore when it comes to this vital topic law and order once again, under the unchanging prevailing circumstances, it is necessary to trot out words spoken by the founder and maker of this country.
On Aug 11, 1947, three days prior to the birth of Pakistan, Mohammad Ali Jinnah did what he could, he told the future legislators that the first and foremost duty of any government is to impose and maintain law and order to stress, the first duty.
They did not listen then; now they simply do not care. They have more pressing matters on their minds.
The cause of law and order was not furthered by the Objectives Resolution which was proposed by Jinnahs successor, his one time right-hand man, Prime Minister Liaquat Ali Khan, six months after his death, and passed by the constituent assembly. It was an incitement to intolerance, and as we know intolerance leads to violence, and violence which through lack of will cannot be controlled negates law and order. This country over the years has not simply been subjected to criminality emanating from all levels of society, the highest to the lowest, but with massive religious intolerance which has led to unending sectarian strife and finally to the Taliban and their territorial plans.
Karachi is no stranger to the absence of law and order, much of it politically inspired. None of our political parties have ever inserted the issue of law and order in their list of priorities it has always been a non-starter. As an illustration of the absence and of the involvement of politics in that absence, let us just take the headlines on one day as were printed on the front page of the Metropolitan section of this newspaper on June 5, last Friday. PPP man kidnapped, killed, Two MQM activists shot dead, JI activist killed in Surjani, Two Haqiqi workers gunned down. A broad coverage of the political spectrum, would one not say?
One of this citys main scourges is the land-grabbing mafia and the consequent turf wars between the grabbers of rival political parties. The government of Sindh has finally awoken and apparently decided to do something about it its reasoning will puzzle many of us as we do not expect concrete action from any of our governments, and we certainly do not expect results. However, we can always hope.
On May 22, 2009 the chief secretary of Sindh put his signature to a notification (No.SO(C-1V)SGA&CD/4-35/09) which reads: 'The Government of Sindh is pleased to constitute a committee with the composition & TORs as under ...'. Listed is the convener and four members tasked with 'Identifying the areas of state/CDGK land under encroachment', and the 'Causes and elements helping proliferation of the menace'. They were to come up with Short-term/long-term measures to retrieve encroached land and overcome the menace' and 'Submit presentation and report also on 24/05/09 positively'.
Three days later, on May 25, a section officer of the services, general administration &coordination Department signed another notification (No.SO(C-1V)SGA&CD/4-37/09) which reads : 'The competent authority has been pleased to constitute a high level provincial committee to tackle the issue of land grabbing/encroachment in Karachi with the following compositions & TORs ...'. Under the chairmanship of the chief secretary will sit 10 members.
They have been instructed 'To ascertain the factors leading to current problem of land grabbing. To identify areas in and around Karachi within one week which have specific trouble spots either currently active or have the potential to threaten law and order in future; To identify the main factors and their supporters (official and non-official) involved in each case of land grabbing. To suggest remedial measures, both short and long term.'
And, amazingly thinking in terms of law and order and to 'ensure no breach of the peace' in the short term, 'Joint check posts of Rangers and police to be established in identified areas with immediate effect. No land transactions between the government and private parties be allowed in specified areas henceforth. This shall not apply to cases where international commitments, foreign investments and government projects are involved. No construction be allowed in areas which are disputed or even have prima facie evidence of being contentious'
And in the long term, a 'Special police force to be established specifically to check the menace of land grabbing as envisaged in Section 15(a) of Sindh Public Property (Removal and Encroachment) Act, 1975, as amended in 2008'.
The committee was to submit its final report to the chief minister within a week. Do we suppose this has been done? Now we wait for the chief minister to ponder over the report and order that actual action be taken. Knowing Qaim Ali Shahs habit of commuting between Karachi and Islamabad, we may be in for a long wait.
In last weeks column I said that city nazim Mustafa Kamal had written on several occasions to CCPO Waseem Ahmed lamenting the collusive role of the police in land grabbing. What is the CCPO to do? One must suppose that the policeman on the beat is as honest as the top guns who rule the roost. Apart from that factor, the force is woefully undermanned.
London, a city of 7,387,868 (half that of Karachi) relatively law-abiding citizens has a police strength of 47,874, a ratio of 1:155. Delhi with a population of 14,000,000 has a police force of 58,000, a ratio of 1:241. Lahore with its 10,000,000 has a force of 30,946, a ratio of 1:323. We, with our estimated 18,000,000 have a force of 34,212, a ratio of 1:526.
On to a relatively related topic US special envoy, our latter-day viceroy, Richard Holbrooke: he spends more time in Pakistan than does our president, the itinerant Asif Zardari of the ever-present prosthodontic grin. This last visit Holbrooke was here for all of three days and found time to visit the Supreme Court and chat with the good chief justice of Pakistan Iftikhar Chaudhry. According to a press report of June 5, the two discussed 'matters relating to judicial reforms as per national judicial policy and the whole judicial structure of Pakistan'.
A news item the same day informed us that our footloose and fancy-free president is leaving us once again this coming Friday to embark upon a visit to six countries over the next four weeks.
By Ardeshir Cowasjee
Sunday, 07 Jun, 2009
To continue to harp on the subject, to continue to be a bore when it comes to this vital topic law and order once again, under the unchanging prevailing circumstances, it is necessary to trot out words spoken by the founder and maker of this country.
On Aug 11, 1947, three days prior to the birth of Pakistan, Mohammad Ali Jinnah did what he could, he told the future legislators that the first and foremost duty of any government is to impose and maintain law and order to stress, the first duty.
They did not listen then; now they simply do not care. They have more pressing matters on their minds.
The cause of law and order was not furthered by the Objectives Resolution which was proposed by Jinnahs successor, his one time right-hand man, Prime Minister Liaquat Ali Khan, six months after his death, and passed by the constituent assembly. It was an incitement to intolerance, and as we know intolerance leads to violence, and violence which through lack of will cannot be controlled negates law and order. This country over the years has not simply been subjected to criminality emanating from all levels of society, the highest to the lowest, but with massive religious intolerance which has led to unending sectarian strife and finally to the Taliban and their territorial plans.
Karachi is no stranger to the absence of law and order, much of it politically inspired. None of our political parties have ever inserted the issue of law and order in their list of priorities it has always been a non-starter. As an illustration of the absence and of the involvement of politics in that absence, let us just take the headlines on one day as were printed on the front page of the Metropolitan section of this newspaper on June 5, last Friday. PPP man kidnapped, killed, Two MQM activists shot dead, JI activist killed in Surjani, Two Haqiqi workers gunned down. A broad coverage of the political spectrum, would one not say?
One of this citys main scourges is the land-grabbing mafia and the consequent turf wars between the grabbers of rival political parties. The government of Sindh has finally awoken and apparently decided to do something about it its reasoning will puzzle many of us as we do not expect concrete action from any of our governments, and we certainly do not expect results. However, we can always hope.
On May 22, 2009 the chief secretary of Sindh put his signature to a notification (No.SO(C-1V)SGA&CD/4-35/09) which reads: 'The Government of Sindh is pleased to constitute a committee with the composition & TORs as under ...'. Listed is the convener and four members tasked with 'Identifying the areas of state/CDGK land under encroachment', and the 'Causes and elements helping proliferation of the menace'. They were to come up with Short-term/long-term measures to retrieve encroached land and overcome the menace' and 'Submit presentation and report also on 24/05/09 positively'.
Three days later, on May 25, a section officer of the services, general administration &coordination Department signed another notification (No.SO(C-1V)SGA&CD/4-37/09) which reads : 'The competent authority has been pleased to constitute a high level provincial committee to tackle the issue of land grabbing/encroachment in Karachi with the following compositions & TORs ...'. Under the chairmanship of the chief secretary will sit 10 members.
They have been instructed 'To ascertain the factors leading to current problem of land grabbing. To identify areas in and around Karachi within one week which have specific trouble spots either currently active or have the potential to threaten law and order in future; To identify the main factors and their supporters (official and non-official) involved in each case of land grabbing. To suggest remedial measures, both short and long term.'
And, amazingly thinking in terms of law and order and to 'ensure no breach of the peace' in the short term, 'Joint check posts of Rangers and police to be established in identified areas with immediate effect. No land transactions between the government and private parties be allowed in specified areas henceforth. This shall not apply to cases where international commitments, foreign investments and government projects are involved. No construction be allowed in areas which are disputed or even have prima facie evidence of being contentious'
And in the long term, a 'Special police force to be established specifically to check the menace of land grabbing as envisaged in Section 15(a) of Sindh Public Property (Removal and Encroachment) Act, 1975, as amended in 2008'.
The committee was to submit its final report to the chief minister within a week. Do we suppose this has been done? Now we wait for the chief minister to ponder over the report and order that actual action be taken. Knowing Qaim Ali Shahs habit of commuting between Karachi and Islamabad, we may be in for a long wait.
In last weeks column I said that city nazim Mustafa Kamal had written on several occasions to CCPO Waseem Ahmed lamenting the collusive role of the police in land grabbing. What is the CCPO to do? One must suppose that the policeman on the beat is as honest as the top guns who rule the roost. Apart from that factor, the force is woefully undermanned.
London, a city of 7,387,868 (half that of Karachi) relatively law-abiding citizens has a police strength of 47,874, a ratio of 1:155. Delhi with a population of 14,000,000 has a police force of 58,000, a ratio of 1:241. Lahore with its 10,000,000 has a force of 30,946, a ratio of 1:323. We, with our estimated 18,000,000 have a force of 34,212, a ratio of 1:526.
On to a relatively related topic US special envoy, our latter-day viceroy, Richard Holbrooke: he spends more time in Pakistan than does our president, the itinerant Asif Zardari of the ever-present prosthodontic grin. This last visit Holbrooke was here for all of three days and found time to visit the Supreme Court and chat with the good chief justice of Pakistan Iftikhar Chaudhry. According to a press report of June 5, the two discussed 'matters relating to judicial reforms as per national judicial policy and the whole judicial structure of Pakistan'.
A news item the same day informed us that our footloose and fancy-free president is leaving us once again this coming Friday to embark upon a visit to six countries over the next four weeks.
A
arshad_lahore
Guest
View from America: Non-white supremos
ANJUM NIAZ
Sunday, 07 Jun, 2009
I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasnt lived that life. Judge Sonia Sotomayor
The colour of power in America is no longer white. It varies from chocolate brown to a tawny caramel. And it is delicious!
Watching President Obama nominate Puerto Rican-born Sonia Sotomayor, 55, to the Supreme Court is the latest affirmation that colour, race and gender matter not a whit. Its the overarching splendour of the soul that eventually prevails. And this has been the dominant theme of the commencement day speeches made before thousands of students graduating this summer. Yes you can! is Obamas famous line. But theres a caveat. While barrier-breakers Obama and Sotomayor are Ivy League graduates, what about the thousands who have no such fancy sounding names like Harvard, Yale, or Princeton to pin up on their personas?
As summer in America begins in earnest, with the blossoms gone with the wind, the new graduates sit sweating with their thin resumes desperately searching for jobs. They need work that will bring in money to pay back their student loans. Yes, life for the young is tough. Before we get maudlin and conclude that these young things are going down the tube unless they find work, heres some graduate exotica from Timothy Egan of New York Times: Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants. Learn to cook, something they dont teach at fancy-pants colleges. Millions for quantum physics and deconstructing Dostoevsky, nothing on how to make enchiladas for 20 people.
For eclectic tips hear out Mary Schmich, a columnist for Chicago Tribune: Wear sunscreen. Stretch. Do one thing every day that scares you. Do one thing every day that scares you? I have spent my years since Princeton, while at law school and in my various professional jobs, not feeling completely a part of the worlds I inhabit. I am always looking over my shoulder wondering if I measure up, someone said once. Guess who this scared person was? Sonia Sotomayor!
Her voyage of personal identity is a scintillating example of how in the face of alienation and self-doubt, one can still end up a success story. At age eight, Sonia was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes, a condition in which the pancreas makes so little insulin that the body cant use blood glucose as energy. Her father, a tool-and-die factory worker with a grade-school education, died at 42. Her mother was a nurse. They grew up in the poorest quarters of New York.
Every day, Sonia would come home from school around five. Soon, the house would be full of her friends, because I didnt allow them to be outside. I would make sure there was rice and beans on the table, said Sonias mother, 82, who flew to Washington to hear President Barack Obama nominate her daughter. They would be up talking and doing homework until late, sometimes nine pm. While growing up, Sonia was inspired by Perry Mason television programmes. She was a brilliant student who graduated from Princeton University in 1976 and then from Yale Law School, where she was an editor of the Yale Law Journal.
Sonia Sotomayors inspired journey is founded upon the strength of a mothers love in hard times. I always taught my children to study and be honest and be good, said the mother. If you have to clean toilets, then be the best at cleaning toilets. That was my motto. The daughter flanked by the president and the vice president told the audience, My mother has devoted her life to my brother and me. She worked often two jobs to help support us after Dad died. I have often said I am who I am because of her, and I am only half the woman she is.
Barack Obama too was once a scared man. He spoke of a constant, crippling fear that I didnt belong somehow, that unless I dodged and hid and pretended to be something I wasnt, I would forever remain an outsider, with the rest of the world, black and white, always standing in judgment. While introducing Sotomayor, who will be the first Latina judge of the Supreme Court, Obama said Experience being tested by obstacles and barriers, by hardship and misfortune; experience insisting, persisting, and ultimately overcoming those barriers. It is experience that can give a person a common touch of compassion; an understanding of how the world works and how ordinary people live. And that is why it is a necessary ingredient in the kind of justice we need on the Supreme Court.
Judge Sonia is a brave woman. Outspoken and fearless. She has openly dismissed Justice Sandra Day OConnor, the first female Supreme Court judge who retired in 2006, saying that a wise old man and wise old woman will reach the same conclusion in deciding cases. I am... not so sure that I agree with the statement. First... there can never be a universal definition of wise. Second, I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasnt lived that life.
The white males, the remnants of Bush era, are working themselves into a lather on TV. The Hispanic judge is being called racist. Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, the man who had to step down because he was having an extramarital affair while holding office, said Imagine a judicial nominee said, my experience as a white man makes me better than a Latina woman. New racism is no better than old racism. They say shes got anger issues: Lawyers who have argued cases before Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor call her nasty, angry and a terror on the bench, is the vicious cacophony coming out from Capitol Hill.
ANJUM NIAZ
Sunday, 07 Jun, 2009
I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasnt lived that life. Judge Sonia Sotomayor
The colour of power in America is no longer white. It varies from chocolate brown to a tawny caramel. And it is delicious!
Watching President Obama nominate Puerto Rican-born Sonia Sotomayor, 55, to the Supreme Court is the latest affirmation that colour, race and gender matter not a whit. Its the overarching splendour of the soul that eventually prevails. And this has been the dominant theme of the commencement day speeches made before thousands of students graduating this summer. Yes you can! is Obamas famous line. But theres a caveat. While barrier-breakers Obama and Sotomayor are Ivy League graduates, what about the thousands who have no such fancy sounding names like Harvard, Yale, or Princeton to pin up on their personas?
As summer in America begins in earnest, with the blossoms gone with the wind, the new graduates sit sweating with their thin resumes desperately searching for jobs. They need work that will bring in money to pay back their student loans. Yes, life for the young is tough. Before we get maudlin and conclude that these young things are going down the tube unless they find work, heres some graduate exotica from Timothy Egan of New York Times: Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants. Learn to cook, something they dont teach at fancy-pants colleges. Millions for quantum physics and deconstructing Dostoevsky, nothing on how to make enchiladas for 20 people.
For eclectic tips hear out Mary Schmich, a columnist for Chicago Tribune: Wear sunscreen. Stretch. Do one thing every day that scares you. Do one thing every day that scares you? I have spent my years since Princeton, while at law school and in my various professional jobs, not feeling completely a part of the worlds I inhabit. I am always looking over my shoulder wondering if I measure up, someone said once. Guess who this scared person was? Sonia Sotomayor!
Her voyage of personal identity is a scintillating example of how in the face of alienation and self-doubt, one can still end up a success story. At age eight, Sonia was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes, a condition in which the pancreas makes so little insulin that the body cant use blood glucose as energy. Her father, a tool-and-die factory worker with a grade-school education, died at 42. Her mother was a nurse. They grew up in the poorest quarters of New York.
Every day, Sonia would come home from school around five. Soon, the house would be full of her friends, because I didnt allow them to be outside. I would make sure there was rice and beans on the table, said Sonias mother, 82, who flew to Washington to hear President Barack Obama nominate her daughter. They would be up talking and doing homework until late, sometimes nine pm. While growing up, Sonia was inspired by Perry Mason television programmes. She was a brilliant student who graduated from Princeton University in 1976 and then from Yale Law School, where she was an editor of the Yale Law Journal.
Sonia Sotomayors inspired journey is founded upon the strength of a mothers love in hard times. I always taught my children to study and be honest and be good, said the mother. If you have to clean toilets, then be the best at cleaning toilets. That was my motto. The daughter flanked by the president and the vice president told the audience, My mother has devoted her life to my brother and me. She worked often two jobs to help support us after Dad died. I have often said I am who I am because of her, and I am only half the woman she is.
Barack Obama too was once a scared man. He spoke of a constant, crippling fear that I didnt belong somehow, that unless I dodged and hid and pretended to be something I wasnt, I would forever remain an outsider, with the rest of the world, black and white, always standing in judgment. While introducing Sotomayor, who will be the first Latina judge of the Supreme Court, Obama said Experience being tested by obstacles and barriers, by hardship and misfortune; experience insisting, persisting, and ultimately overcoming those barriers. It is experience that can give a person a common touch of compassion; an understanding of how the world works and how ordinary people live. And that is why it is a necessary ingredient in the kind of justice we need on the Supreme Court.
Judge Sonia is a brave woman. Outspoken and fearless. She has openly dismissed Justice Sandra Day OConnor, the first female Supreme Court judge who retired in 2006, saying that a wise old man and wise old woman will reach the same conclusion in deciding cases. I am... not so sure that I agree with the statement. First... there can never be a universal definition of wise. Second, I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasnt lived that life.
The white males, the remnants of Bush era, are working themselves into a lather on TV. The Hispanic judge is being called racist. Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, the man who had to step down because he was having an extramarital affair while holding office, said Imagine a judicial nominee said, my experience as a white man makes me better than a Latina woman. New racism is no better than old racism. They say shes got anger issues: Lawyers who have argued cases before Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor call her nasty, angry and a terror on the bench, is the vicious cacophony coming out from Capitol Hill.
A
arshad_lahore
Guest
Twos company: Moving livelihoods
By S.M. Shahid
Sunday, 07 Jun, 2009
Is migration a natural phenomenon? I asked Babboo.
Must you always begin the conversation with a silly question? Dont you know? he said.
I know, but theres no harm in asking you! I provoked him.
In that case, let me tell you that birds, animals and fish migrate. Birds migrate from Siberia to the wetlands of Sindh every winter on Flyway 4. Those going to Europe or America take other flights, I mean other flyways. This migration is quite organised and orderly and when the winter of their discontent is over, they go back to where they had come from again in a disciplined manner.
What are you hinting at? You probably want to say something unkind about the movement of more than two million absolutely peaceful people from the cold climes to the scorching plains. And I know youre going to compare this haphazard movement with the orderly migration of birds. And then you are going to say that birds have no political or religious leaders to guide them or show them the way, so they travel long distances entirely on their own, guided by their sense of direction. And I know that in the end, you are going to say that birds are more intelligent than human beings.
Where did you learn mind-reading? Anyhow, you have missed the fact that birds have no ministers, bureaucrats, NGOs or advisors to organise their escape from the bitter cold of Siberia. They also dont talk about logistics something we humans love bragging about and use as crutches to handle a disaster. Birds also do not embarrass themselves by finding an excuse to go asking for money from friends and foes to handle a problem that is self-created.
You are being unnecessarily critical of the efforts they are making to handle the great exodus. One should not be bitter all the time. I said.
I am not being bitter. I only want to point out that when the mallards, pintails and pochards arrive in Haleji, the resident birds moorhen, egrets, coots and cormorants do not say IDPs not allowed! You can imagine what hangama would be created in the lake if the local birds started agitating against birds that came to find refuge from the freezing cold of the North. No strike calls, no postponement of examinations, no pahiya jam. Life goes on peacefully on the placid waters of Haleji.
Tell me, what is the difference between migration and invasion? I asked.
Migration, generally, is movement from one country to another, mostly under natural forces; invasion is forceful entry of hostile people into another country. The history of man tells us that he has gone through both great migrations and invasions. Moses migrated with his tribe. Our own Prophet had to migrate to Madinah. You and I had to migrate from India. Migration is not just running away from natural or man-made catastrophe, it is in pursuit of better opportunities too. The Polish, Germans, Italians, Chinese, Indians and Pakistanis migrated to the US to better their prospects as well as to make the US a great country. Invasion is, on the other hand, what was the favourite pastime of Changez Khan, Hilaku Khan, Taimerlaine, and their like. They invaded for the sake of invading. Nadir Shah of Persia, according to Urdu humorist Shafiqur Rahman, found an excuse to invade India in calling on his long lost Phuphi Saheba! Mughal king Zaheeruddin Babar invaded India to set up the Mughal Empire, since Farghana in central Asia, where he ruled, was too small to be called an empire. The British came to India for the same purpose, or how would they call a tiny island an empire unless a number of countries in Asia and Africa were grabbed and robbed of their riches to make the British Empire a place where the sun refused to set!
Yaar, to tell you the truth, invasion is too bad but I dont understand migration either. I was living in Patna, Bihar, not bothering to venture out to even Calcutta, Delhi or Bombay, when I migrated to East Pakistan. Then I migrated to West Pakistan. Then my own daughter migrated to the US. This should stop now.
Unable to make out what I meant, Babboo said, You are an invader first, then, after you have successfully invaded, you become a migrant. You make hay while the sun shines, till certain others like you try to migrate to better their prospects or to take refuge from some calamity and the problem starts. They become unwanted since you think it is YOUR territory! Why cant you behave like the resident waders of Haleji (egrets, moorhens and snipes) who do not consider the mallards, pochards and pintails invaders from the North?
Dil mein khaoff baith geya hai. They have seen the invasion of the barbarians stopping girls from going to school, suffocating women in their burqas and throwing poor barbers out of jobs, even slitting the throats of those who tried to put some sense into their rabid heads.
Whatever is the cause and effect, it is heart wrenching to see the innocent, bewildered faces of those little darlings wandering in the IDP camps. Coming from places where the weather is heavenly, it is saddening to see how these precious little sweethearts are exposed to the blazing heat of the plains.
It was quite touching to see depression and agony on my friends face. There was not a trace of shararat in his eyes. Indeed, it required the insensitivity of a Taliban to not notice it. So, in order to cheer him up I said, But Babboo, such human sufferings also provide great opportunity for many people.
What do you mean? He glared at me angrily. He appeared to me a changed person. TV watching had made the hidden chords of his heart go haywire.
The fact is, when we make great hue and cry, and, with us, the whole world cries, money and goods start pouring in for the unfortunate IDPs, and this brings a windfall for many. Be it an earthquake, some other natural disaster, or a deadlier calamity like the Taliban epidemic sweeping across the paradise called Swat, every catastrophe is a blessing for many. I am told during the great famine in West Bengal in the 1940s, some respectable politicians operating in that area went into business and became hoarders. They became filthy rich which later helped them become successful politicians.
Lanat hai un par aur tum par bhi! said Babboo and left in a huff.
By S.M. Shahid
Sunday, 07 Jun, 2009
Is migration a natural phenomenon? I asked Babboo.
Must you always begin the conversation with a silly question? Dont you know? he said.
I know, but theres no harm in asking you! I provoked him.
In that case, let me tell you that birds, animals and fish migrate. Birds migrate from Siberia to the wetlands of Sindh every winter on Flyway 4. Those going to Europe or America take other flights, I mean other flyways. This migration is quite organised and orderly and when the winter of their discontent is over, they go back to where they had come from again in a disciplined manner.
What are you hinting at? You probably want to say something unkind about the movement of more than two million absolutely peaceful people from the cold climes to the scorching plains. And I know youre going to compare this haphazard movement with the orderly migration of birds. And then you are going to say that birds have no political or religious leaders to guide them or show them the way, so they travel long distances entirely on their own, guided by their sense of direction. And I know that in the end, you are going to say that birds are more intelligent than human beings.
Where did you learn mind-reading? Anyhow, you have missed the fact that birds have no ministers, bureaucrats, NGOs or advisors to organise their escape from the bitter cold of Siberia. They also dont talk about logistics something we humans love bragging about and use as crutches to handle a disaster. Birds also do not embarrass themselves by finding an excuse to go asking for money from friends and foes to handle a problem that is self-created.
You are being unnecessarily critical of the efforts they are making to handle the great exodus. One should not be bitter all the time. I said.
I am not being bitter. I only want to point out that when the mallards, pintails and pochards arrive in Haleji, the resident birds moorhen, egrets, coots and cormorants do not say IDPs not allowed! You can imagine what hangama would be created in the lake if the local birds started agitating against birds that came to find refuge from the freezing cold of the North. No strike calls, no postponement of examinations, no pahiya jam. Life goes on peacefully on the placid waters of Haleji.
Tell me, what is the difference between migration and invasion? I asked.
Migration, generally, is movement from one country to another, mostly under natural forces; invasion is forceful entry of hostile people into another country. The history of man tells us that he has gone through both great migrations and invasions. Moses migrated with his tribe. Our own Prophet had to migrate to Madinah. You and I had to migrate from India. Migration is not just running away from natural or man-made catastrophe, it is in pursuit of better opportunities too. The Polish, Germans, Italians, Chinese, Indians and Pakistanis migrated to the US to better their prospects as well as to make the US a great country. Invasion is, on the other hand, what was the favourite pastime of Changez Khan, Hilaku Khan, Taimerlaine, and their like. They invaded for the sake of invading. Nadir Shah of Persia, according to Urdu humorist Shafiqur Rahman, found an excuse to invade India in calling on his long lost Phuphi Saheba! Mughal king Zaheeruddin Babar invaded India to set up the Mughal Empire, since Farghana in central Asia, where he ruled, was too small to be called an empire. The British came to India for the same purpose, or how would they call a tiny island an empire unless a number of countries in Asia and Africa were grabbed and robbed of their riches to make the British Empire a place where the sun refused to set!
Yaar, to tell you the truth, invasion is too bad but I dont understand migration either. I was living in Patna, Bihar, not bothering to venture out to even Calcutta, Delhi or Bombay, when I migrated to East Pakistan. Then I migrated to West Pakistan. Then my own daughter migrated to the US. This should stop now.
Unable to make out what I meant, Babboo said, You are an invader first, then, after you have successfully invaded, you become a migrant. You make hay while the sun shines, till certain others like you try to migrate to better their prospects or to take refuge from some calamity and the problem starts. They become unwanted since you think it is YOUR territory! Why cant you behave like the resident waders of Haleji (egrets, moorhens and snipes) who do not consider the mallards, pochards and pintails invaders from the North?
Dil mein khaoff baith geya hai. They have seen the invasion of the barbarians stopping girls from going to school, suffocating women in their burqas and throwing poor barbers out of jobs, even slitting the throats of those who tried to put some sense into their rabid heads.
Whatever is the cause and effect, it is heart wrenching to see the innocent, bewildered faces of those little darlings wandering in the IDP camps. Coming from places where the weather is heavenly, it is saddening to see how these precious little sweethearts are exposed to the blazing heat of the plains.
It was quite touching to see depression and agony on my friends face. There was not a trace of shararat in his eyes. Indeed, it required the insensitivity of a Taliban to not notice it. So, in order to cheer him up I said, But Babboo, such human sufferings also provide great opportunity for many people.
What do you mean? He glared at me angrily. He appeared to me a changed person. TV watching had made the hidden chords of his heart go haywire.
The fact is, when we make great hue and cry, and, with us, the whole world cries, money and goods start pouring in for the unfortunate IDPs, and this brings a windfall for many. Be it an earthquake, some other natural disaster, or a deadlier calamity like the Taliban epidemic sweeping across the paradise called Swat, every catastrophe is a blessing for many. I am told during the great famine in West Bengal in the 1940s, some respectable politicians operating in that area went into business and became hoarders. They became filthy rich which later helped them become successful politicians.
Lanat hai un par aur tum par bhi! said Babboo and left in a huff.
A
arshad_lahore
Guest
Smokerscorner: Loons of doom
Nadeem F. PARACHA
Sunday, 07 Jun, 2009
In one of the chapters in Atizaz Ahsans The Indus Saga perhaps the finest book written on the history of the region we call Pakistan he makes an interesting point about our habit of blaming foreign/ hidden forces behind whatever goes wrong with us. Ahsan marks the starting point of this custom to be the period between the decline of the Mughal empire and the arrival of the British colonialists.
It is during this time that Ahsan claims people of this region developed the habit of accusing malicious outsiders working with the corrupt rulers in Delhi for all the economic and political misery that the people faced. Well, today it seems this habit is not only alive, but thriving; perhaps a lot more fervently than ever.
Of course, the whole concept of the conspiracy theory which is this habits ripest fruit is certainly not confined to this region alone. The West too has its fair share of nutcases from those claiming to be abducted by aliens to those denying the Holocaust. But, even though this phenomenon has given birth to a lucrative industry of sorts (books, DVDs, dedicated websites), it hardly ventures beyond being taken as anything other than fiction dressed as fact.
For example, in the West, nutcase books and DVDs have now found their way into mainstream stores, but they are at once challenged and then comprehensively and convincingly discredited by respected intellectuals. Unfortunately, such is not the case in Pakistan. Though the media and, subsequently, DVD retailers here were quick to grasp and exploit the commercial potential of this infotainment industry, the flip side of this trend has gone missing in Pakistan.
Whereas assorted conspiracy theorists can be found doing the rounds in the shape of strategic analysts, Islamic scientists, and political experts on TV channels, and whole shelves are being dedicated to crackpot DVDs under the documentary banner at DVD outlets, only rarely does one find a rational Pakistani intellectual ever attempting to challenge the outlandish notions of politics, economics and religion put forth by conspiracy theorists.
They are doing a roaring business, especially on shows and documentaries offering bizarre concoctions on the 9/11 attacks, malicious Zionist/American/Hindu designs over Pakistan, not to forget the Lal Masjid episode. It is surprising that the information derived from conspiracy books and documentaries the likes of which have been convincingly debunked elsewhere, remains to be taken as fact by a number of TV show hosts, experts and their viewers.
But what makes a theory conspiratorial? Its simple. It is a theory that tends to rally support against an enemy by claiming that the enemy is part of a widespread and sinister conspiracy. The conspiracy theorists worldview imagines secret plots by powerful cults of powerful and rich lobbies who are also behind important historical events.
The theorist then makes irrational leaps of logic in analysing factual evidence in order to prove connections between unrelated events to blame socio-political and economic conflicts on either an enemy country, an economic institution or an international conspiratorial cult that is usually headed by an elusive breed of Zionists backed by Western powers.
This model is apparent on TV programmes supposedly discussing geo-political matters, terrorism, Islamic history, and Indo-Pak relations. More worryingly, the convoluted narratives that these programmes propagate are being swallowed wholesale by the educated, middle-class Pakistani youth without any worthwhile critical analysis.
No wonder, then, that according to a series of surveys conducted by various Western and Muslim institutions and universities since 9/11, more and more educated Pakistanis believe that the 9/11 tragedy was a Zionist plot; that the Pakistani Taliban are a creation of a Hindu-American-Zionist nexus; and that big corporate conglomerates in cohorts with secretive cults are behind everything from world wars, to the Aids virus, to economic recession, to the creation of both democracy, capitalism as well as communism.
What next, then? A majority of Pakistanis believing that the Earth is flat, perhaps? Maybe learned Pakistani intellectuals who can easily dent these irrational notions (but somehow dont), think that most educated Pakistanis will never be sucked in by such theories.
But if sociologist Karl Polanyis symptoms of a society fast approaching a confused sense of quasi-fascistic conspiratorial-ism are an indication, the truth is that most young, educated Pakistanis actually are being sucked in. So what are the indications?
The spread of irrational philosophies, xenophobic aesthetics, anti-secular demagogy, heterodox currency views, criticism of the multi-party-based political system, widespread censure of the regime and of democratic setup.
Why else would certain TV personalities, channels and DVD retailers continue piling on such nonsense? After all, this is turning out to be the new revolutionary Pakistani zeitgeist that, if nothing else, can always be turned into a lucrative business venture.
Most conspiracy theories are like unintentional parodies of serious and credible historical analysis of politics, society and economics. They are a ready-made model of an exhibitionist intellectualism for those who are not academically inclined towards rational, analytical thinking and critique.
And they thrive in uncertain times when societies are at their most venerable, looking for elusive scapegoats for their misery and other shortcomings.
Nadeem F. PARACHA
Sunday, 07 Jun, 2009
In one of the chapters in Atizaz Ahsans The Indus Saga perhaps the finest book written on the history of the region we call Pakistan he makes an interesting point about our habit of blaming foreign/ hidden forces behind whatever goes wrong with us. Ahsan marks the starting point of this custom to be the period between the decline of the Mughal empire and the arrival of the British colonialists.
It is during this time that Ahsan claims people of this region developed the habit of accusing malicious outsiders working with the corrupt rulers in Delhi for all the economic and political misery that the people faced. Well, today it seems this habit is not only alive, but thriving; perhaps a lot more fervently than ever.
Of course, the whole concept of the conspiracy theory which is this habits ripest fruit is certainly not confined to this region alone. The West too has its fair share of nutcases from those claiming to be abducted by aliens to those denying the Holocaust. But, even though this phenomenon has given birth to a lucrative industry of sorts (books, DVDs, dedicated websites), it hardly ventures beyond being taken as anything other than fiction dressed as fact.
For example, in the West, nutcase books and DVDs have now found their way into mainstream stores, but they are at once challenged and then comprehensively and convincingly discredited by respected intellectuals. Unfortunately, such is not the case in Pakistan. Though the media and, subsequently, DVD retailers here were quick to grasp and exploit the commercial potential of this infotainment industry, the flip side of this trend has gone missing in Pakistan.
Whereas assorted conspiracy theorists can be found doing the rounds in the shape of strategic analysts, Islamic scientists, and political experts on TV channels, and whole shelves are being dedicated to crackpot DVDs under the documentary banner at DVD outlets, only rarely does one find a rational Pakistani intellectual ever attempting to challenge the outlandish notions of politics, economics and religion put forth by conspiracy theorists.
They are doing a roaring business, especially on shows and documentaries offering bizarre concoctions on the 9/11 attacks, malicious Zionist/American/Hindu designs over Pakistan, not to forget the Lal Masjid episode. It is surprising that the information derived from conspiracy books and documentaries the likes of which have been convincingly debunked elsewhere, remains to be taken as fact by a number of TV show hosts, experts and their viewers.
But what makes a theory conspiratorial? Its simple. It is a theory that tends to rally support against an enemy by claiming that the enemy is part of a widespread and sinister conspiracy. The conspiracy theorists worldview imagines secret plots by powerful cults of powerful and rich lobbies who are also behind important historical events.
The theorist then makes irrational leaps of logic in analysing factual evidence in order to prove connections between unrelated events to blame socio-political and economic conflicts on either an enemy country, an economic institution or an international conspiratorial cult that is usually headed by an elusive breed of Zionists backed by Western powers.
This model is apparent on TV programmes supposedly discussing geo-political matters, terrorism, Islamic history, and Indo-Pak relations. More worryingly, the convoluted narratives that these programmes propagate are being swallowed wholesale by the educated, middle-class Pakistani youth without any worthwhile critical analysis.
No wonder, then, that according to a series of surveys conducted by various Western and Muslim institutions and universities since 9/11, more and more educated Pakistanis believe that the 9/11 tragedy was a Zionist plot; that the Pakistani Taliban are a creation of a Hindu-American-Zionist nexus; and that big corporate conglomerates in cohorts with secretive cults are behind everything from world wars, to the Aids virus, to economic recession, to the creation of both democracy, capitalism as well as communism.
What next, then? A majority of Pakistanis believing that the Earth is flat, perhaps? Maybe learned Pakistani intellectuals who can easily dent these irrational notions (but somehow dont), think that most educated Pakistanis will never be sucked in by such theories.
But if sociologist Karl Polanyis symptoms of a society fast approaching a confused sense of quasi-fascistic conspiratorial-ism are an indication, the truth is that most young, educated Pakistanis actually are being sucked in. So what are the indications?
The spread of irrational philosophies, xenophobic aesthetics, anti-secular demagogy, heterodox currency views, criticism of the multi-party-based political system, widespread censure of the regime and of democratic setup.
Why else would certain TV personalities, channels and DVD retailers continue piling on such nonsense? After all, this is turning out to be the new revolutionary Pakistani zeitgeist that, if nothing else, can always be turned into a lucrative business venture.
Most conspiracy theories are like unintentional parodies of serious and credible historical analysis of politics, society and economics. They are a ready-made model of an exhibitionist intellectualism for those who are not academically inclined towards rational, analytical thinking and critique.
And they thrive in uncertain times when societies are at their most venerable, looking for elusive scapegoats for their misery and other shortcomings.
A
arshad_lahore
Guest
So who did kill Benazir Bhutto?
By Humayun Gauhar | Published: June 7, 2009
I ended last Sunday's article, Who killed Benazir? with the promise that, "Perhaps I'll continue with this next week because there's so much to tell, unless something happens - which is well within the realm of possibility - that demands more attention." Well something did happen, to wit President Obama's seminal speech in Cairo to what is euphemistically called 'the Muslim World'. It demands attention, but also requires consideration, not a knee-jerk article written in a couple of days just to show that I recognise the importance of the speech. It is precisely because I recognise its great importance and its great potential that I am leaving comment till full consideration.
When the West has no cogent argument it accuses Pakistanis of wallowing in conspiracy theories. Sure people are vulnerable to conspiracy theories - I guess the most have to do with Kennedy's assassination - but who plants their seeds? Here's an example. Many believed that Benazir damaged the justification for the continued US presence in Afghanistan by saying to Sir David Frost on Al-Jazeera that Osama Bin Laden was dead, killed by Omar Saeed Sheikh, the former or current MI6 agent, God alone knows which. This view gained great currency when the BBC website first edited out Benazir's crucial sentence - one excuse was that perhaps she had "misspoken" - then apologised and restored it. I said last week: "People have heard the interview many times. Benazir said the words deliberately and cautiously, after stopping and taking a breath before uttering Osama's name. Spurious excuses such as these insult people's intelligence and beget conspiracy theories for which people are then mocked by the perpetrators of spurious excuses."
It has been alleged by President Musharraf that British born Omar Saeed Sheikh was first recruited by MI6 but then "turned". Perhaps he didn't and is a "double agent". I have never read any clarification of this from the British authorities, which also causes people to see possible conspiracies.
The Seymour Hersh kafuffle started with his startling statement, to put it mildly, at the University of Minnesota on March 10 this year. "Congress has no oversight of it. It's an executive assassination wing, essentially. And it's been going on and on and on. And just today in the Times there is a story saying that its leader, a three-star admiral named McRaven, ordered a stop to certain activities because there were so many collateral deaths. It's been going in...under President Bush's authority, they've been going into countries, not talking to the ambassador or the CIA station chief, and finding people on a list and executing them and leaving."
Wow! That's more damning than anything I've ever read or heard from the worst American enemy. Look at it.
? Its a rogue "executive assassination wing" (or death squad, same thing) because "Congress has no oversight over it."
? It is "under President Bush's authority" no less, far worse than being under Vice President Dick Cheney's authority.
? It goes into countries secretly because it doesn't talk to the US ambassador or the CIA station chief. That's typical hit men stuff.? They have a list of people to execute, whom they find, kill and then leave - the opposite of Schindler's list, what?
Being in the position that it is landed in, Pakistan must be the most visited destination of this executive assassination wing, but then neither Ambassador Patterson nor the CIA station chief would know anything about it, would they, which explains her umbrage that led her to write a rather acerbic self-righteous letter to The Nation. What Mr Hersh has said is damning indeed, as damning as saying that a US death squad killed Benazir Bhutto. So tell me: "Who killed Benazir Bhutto?" Do you still blame Pakistanis, a people who have been victims of many conspiracies, for believing in 'conspiracy theories', one of which is that the US killed Benazir? The seeds of many a 'conspiracy theory' are often sowed by the US and its western allies and their media's "Nescafe journalism".
There's more, enough to write a book. Soon after Hersh's Minnesota speech, the CNN's Wolf Blitzer asked Dick Cheney's former National Security Adviser John Hannah about Hersh's claim: "Is there a list of terrorists, suspected terrorists out there who can be assassinated?" And this is what Hannah said: "There is clearly a group of people that go through a very extremely well-vetted process, inter-agency process...that have committed acts of war against the United States, who are at war with the United States, or are suspected of planning operations of war against the United States, whom authority is given to the troops in the field and in certain war theatres to capture or kill those individuals. That is certainly true."
Wolf Blitzer: "And so, this would be, and from your perspective - and you worked in the Bush administration for many years - it would be totally constitutional, totally legal, to go out and find these guys and to whack 'em?"
John Hannah: "There's no question that in a theatre of war, when we are at war, and we know - there's no doubt, we are still at war against Al-Qaeda in Iraq, Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan and on that Pakistani border, that our troops have the authority to go after and capture and kill the enemy, including the leadership of the enemy."
Hersh told Amy Goodman of Democracy Now! "The problem with having military go kill people when they're not directly in combat, these are asking American troops to go out and find people and...they go into countries without telling any of the authorities, the American ambassador, the CIA chief, certainly nobody in the government that we're going into, and it's far more than just in combat areas. There's more - at least a dozen countries, and perhaps more....The president has authorised these kinds of actions...our boys have been told they can go and take the kind of executive action they need...there's no legal basis for it."
Hersh on Guantanamo: "An internal report that I wrote about in a book I did years ago, an internal report made by the summer of 2002, estimated that at least half and possibly more of those people had nothing to do with actions against America. The intelligence we have is often very fragmentary, not very good. And the idea that the American president would think he has the constitutional power or the legal right to tell soldiers not engaged in immediate combat to go out and find people based on lists and execute them is just amazing to me...the thing about George Bush is, everything's sort of done in plain sight. In his State of the Union address, I think January the 28th, 2003, about a month and a half before we went into Iraq, Bush was describing the progress in the war, and he said...that we've captured more than 3,000 members of Al-Qaeda and suspected members, people suspected of operations against us. And then he added with that little smile he has, 'And let me tell you, some of those people will not be able to ever operate again. I can assure you that. They will not be in a position'. He's clearly talking about killing people, and to applause."
About the JSOC, Hersh told Amy Goodman: "Well, it's a special unit. We have something called the Special Operations Command that operates out of Florida, and it involves a lot of wings. And one of the units that work under the umbrella of the Special Operations Command is known as Joint Special Op - JSOC. It's a special unit. What makes it so special, it's a group of elite people that include Navy Seals, some Navy Seals, Delta Force - what we call our black units, the commando units. 'Commando' is a word they don't like, but that's what we, most of us, refer to them as. And they promote from within. It's a unit that has its own promotion structure. And one of the elements, I must tell you, about getting ahead in promotion is the number of kills you have. Of course. Because it's basically devised - it's been transmogrified, if you will, into this unit that goes after high-value targets. And where Cheney comes in and the idea of an assassination ring - I actually said 'wing' - that reports to Cheney was simply that they clear lists through the vice president's office. He's not sitting around picking targets. They clear the lists. And he's certainly deeply involved, less and less as time went on, of course, but in the beginning very closely involved. And this is the elite unit. I think they do three-month tours. And last summer, I wrote a long article in The New Yorker, last July, about how the JSOC operation is simply not available, and there's no information provided by the executive to Congress."
So who 'did' kill Benazir Bhutto? The question is still suspended in the air, where it will remain forevermore if they can help it.
The writer is a political analyst
By Humayun Gauhar | Published: June 7, 2009
I ended last Sunday's article, Who killed Benazir? with the promise that, "Perhaps I'll continue with this next week because there's so much to tell, unless something happens - which is well within the realm of possibility - that demands more attention." Well something did happen, to wit President Obama's seminal speech in Cairo to what is euphemistically called 'the Muslim World'. It demands attention, but also requires consideration, not a knee-jerk article written in a couple of days just to show that I recognise the importance of the speech. It is precisely because I recognise its great importance and its great potential that I am leaving comment till full consideration.
When the West has no cogent argument it accuses Pakistanis of wallowing in conspiracy theories. Sure people are vulnerable to conspiracy theories - I guess the most have to do with Kennedy's assassination - but who plants their seeds? Here's an example. Many believed that Benazir damaged the justification for the continued US presence in Afghanistan by saying to Sir David Frost on Al-Jazeera that Osama Bin Laden was dead, killed by Omar Saeed Sheikh, the former or current MI6 agent, God alone knows which. This view gained great currency when the BBC website first edited out Benazir's crucial sentence - one excuse was that perhaps she had "misspoken" - then apologised and restored it. I said last week: "People have heard the interview many times. Benazir said the words deliberately and cautiously, after stopping and taking a breath before uttering Osama's name. Spurious excuses such as these insult people's intelligence and beget conspiracy theories for which people are then mocked by the perpetrators of spurious excuses."
It has been alleged by President Musharraf that British born Omar Saeed Sheikh was first recruited by MI6 but then "turned". Perhaps he didn't and is a "double agent". I have never read any clarification of this from the British authorities, which also causes people to see possible conspiracies.
The Seymour Hersh kafuffle started with his startling statement, to put it mildly, at the University of Minnesota on March 10 this year. "Congress has no oversight of it. It's an executive assassination wing, essentially. And it's been going on and on and on. And just today in the Times there is a story saying that its leader, a three-star admiral named McRaven, ordered a stop to certain activities because there were so many collateral deaths. It's been going in...under President Bush's authority, they've been going into countries, not talking to the ambassador or the CIA station chief, and finding people on a list and executing them and leaving."
Wow! That's more damning than anything I've ever read or heard from the worst American enemy. Look at it.
? Its a rogue "executive assassination wing" (or death squad, same thing) because "Congress has no oversight over it."
? It is "under President Bush's authority" no less, far worse than being under Vice President Dick Cheney's authority.
? It goes into countries secretly because it doesn't talk to the US ambassador or the CIA station chief. That's typical hit men stuff.? They have a list of people to execute, whom they find, kill and then leave - the opposite of Schindler's list, what?
Being in the position that it is landed in, Pakistan must be the most visited destination of this executive assassination wing, but then neither Ambassador Patterson nor the CIA station chief would know anything about it, would they, which explains her umbrage that led her to write a rather acerbic self-righteous letter to The Nation. What Mr Hersh has said is damning indeed, as damning as saying that a US death squad killed Benazir Bhutto. So tell me: "Who killed Benazir Bhutto?" Do you still blame Pakistanis, a people who have been victims of many conspiracies, for believing in 'conspiracy theories', one of which is that the US killed Benazir? The seeds of many a 'conspiracy theory' are often sowed by the US and its western allies and their media's "Nescafe journalism".
There's more, enough to write a book. Soon after Hersh's Minnesota speech, the CNN's Wolf Blitzer asked Dick Cheney's former National Security Adviser John Hannah about Hersh's claim: "Is there a list of terrorists, suspected terrorists out there who can be assassinated?" And this is what Hannah said: "There is clearly a group of people that go through a very extremely well-vetted process, inter-agency process...that have committed acts of war against the United States, who are at war with the United States, or are suspected of planning operations of war against the United States, whom authority is given to the troops in the field and in certain war theatres to capture or kill those individuals. That is certainly true."
Wolf Blitzer: "And so, this would be, and from your perspective - and you worked in the Bush administration for many years - it would be totally constitutional, totally legal, to go out and find these guys and to whack 'em?"
John Hannah: "There's no question that in a theatre of war, when we are at war, and we know - there's no doubt, we are still at war against Al-Qaeda in Iraq, Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan and on that Pakistani border, that our troops have the authority to go after and capture and kill the enemy, including the leadership of the enemy."
Hersh told Amy Goodman of Democracy Now! "The problem with having military go kill people when they're not directly in combat, these are asking American troops to go out and find people and...they go into countries without telling any of the authorities, the American ambassador, the CIA chief, certainly nobody in the government that we're going into, and it's far more than just in combat areas. There's more - at least a dozen countries, and perhaps more....The president has authorised these kinds of actions...our boys have been told they can go and take the kind of executive action they need...there's no legal basis for it."
Hersh on Guantanamo: "An internal report that I wrote about in a book I did years ago, an internal report made by the summer of 2002, estimated that at least half and possibly more of those people had nothing to do with actions against America. The intelligence we have is often very fragmentary, not very good. And the idea that the American president would think he has the constitutional power or the legal right to tell soldiers not engaged in immediate combat to go out and find people based on lists and execute them is just amazing to me...the thing about George Bush is, everything's sort of done in plain sight. In his State of the Union address, I think January the 28th, 2003, about a month and a half before we went into Iraq, Bush was describing the progress in the war, and he said...that we've captured more than 3,000 members of Al-Qaeda and suspected members, people suspected of operations against us. And then he added with that little smile he has, 'And let me tell you, some of those people will not be able to ever operate again. I can assure you that. They will not be in a position'. He's clearly talking about killing people, and to applause."
About the JSOC, Hersh told Amy Goodman: "Well, it's a special unit. We have something called the Special Operations Command that operates out of Florida, and it involves a lot of wings. And one of the units that work under the umbrella of the Special Operations Command is known as Joint Special Op - JSOC. It's a special unit. What makes it so special, it's a group of elite people that include Navy Seals, some Navy Seals, Delta Force - what we call our black units, the commando units. 'Commando' is a word they don't like, but that's what we, most of us, refer to them as. And they promote from within. It's a unit that has its own promotion structure. And one of the elements, I must tell you, about getting ahead in promotion is the number of kills you have. Of course. Because it's basically devised - it's been transmogrified, if you will, into this unit that goes after high-value targets. And where Cheney comes in and the idea of an assassination ring - I actually said 'wing' - that reports to Cheney was simply that they clear lists through the vice president's office. He's not sitting around picking targets. They clear the lists. And he's certainly deeply involved, less and less as time went on, of course, but in the beginning very closely involved. And this is the elite unit. I think they do three-month tours. And last summer, I wrote a long article in The New Yorker, last July, about how the JSOC operation is simply not available, and there's no information provided by the executive to Congress."
So who 'did' kill Benazir Bhutto? The question is still suspended in the air, where it will remain forevermore if they can help it.
The writer is a political analyst
A
arshad_lahore
Guest
Denying the severity of the threat?
By Amina Jilani | Published: June 7, 2009
After Swat, what? This is a question posed by all following the on-going army operation up north. If the army is to be believed it will not stop at Swat but continue on with its fight in Waziristan and the other tribal areas that give sanctuary to the Taliban and their allies. Difficult, as the government's writ does not and has never extended into these regions.
With a weak government, bequeathed to us by friend, mentor and ally, the USA, the fractious political classes and an army obsessed more by a potential threat from India than the threat within its own country, the task may be even more difficult. But that the army finally awoke, when prodded by the US in April after inexplicable peace deals and inactivity, and went into top gear (as far as we know), could be good news. Our problem is that we know only what the army wishes us to know, we are solely privy to information disseminated by its spokesmen that we are expected to believe, as we are what we see in seemingly unchanging photographs and news footage. We cannot know what is 'really' happening.
Be that as it may, America is pleased and at some stage will show its concrete support when President Barack Obama's request to the Congress to release a total of USD 310 million comes through. This is bound to happen, as it always has. The US has been paymaster to Pakistan through all its financial woes since its birth.
As Special Envoy Richard Holbrooke stated last week in Islamabad, what the US is about to give towards this present predicament is half of that given by the rest of the world. This of course, as he rightly and frankly acknowledged, is given in the interests of the US in its present sole superpower position, with its AfPak policy to the fore, as it needs a Pakistan totally unshackled to the Taliban and their like-minded terrorist friends.
A headline in the press on June 3 blazed: President urges tycoons to help rehabilitate IDPs. His wish is that the tycoons adopt affected villages and rebuild and rehabilitate. Now, what the tycoons and the people would like to know is what the tycoons sitting in the government and opposition have done?
At the Islamabad Holbrooke press conference on June 3, President Zardari trotted out the old appeal to "hearts and minds." Coming from him, it is unlikely to arouse much response. This is an old phrase, the first modern usage of which is said to have been made by the British during the Malayan emergency when they were fighting nationalist insurgents. Then came its cynical use by the Americans in an effort to win support from the people of South Vietnam - it was a favourite of Lyndon Johnson who used it frequently at the time the US military was in the throes of devastating the South Vietnamese nation.
It will truly be an uphill task for Zardari and his present lot of men and women to win the hearts and minds of the millions made homeless and left to rot, as far as the government is concerned, in totally inadequate and inhumane conditions. The military capacity may now be satisfactory, but what happens after the clear up? Will the army hold the area? Will the Taliban fan out into pastures new? And what happens to the displaced? There are no trained experienced reconstruction teams to institute some form of governance and re-development work, at least not that we know of. As has been said, the devil's in the detail and the coming months will show us how things play out.
We are back in the old cycle that afflicts Pakistan's politics. Since 1958 we have seen military governments that came in on a popular wave and grew to be highly unpopular replaced by weak, corrupt and ineffective civilian governments which, with one exception, are able to complete their terms. Each time a cycle has run, what exists of the institutions of the state grow weaker, and in this present case so does the government's ability to contain militancy and terrorism.
Doubts are being expressed internally and externally about the prospects of survival of the government we now have - which seems to thrive on doing nothing. Though this is termed by many as a good thing, inactivity being preferable to activity as when it acts it invariably does the wrong thing.
Where is Parliament? It has not uttered. All we had was the May 18 joint declaration signed by several political parties supporting the military action, which, in order to win consensus had to carefully omit any reference to the Taliban. Does this imply that there exists millions in a state of denial who still remain sympathetic to the militant cause?
The writer is a freelance columnist
By Amina Jilani | Published: June 7, 2009
After Swat, what? This is a question posed by all following the on-going army operation up north. If the army is to be believed it will not stop at Swat but continue on with its fight in Waziristan and the other tribal areas that give sanctuary to the Taliban and their allies. Difficult, as the government's writ does not and has never extended into these regions.
With a weak government, bequeathed to us by friend, mentor and ally, the USA, the fractious political classes and an army obsessed more by a potential threat from India than the threat within its own country, the task may be even more difficult. But that the army finally awoke, when prodded by the US in April after inexplicable peace deals and inactivity, and went into top gear (as far as we know), could be good news. Our problem is that we know only what the army wishes us to know, we are solely privy to information disseminated by its spokesmen that we are expected to believe, as we are what we see in seemingly unchanging photographs and news footage. We cannot know what is 'really' happening.
Be that as it may, America is pleased and at some stage will show its concrete support when President Barack Obama's request to the Congress to release a total of USD 310 million comes through. This is bound to happen, as it always has. The US has been paymaster to Pakistan through all its financial woes since its birth.
As Special Envoy Richard Holbrooke stated last week in Islamabad, what the US is about to give towards this present predicament is half of that given by the rest of the world. This of course, as he rightly and frankly acknowledged, is given in the interests of the US in its present sole superpower position, with its AfPak policy to the fore, as it needs a Pakistan totally unshackled to the Taliban and their like-minded terrorist friends.
A headline in the press on June 3 blazed: President urges tycoons to help rehabilitate IDPs. His wish is that the tycoons adopt affected villages and rebuild and rehabilitate. Now, what the tycoons and the people would like to know is what the tycoons sitting in the government and opposition have done?
At the Islamabad Holbrooke press conference on June 3, President Zardari trotted out the old appeal to "hearts and minds." Coming from him, it is unlikely to arouse much response. This is an old phrase, the first modern usage of which is said to have been made by the British during the Malayan emergency when they were fighting nationalist insurgents. Then came its cynical use by the Americans in an effort to win support from the people of South Vietnam - it was a favourite of Lyndon Johnson who used it frequently at the time the US military was in the throes of devastating the South Vietnamese nation.
It will truly be an uphill task for Zardari and his present lot of men and women to win the hearts and minds of the millions made homeless and left to rot, as far as the government is concerned, in totally inadequate and inhumane conditions. The military capacity may now be satisfactory, but what happens after the clear up? Will the army hold the area? Will the Taliban fan out into pastures new? And what happens to the displaced? There are no trained experienced reconstruction teams to institute some form of governance and re-development work, at least not that we know of. As has been said, the devil's in the detail and the coming months will show us how things play out.
We are back in the old cycle that afflicts Pakistan's politics. Since 1958 we have seen military governments that came in on a popular wave and grew to be highly unpopular replaced by weak, corrupt and ineffective civilian governments which, with one exception, are able to complete their terms. Each time a cycle has run, what exists of the institutions of the state grow weaker, and in this present case so does the government's ability to contain militancy and terrorism.
Doubts are being expressed internally and externally about the prospects of survival of the government we now have - which seems to thrive on doing nothing. Though this is termed by many as a good thing, inactivity being preferable to activity as when it acts it invariably does the wrong thing.
Where is Parliament? It has not uttered. All we had was the May 18 joint declaration signed by several political parties supporting the military action, which, in order to win consensus had to carefully omit any reference to the Taliban. Does this imply that there exists millions in a state of denial who still remain sympathetic to the militant cause?
The writer is a freelance columnist
A
arshad_lahore
Guest
Can Obama deliver on his vows?
By Mohammad Jamil | Published: June 7, 2009
President Barack Obama presented his vision in his landmark address at Cairo with regard to relations with the Muslim World. Earlier, he had met Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah and Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak to have their blessings and advice before his much-awaited speech in which he sought a new beginning for Islam and America adding that the cycle of suspicion and mistrust must end. Palestinians have been listening to the promises for their independent state vis--vis implementation of United Nations Security resolutions, roadmaps and accords that were never fulfilled. However, Obama said certain things boldly which nobody else had dared to say in the past. He was candid in saying that two states is the only solution of the Middle East conflict and United States will not turn its back on Palestinians' right for their homeland but at the same time he urged the Palestinians to abandon the violence. Obama's speech has been well received by the Muslims at large who consider it a paradigm shift in the US policy, but the litmus test of his sincerity is the practical demonstration by translating his noble sentiments into action within a reasonable period of time.
The sceptics, however, are of the opinion that the US needs a symbol to showcase its decency with a view to restoring America's image. And America is trying to use President Obama who is respected for his being savant with polite demeanour as against former President Bush's abrasive manners with his 'trademark' of strut and smirk. They argue that the US economy is in deep recession therefore the US cannot afford to continue war in Iraq and for that matter even in Afghanistan. Anyhow, if President Obama is sincere he should not be influenced by the neocons, corporate capital and Israeli and Indian lobbies, and should work according to his conscience, because to be a respectable world leader it is not enough to be a president of a superpower; President Obama should therefore display his political acumen and determination because he has the potential to change the course of history. In April, addressing the Turkish parliament on the final leg of his tour of Europe, President Barack Obama declared that the United States was not, and never will be, at war with Islam. Unfortunately, his predecessor former President George W Bush was a loose cannon and used derogatory remarks against Muslims. President Bush had set aside all his inhibitions to malign Muslims and Islam, euphemistically using terms like 'a radical Islamic empire' and 'Islamic radicalism', and once he used the term Islmo-fascism.
Before and after elections, President Obama had given hope to the world that he would help resolve the long-standing issues between the belligerent nations and also review the US policy towards Iran, Cuba and North Korea. One has no reason to disbelieve President Obama, and at least he in his speech has acknowledged the right of Iran to develop peaceful nuclear energy. But the analysts and commentators express their doubt about his ability to control the corporate capital, Jewish lobbies and neocons that are well-entrenched in the Republican and Democratic parties. It is too well known that the Jews have very strong lobbies in US Congress, the Senate, CIA, think tanks and all other organs of the state. This is the reason that during the last six decades a dozen US presidents during their tenures had failed to get the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) resolutions on establishment of Palestinian state implemented due to Israel's intransigence. Same was the case with Kashmir dispute between India and Pakistan where the former has refused to implement UNSC resolutions and Kashmiris are suffering at the hands of Indian Army and agencies for the last six decades.
President Obama during his election campaign and even after saddling into power declared that he would nominate US special envoy for Pakistan, Afghanistan and India, but when Holbrooke was nominated, India was excluded from the loop. For Middle East, he had appointed George Mitchell as special US envoy to resolve the Palestinian issue who asseverated that the 2002 Arab peace initiative - under which Arab states would normalise relations with Israel in exchange for full Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank and Gaza - should be the basis of peace talks. During the previous administration, Condoleezza Rice frequented the region to resolve the issue but no headway could be made, as Israel had been pushing for a vaguely worded document while the Palestinians wanted a detailed outline, complete with a timetable for establishing a Palestinian state. Palestinians have, indeed, undergone the longest ordeal in the annals of history, and despite various UN resolutions and accords there seems to be no end in sight to the sufferings as a result of atrocities perpetrated on them by Israeli forces.
It all started on May 14, 1948 when the UN, the successor to the League of Nations, implemented the 1947 UN Partition Plan and established the state of Israel. With backing of the West, Israel continued usurping the Palestinian land, and balked at UN resolutions that gave the Palestinians the right to have an independent state. In July 2004, after 37 years of 1967 war International Court of Justice in its judgement had declared the occupation of Palestinian lands by Israel as illegal. It said that Israel was under an obligation to cease forthwith the construction of wall built in the occupied Palestinian territory including in and around Jerusalem, and to demolish the raised structures. The court had called upon the UN General Assembly and Security Council to take action to halt the construction work, but to no avail. The moot question remains unanswered whether any country has the right to invade and occupy the other's land? What is the legal position of Palestinian lands? Though Israel had withdrawn from Gaza Strip and part of the West Bank yet Jews have made settlements in the West Bank in such a manner that obscured the possibility of a contiguous Palestinian state.
During the last 40 years, a number of initiatives for peace have been taken, in the context of Security Council Resolution 242 but none has succeeded. Palestinian problem continues to defy any solution, primarily due to intransigence of Israel, blindly supported and encouraged by US. The Palestinian tragedy has been further compounded with the treachery of Arabs, duplicity and silence of the international community. President Obama should act fast so that he does not hand over the baton to the next president after four years who would again promise to resolve the issue. Anyhow, Muslims throughout the world had pinned high hopes on President Obama that he would take urgent measures to ensure justice to the Muslim countries that have suffered death and destruction for the last 60 years. Palestinians and Kashmiris have been waiting for six decades to see that the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) resolutions are implemented but despite promises made by almost each and every US administration, the issues and dispute remain unresolved. Palestinians and Kashmiris do not want promises but implementation of the UNSC resolutions.
The writer is a freelance columnist
By Mohammad Jamil | Published: June 7, 2009
President Barack Obama presented his vision in his landmark address at Cairo with regard to relations with the Muslim World. Earlier, he had met Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah and Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak to have their blessings and advice before his much-awaited speech in which he sought a new beginning for Islam and America adding that the cycle of suspicion and mistrust must end. Palestinians have been listening to the promises for their independent state vis--vis implementation of United Nations Security resolutions, roadmaps and accords that were never fulfilled. However, Obama said certain things boldly which nobody else had dared to say in the past. He was candid in saying that two states is the only solution of the Middle East conflict and United States will not turn its back on Palestinians' right for their homeland but at the same time he urged the Palestinians to abandon the violence. Obama's speech has been well received by the Muslims at large who consider it a paradigm shift in the US policy, but the litmus test of his sincerity is the practical demonstration by translating his noble sentiments into action within a reasonable period of time.
The sceptics, however, are of the opinion that the US needs a symbol to showcase its decency with a view to restoring America's image. And America is trying to use President Obama who is respected for his being savant with polite demeanour as against former President Bush's abrasive manners with his 'trademark' of strut and smirk. They argue that the US economy is in deep recession therefore the US cannot afford to continue war in Iraq and for that matter even in Afghanistan. Anyhow, if President Obama is sincere he should not be influenced by the neocons, corporate capital and Israeli and Indian lobbies, and should work according to his conscience, because to be a respectable world leader it is not enough to be a president of a superpower; President Obama should therefore display his political acumen and determination because he has the potential to change the course of history. In April, addressing the Turkish parliament on the final leg of his tour of Europe, President Barack Obama declared that the United States was not, and never will be, at war with Islam. Unfortunately, his predecessor former President George W Bush was a loose cannon and used derogatory remarks against Muslims. President Bush had set aside all his inhibitions to malign Muslims and Islam, euphemistically using terms like 'a radical Islamic empire' and 'Islamic radicalism', and once he used the term Islmo-fascism.
Before and after elections, President Obama had given hope to the world that he would help resolve the long-standing issues between the belligerent nations and also review the US policy towards Iran, Cuba and North Korea. One has no reason to disbelieve President Obama, and at least he in his speech has acknowledged the right of Iran to develop peaceful nuclear energy. But the analysts and commentators express their doubt about his ability to control the corporate capital, Jewish lobbies and neocons that are well-entrenched in the Republican and Democratic parties. It is too well known that the Jews have very strong lobbies in US Congress, the Senate, CIA, think tanks and all other organs of the state. This is the reason that during the last six decades a dozen US presidents during their tenures had failed to get the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) resolutions on establishment of Palestinian state implemented due to Israel's intransigence. Same was the case with Kashmir dispute between India and Pakistan where the former has refused to implement UNSC resolutions and Kashmiris are suffering at the hands of Indian Army and agencies for the last six decades.
President Obama during his election campaign and even after saddling into power declared that he would nominate US special envoy for Pakistan, Afghanistan and India, but when Holbrooke was nominated, India was excluded from the loop. For Middle East, he had appointed George Mitchell as special US envoy to resolve the Palestinian issue who asseverated that the 2002 Arab peace initiative - under which Arab states would normalise relations with Israel in exchange for full Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank and Gaza - should be the basis of peace talks. During the previous administration, Condoleezza Rice frequented the region to resolve the issue but no headway could be made, as Israel had been pushing for a vaguely worded document while the Palestinians wanted a detailed outline, complete with a timetable for establishing a Palestinian state. Palestinians have, indeed, undergone the longest ordeal in the annals of history, and despite various UN resolutions and accords there seems to be no end in sight to the sufferings as a result of atrocities perpetrated on them by Israeli forces.
It all started on May 14, 1948 when the UN, the successor to the League of Nations, implemented the 1947 UN Partition Plan and established the state of Israel. With backing of the West, Israel continued usurping the Palestinian land, and balked at UN resolutions that gave the Palestinians the right to have an independent state. In July 2004, after 37 years of 1967 war International Court of Justice in its judgement had declared the occupation of Palestinian lands by Israel as illegal. It said that Israel was under an obligation to cease forthwith the construction of wall built in the occupied Palestinian territory including in and around Jerusalem, and to demolish the raised structures. The court had called upon the UN General Assembly and Security Council to take action to halt the construction work, but to no avail. The moot question remains unanswered whether any country has the right to invade and occupy the other's land? What is the legal position of Palestinian lands? Though Israel had withdrawn from Gaza Strip and part of the West Bank yet Jews have made settlements in the West Bank in such a manner that obscured the possibility of a contiguous Palestinian state.
During the last 40 years, a number of initiatives for peace have been taken, in the context of Security Council Resolution 242 but none has succeeded. Palestinian problem continues to defy any solution, primarily due to intransigence of Israel, blindly supported and encouraged by US. The Palestinian tragedy has been further compounded with the treachery of Arabs, duplicity and silence of the international community. President Obama should act fast so that he does not hand over the baton to the next president after four years who would again promise to resolve the issue. Anyhow, Muslims throughout the world had pinned high hopes on President Obama that he would take urgent measures to ensure justice to the Muslim countries that have suffered death and destruction for the last 60 years. Palestinians and Kashmiris have been waiting for six decades to see that the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) resolutions are implemented but despite promises made by almost each and every US administration, the issues and dispute remain unresolved. Palestinians and Kashmiris do not want promises but implementation of the UNSC resolutions.
The writer is a freelance columnist
A
arshad_lahore
Guest
Standing up to pressures from India
By Dr Maqbool Ahmad Bhatty | Published: June 7, 2009
The result of the 2009 Parliamentary Elections in India has served to reinforce the confidence of that ambitious power to play an assertive role not only in its region but also at the global level.
The Congress Party's emergence as the largest party has been made possible by the burgeoning economy and rise of an educated middle class creating a consumer's market of 300 million. Even though the electoral process gets messy in a county with the greatest multiplicity of ethnic groups and religious minorities, and its conduct is not totally transparent, the result has a certain credibility justifying for the country the title of the world's largest democracy.
Mr Manmohan Singh, the Sikh technocrat who helped launch India on its economic resurgence in 1990, will continue as prime minister. Interestingly, the dynastic legacy since Nehru's uninterrupted premiership from 1947 to 1964 continues. Daughter Indira Gandhi succeeded him, and her son Rajiv Gandhi inherited the leadership. Both were assassinated, one by a Sikh bodyguard and the other by a Tamil woman suicide bomber.
Rajiv's widow Sonia Gandhi being Italian born chose to play a kingmaker's role, recognising the constraints on ambition arising from such ancestry. Her son Rahul, now 36 years old, is preparing himself for leadership by strengthening the party and has played a prominent role in the election campaign. The image he has acquired is that of a gifted and dedicated nationalist who will continue to pursue his great grandfather's vision of India as a world power.
The Hindu content of India's national ethos, that was exemplified by Mahatama Gandhi, even though he was assassinated by a Hindu extremist in 1948, still bedevils the region's politics. The Kashmir dispute continues to poison relations with Pakistan and constitutes one facet of a post World War II global order in which Muslim rights and aspirations have been suppressed.
The 9/11 events were used to brand Islamic resurgence as 'terrorist' in character. Palestinians faced stronger repression in Israeli occupied regions, while India followed suit by equating the Kashmiri liberation struggle to terrorism.
The eight years of President George W Bush were coloured by his anti-Muslim obsession, from which India benefited by being groomed as a strategic ally, and though the signing of a nuclear accord. Despite President Musharraf's subservience to the Bush policies, that led him to station 100,000 Pakistan troops on the Pak-Afghan border, the US relationship with New Delhi reflected its two basic concerns, reinforcing Israel's security and containing China. Pakistan obviously could not normalise relations with Israel, though some preliminary moves were made when Foreign Minister Kasuri met his Israeli counterpart in Turkey in 2005. On China, Pakistan's longstanding alliance was codified through a Pakistan-China Treaty on Peace and Friendship, concluded in April 2005.
The Peace Process with India, initiated in January 2004 during Prime Minister A B Vajpayee's visit to Islamabad for the SAARC Summit was maintained when Vajpayee was defeated by the Congress and Manmohan Singh succeeded him as prime minister.
The dialogue was maintained over the next four years, though the emphasis was more on Confidence Building Measures (CBMs) than on dispute resolution. The earthquake of 2005 led to some humanitarian cooperation in Kashmir where its fury was concentrated but bilateral relations virtually stagnated, as even issues such as Siachin Glacier and Sir Creek could not be finalised with last minute hitches coming from India.
The democratic process in Pakistan that culminated in the elections of February 18, 2008 did produce some useful manifestations of goodwill, though India's attitude was transformed by the Mumbai terrorist attacks of November 26 attributed to "non-state actors." Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi happened to be in New Delhi when the incident happened, and stayed on for a while as a reassuring gesture. India's inclination to exert military pressure on Pakistan was discouraged by the US and NATO, which are aware of the problems Pakistan has been confronting in its tribal region along the Afghan border.
With the coming into power of the Obama regime in Washington, that has shown awareness of discontents in the Islamic world, hopes have been aroused that though terrorism remains a concern, the longstanding sources of tension such as Palestine and Kashmir will be addressed. Obama's election is a landmark, as he is the first Afro-American to enter the White House. His father was a Muslim of Kenyan origin so that he has linkages both to the Third World and the World of Islam. Even during his election campaign he not only proclaimed an agenda for change but also his intention to launch a dialogue with the World of Islam, to replace Bush's confrontationist strategy rooted in Huntington "Clash of Civilisations" theory.
India is already behaving with a self-assurance arising from its global diplomatic standing including strategic and economic convergence with the US, Europe, Russia and Japan. On the contrary, despite having elections and adopting a reformist economic agenda, Pakistan's future is not seen as secure with Henry Kissinger forecasting instability in 2015 and the end of independent existence by 2025. Our post election leadership remains preoccupied with personal intrigues and petty rivalries. It is time that our elected leadership rises to the real challenges, including India's enduring animus. It is pertinent to recall that after India's nuclear tests in May 1998, the Indian ruling party leader L K Advani called upon Pakistan to vacate Azad Kashmir while BJP Party President Singhal had declared that the partition of the subcontinent in 1947should end and Akhand Bharat restored. Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's historic decision to demonstrate Pakistan's nuclear capability on May 28, 1998 restored nuclear balance, guaranteeing Pakistan's survival.
Apart from safeguarding national unity and sovereignty, our greatest challenge will always be to ensure our independent existence and whoever is the head in Pakistan must meet that challenge by mobilising the nation with courage and conviction.
The writer is a former ambassador
By Dr Maqbool Ahmad Bhatty | Published: June 7, 2009
The result of the 2009 Parliamentary Elections in India has served to reinforce the confidence of that ambitious power to play an assertive role not only in its region but also at the global level.
The Congress Party's emergence as the largest party has been made possible by the burgeoning economy and rise of an educated middle class creating a consumer's market of 300 million. Even though the electoral process gets messy in a county with the greatest multiplicity of ethnic groups and religious minorities, and its conduct is not totally transparent, the result has a certain credibility justifying for the country the title of the world's largest democracy.
Mr Manmohan Singh, the Sikh technocrat who helped launch India on its economic resurgence in 1990, will continue as prime minister. Interestingly, the dynastic legacy since Nehru's uninterrupted premiership from 1947 to 1964 continues. Daughter Indira Gandhi succeeded him, and her son Rajiv Gandhi inherited the leadership. Both were assassinated, one by a Sikh bodyguard and the other by a Tamil woman suicide bomber.
Rajiv's widow Sonia Gandhi being Italian born chose to play a kingmaker's role, recognising the constraints on ambition arising from such ancestry. Her son Rahul, now 36 years old, is preparing himself for leadership by strengthening the party and has played a prominent role in the election campaign. The image he has acquired is that of a gifted and dedicated nationalist who will continue to pursue his great grandfather's vision of India as a world power.
The Hindu content of India's national ethos, that was exemplified by Mahatama Gandhi, even though he was assassinated by a Hindu extremist in 1948, still bedevils the region's politics. The Kashmir dispute continues to poison relations with Pakistan and constitutes one facet of a post World War II global order in which Muslim rights and aspirations have been suppressed.
The 9/11 events were used to brand Islamic resurgence as 'terrorist' in character. Palestinians faced stronger repression in Israeli occupied regions, while India followed suit by equating the Kashmiri liberation struggle to terrorism.
The eight years of President George W Bush were coloured by his anti-Muslim obsession, from which India benefited by being groomed as a strategic ally, and though the signing of a nuclear accord. Despite President Musharraf's subservience to the Bush policies, that led him to station 100,000 Pakistan troops on the Pak-Afghan border, the US relationship with New Delhi reflected its two basic concerns, reinforcing Israel's security and containing China. Pakistan obviously could not normalise relations with Israel, though some preliminary moves were made when Foreign Minister Kasuri met his Israeli counterpart in Turkey in 2005. On China, Pakistan's longstanding alliance was codified through a Pakistan-China Treaty on Peace and Friendship, concluded in April 2005.
The Peace Process with India, initiated in January 2004 during Prime Minister A B Vajpayee's visit to Islamabad for the SAARC Summit was maintained when Vajpayee was defeated by the Congress and Manmohan Singh succeeded him as prime minister.
The dialogue was maintained over the next four years, though the emphasis was more on Confidence Building Measures (CBMs) than on dispute resolution. The earthquake of 2005 led to some humanitarian cooperation in Kashmir where its fury was concentrated but bilateral relations virtually stagnated, as even issues such as Siachin Glacier and Sir Creek could not be finalised with last minute hitches coming from India.
The democratic process in Pakistan that culminated in the elections of February 18, 2008 did produce some useful manifestations of goodwill, though India's attitude was transformed by the Mumbai terrorist attacks of November 26 attributed to "non-state actors." Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi happened to be in New Delhi when the incident happened, and stayed on for a while as a reassuring gesture. India's inclination to exert military pressure on Pakistan was discouraged by the US and NATO, which are aware of the problems Pakistan has been confronting in its tribal region along the Afghan border.
With the coming into power of the Obama regime in Washington, that has shown awareness of discontents in the Islamic world, hopes have been aroused that though terrorism remains a concern, the longstanding sources of tension such as Palestine and Kashmir will be addressed. Obama's election is a landmark, as he is the first Afro-American to enter the White House. His father was a Muslim of Kenyan origin so that he has linkages both to the Third World and the World of Islam. Even during his election campaign he not only proclaimed an agenda for change but also his intention to launch a dialogue with the World of Islam, to replace Bush's confrontationist strategy rooted in Huntington "Clash of Civilisations" theory.
India is already behaving with a self-assurance arising from its global diplomatic standing including strategic and economic convergence with the US, Europe, Russia and Japan. On the contrary, despite having elections and adopting a reformist economic agenda, Pakistan's future is not seen as secure with Henry Kissinger forecasting instability in 2015 and the end of independent existence by 2025. Our post election leadership remains preoccupied with personal intrigues and petty rivalries. It is time that our elected leadership rises to the real challenges, including India's enduring animus. It is pertinent to recall that after India's nuclear tests in May 1998, the Indian ruling party leader L K Advani called upon Pakistan to vacate Azad Kashmir while BJP Party President Singhal had declared that the partition of the subcontinent in 1947should end and Akhand Bharat restored. Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's historic decision to demonstrate Pakistan's nuclear capability on May 28, 1998 restored nuclear balance, guaranteeing Pakistan's survival.
Apart from safeguarding national unity and sovereignty, our greatest challenge will always be to ensure our independent existence and whoever is the head in Pakistan must meet that challenge by mobilising the nation with courage and conviction.
The writer is a former ambassador
A
arshad_lahore
Guest
Cairo University and US President's address
By Ikramullah | Published: June 7, 2009
A part from the political and strategic impact of President Barack Obama's so-called historic impact on the Muslim world in particular and the "clash of civilisations" in general, my mind, instantly, took off in a different direction. Going back in time, I remembered Maulana Abu Kalam Azad addressing Delhi University preaching peace amongst the Indians belonging to different faiths when Hindu-Muslim riots were taking place in India. Undoubtedly the universities played a great part as non-political and independent platforms for the promotion of peace and harmony.
As the universities were considered an important instrument of interaction between the government and intellectuals, Quaid-i-Azam also utilised the Aligarh University, Islamia College Peshawar and Islamia College Lahore to promote the Pakistan Movement although he strongly believed that students should shun politics and concentrate more on their studies.
Besides this, the West has developed a different university culture as a result of which the students do not take active part in politics during their studies. However the faculty members who specialise in certain fields are always consulted and offer their advice at different levels of the administration. Some senior professors end up holding very high positions at the state and even federal levels. Similarly, it is a matter of routine for US presidents, British PMs and European heads of government to address the selected universities on national issues. Many former presidents consider it a matter of great honour.
In case of Pakistan, unfortunately, no such culture has taken shape due to a number of reasons. No constitution or sustained leadership was ever in place. The musical chairs played between the army and the civil authority made the confusion worst confounded. There was hardly any peaceful or honourable exit of PMs or presidents. It may look odd but in Pakistan hardly a president, PM, CM or governor - with one or two exceptions - has been terminated or forced to resign. That is the main reason why, after the sudden departure of Quaid-i-Azam in 1948, the civil-military-bureaucracy comprising Ghulam Muhammad, Chaudhry Muhammad Ali Sikandar Mirza and Khan Qurban Ali in Punjab and another IGP Abdul Rasheed Khan took over NWFP. Our present woes are the direct result of the failure of our politicians to evolve a constitution and hold elections within two years of independence as India did and proved themselves worthy of running the Executive, the Parliament and the Judiciary which could provide good governance to the people under a stable political leadership. The Quaid as governor general ruled East and West Pakistan with one PM, eight ministers and eight secretaries in addition to a few essential autonomous bodies and their chairmen's. Let me boldly say that had Pakistan, between August 14, 1947 and August 14, 1950 evolved a constitution, held elections at the central and the provincial levels, done away with the feudal system through bold land reforms, amalgamated the federally administered territories like FATA and evolved and pursued an independent foreign policy we would have been saved from the sorry state of affairs in which Pakistan is facing today.
I had started this column with President Obama's historic address to reach out to the Muslim world with a message of peace and promotion of a strategy of change from the past to usher in a better future. He chose the historic Cairo University to launch the New Global Order. I, for one, warmly welcome the president's bold initiative. As I watched Obama's address, I noted a ring of sincerity in his words and body language. Let us all give a helping hand in his peace offensive and wait for the results.
In the meantime here is a chance for the vice chancellors of the many distinguished universities in Pakistan to offer their platform to the president, PM and other high ranking officials in order to share the challenges faced by the government and seek their advice. I urge the oldest and largest seat of higher learning in Pakistan, University of the Punjab, to take a lead in this adventure by requesting the president to give his vision of Pakistan to the new generation while others leaders can follow. Joined by other universities, the net result of this exercise shall certainly produce new ideas. At worst no harm is likely to be caused to anyone.
The writer is the president of the Pakistan National Forum
By Ikramullah | Published: June 7, 2009
A part from the political and strategic impact of President Barack Obama's so-called historic impact on the Muslim world in particular and the "clash of civilisations" in general, my mind, instantly, took off in a different direction. Going back in time, I remembered Maulana Abu Kalam Azad addressing Delhi University preaching peace amongst the Indians belonging to different faiths when Hindu-Muslim riots were taking place in India. Undoubtedly the universities played a great part as non-political and independent platforms for the promotion of peace and harmony.
As the universities were considered an important instrument of interaction between the government and intellectuals, Quaid-i-Azam also utilised the Aligarh University, Islamia College Peshawar and Islamia College Lahore to promote the Pakistan Movement although he strongly believed that students should shun politics and concentrate more on their studies.
Besides this, the West has developed a different university culture as a result of which the students do not take active part in politics during their studies. However the faculty members who specialise in certain fields are always consulted and offer their advice at different levels of the administration. Some senior professors end up holding very high positions at the state and even federal levels. Similarly, it is a matter of routine for US presidents, British PMs and European heads of government to address the selected universities on national issues. Many former presidents consider it a matter of great honour.
In case of Pakistan, unfortunately, no such culture has taken shape due to a number of reasons. No constitution or sustained leadership was ever in place. The musical chairs played between the army and the civil authority made the confusion worst confounded. There was hardly any peaceful or honourable exit of PMs or presidents. It may look odd but in Pakistan hardly a president, PM, CM or governor - with one or two exceptions - has been terminated or forced to resign. That is the main reason why, after the sudden departure of Quaid-i-Azam in 1948, the civil-military-bureaucracy comprising Ghulam Muhammad, Chaudhry Muhammad Ali Sikandar Mirza and Khan Qurban Ali in Punjab and another IGP Abdul Rasheed Khan took over NWFP. Our present woes are the direct result of the failure of our politicians to evolve a constitution and hold elections within two years of independence as India did and proved themselves worthy of running the Executive, the Parliament and the Judiciary which could provide good governance to the people under a stable political leadership. The Quaid as governor general ruled East and West Pakistan with one PM, eight ministers and eight secretaries in addition to a few essential autonomous bodies and their chairmen's. Let me boldly say that had Pakistan, between August 14, 1947 and August 14, 1950 evolved a constitution, held elections at the central and the provincial levels, done away with the feudal system through bold land reforms, amalgamated the federally administered territories like FATA and evolved and pursued an independent foreign policy we would have been saved from the sorry state of affairs in which Pakistan is facing today.
I had started this column with President Obama's historic address to reach out to the Muslim world with a message of peace and promotion of a strategy of change from the past to usher in a better future. He chose the historic Cairo University to launch the New Global Order. I, for one, warmly welcome the president's bold initiative. As I watched Obama's address, I noted a ring of sincerity in his words and body language. Let us all give a helping hand in his peace offensive and wait for the results.
In the meantime here is a chance for the vice chancellors of the many distinguished universities in Pakistan to offer their platform to the president, PM and other high ranking officials in order to share the challenges faced by the government and seek their advice. I urge the oldest and largest seat of higher learning in Pakistan, University of the Punjab, to take a lead in this adventure by requesting the president to give his vision of Pakistan to the new generation while others leaders can follow. Joined by other universities, the net result of this exercise shall certainly produce new ideas. At worst no harm is likely to be caused to anyone.
The writer is the president of the Pakistan National Forum
