| February 17, 2002 | Sunday | Zilhaj 4, 1422 |
Chitral needs an all-weather route
UK govt working on plans to toughen citizenship laws
Short-story collection launched
Sui gas, a long-pending Commitment
And a students’ protest about sewerage! Shame?
Brittle batting poses problems to selectors
WITH the approach of winter every year, people in Chitral consider it a part of their fate to endure innumerable communication-related problems, for almost half of the year cut off completely from the outside world because of the closure of Lowari Pass, which links the valley with other parts of the country.
TO become a British citizen would not be as easy in the future as it has been till now. The UK authorities are passing tougher and tougher citizenship and asylum laws, to try to combat bogus marriages and contain the flow of illegal immigrants.
OF ALL the occasions for conspicuous consumption, Basant is probably the least defensible.
The wedding season is in full swing and despite laws against dowries, gifts and meals one does not see austerity gaining much ground. But then there is much to be said for expensive weddings. Rarely, it is argued, can an average Pakistani hope to be the centre of attention except on the day he is born, the day he marries and the day he dies. Much joy may surround a birth but the baby can hardly appreciate it. Nor can the dead derive any satisfaction from the arrangements made on their account. That leaves the wedding. Also, it is said, the wedding gifts and dowries are some of the very few mechanisms in our society for distribution of wealth. The ban on meals, while it was respected, did not really bring down the cost of weddings. It just took away the spending from some locally produced commodities and encouraged spending on imports.
The Eid is only days away. While many people might actually spend more on sacrificial animals than indicated by the normal prices of meat, the spirit of giving and sharing will prevail. This indeed is the great point about religious feasts. They are all occasions for charity. Therein lies their utility even if the corruption of moral fibre means that many people are motivated by wrong instincts. The Eids are also an occasion for equality and fraternity. Mass congregations see to that. They are also much less noisy. Nor is the spirit unique to Muslims. The Christian, Hindu and Sikh feasts, too, involve sharing one’s blessings with those around.
Even Valentine’s day has its points. For one thing, it is a celebration of love. It also calls for commitment and consideration. And it is not the least bit rowdy or polluting.
The spirit of Basant, by comparison, is selfish, arrogant, competitive and exclusive. It also involves noise, pollution and hazards for life and limb.
It has been argued that its association with colours of spring, particularly the mustard flower, makes for an unbreakable, healthy bond with the rural Punjab. That it thus places the metropolis in context — at the heart of an agrarian economy. That nothing could be farther than truth has been starkly shown in recent years. An acute water shortage has again raised the spectre of a failed wheat crop and famine. While the farmers pray for plentiful rains the Basant enthusiasts wish for clear sunny skies.
A recent Dawn feature drew distinction between the official Basant, the Basant of the rich and the common man’s Basant. The official Basant, it seems consists of highlighting our propensity, as a people, for yuppiness. It is an invitation to multinational marketeers of products having doubtful utility. For the affluent and the upstart it is the occasion to flaunt their wealth without even the slightest pretension of wanting to share it. The poor are condemned to envy, devising clumsy substitutes and begging for, running after and fighting over windfalls, discards and other people’s losses. Custom demands that they should claim that they derive pleasure from these activities.
THE inspector-general of the Punjab Police inaugurated an investigation centre of his Lahore force on Friday. It was a dual landmark for the ambitious reform and restructuring programme of the police all over the country signifying the launch of city district police for the provincial metropolis as well as separation of investigation from other functions of the police.
DIG Javed Noor, Lahore’s first district police officer, will be assisted by four SSPs. Aftab Cheema, convicted and sentenced recently by the Lahore High Court for contempt was appointed the first SSP (Operations). Following his conviction Mr Cheema had resigned from his job. The resignation, a spokesman for the police explained, has not been accepted. Also on Friday, the officer filed an appeal against the LHC order.
Technically speaking, there is nothing wrong with the appointment. The officer has the right to appeal and the judgment may be overturned or the sentence reduced or suspended. Propriety, however, demanded that an officer prima facie guilty of flouting or ignoring court orders should not be given a high profile assignment until he had cleared his name.
At the inauguration ceremony, the IG had spoken of his hope that increased efficiency would help restore citizens’ confidence in the police. In appointing SSP Cheema, the objective seems to have been obscured by the esprit de corps. Comparison has been made to the incident involving Inamullah Niazi, then a member of the provincial assembly, who was manhandled by the police right in front of the Assembly Chambers while the PA was in session. After an uproar in the House, the officer accused of highhandedness was suspended from service. When it was pointed out on the PA floor the next day that he was still heading the guard in front of the building, the explanation was that a police officer was required under rules to perform the duties assigned to him even while suspended from service.
PUNJAB University was in the news last week for the wrong reasons. A mass communication student lodged a formal complaint with the vice-chancellor, alleging sexual harassment by two teachers. Disturbing as the incident was in itself, reactions to the news have been even more shocking. According to a Dawn survey, most of the students believe that the problem is widespread and that the student involved should, therefore, have been more watchful. The faculty see a conspiracy and are, by and large, supporting the accused colleagues. This includes the head of the mass communication department who is reported to have spoken at a recent ceremony of his pride in the teachers and ignored the loud laughter that greeted his remarks.
While the university has ordered an inquiry and is apparently content to proceed under rules, it obviously needs to do more. There is clearly a case for a very clear policy on harassment, detailed guidelines on acceptable conduct, transparency in handling of complaints and support for victims.
Given the difficulty of her situation, it is clear that it takes a very brave young woman to go on record. And no, she cannot be reproached for trusting her teachers. In fact, those making the suggestion should be ashamed of themselves.
OVER a hundred people were arrested in the Tibbi City area last week and detained on charges of showing and watching what the police described as obscene movies.
BRIEFING journalists about a Japanese film festival here, Hayat Ahmad Khan had some nice words about their content and craftsmanship. A reporter interrupted him to ask whether Pakistani movies were similarly shown in Japan. Mr Khan answered in the affirmative. “And how do they describe them?” the reporter persisted.
SYED Ahsan-us-Sabooh Gilani, second generation journalist and Dawn staffer, married Raheela Jaffery, a teacher. Excitement had earlier been building with the countdown at his home as well as at Dawn offices. The wedding, brought forward to allow the guests to keep their Basant appointments, was a grand affair. Besides the families and friends it was attended by a number of newspaper people who never stopped discussing the working conditions. — ONLOOKER
The 14,850-square-kilometre valley of Chitral, with a population of over 330,000, is accessible by road only through its two high-altitude hilly passes — Lowari Pass at the height of 10,500 feet in the south of the district and the 12,400-foot-high Shandur Pass on its northeast. From December-end to May communication to and from the district becomes restricted to the PIA air service, that too depending on weather.
For the last about 10 years, the people have been using a highly dilapidated unmetalled road through the Kunar province of Afghanistan for reaching Peshawar via the Nawa Pass. But because of the changed situation in the neighbouring country, the Kunar-Nawa pass road has also been closed this year and the Chitral Scouts have sealed the border near Arandu after the closure of Lowari Pass.
And to rub salt into the wounds, the PIA with the onset of winter this year has announced that it will give its Peshawar-Chitral-Peshawar route to the private sector on contract to, what the airline said, lessen its financial loses. The decision has created resentment in the valley, where people term the decision irresponsible and say that at a time when the area is confronted with innumerable communication-related problems, the act of the national flag-carrier would further multiply their miseries and create unrest in the area.
Talking to Dawn on telephones from Chitral they urged President Pervez Musharraf to intervene in the matter as it would totally cripple the already haggard communication system of the area, particularly in the winter when the people solely become dependent on air travel.
The regional office of the PIA in Peshawar has decided to abolish its services to Saidu Sharif, Parachinar, Bannu and Dera Ismail Khan, besides giving the Peshawar-Chitral route to the private sector.
The local people fear that the decision will hit them hard as the private party will increase fares and resort to black marketing of the tickets in winter, besides mismanaging the whole affairs. They recall the 22 years of agony which they gone through between 1965 and 1987 when the PIA air ticketing, cargo handling, etc., were in the hand of a local private organization.
But when contacted, PIA General Manager S.M.Imran Gardezi expressed his ignorance about the reports which had originated in Peshawar. “No such decision has been taken at all, and I categorically contradict the report,” he said, adding that normal flight schedules, however, could be changed according to the requirements but as far as the question of privatization was concerned it is a long process and it is not possible that one route of the airline could be given to the private sector. When the PIA had not opened its sales office in Chitral, all the ticketing, cargo handling, etc., were in the hand of a local private organization from 1965 to 1987. The people were angry because of rampant mismanagement, nepotism and black marketing of tickets during the period, which led to frequent protest demonstrations in the area. The situation had so deteriorated that the matter was taken up at the National Assembly which passed two resolutions, asking the PIA to establish its own office in Chitral to mitigate the sufferings of the people. Subsequently, the PIA district sales office was opened in the district in 1987.
The district should not be treated at par with other parts of the country where road facilities are available round-the-year whereas Chitral remained completely cut off from the rest of the country in the winter, Chitral tehsil Nazim Amir Khan Mir said.
“The decision of the PIA, reportedly taken because of financial loss, is ridiculous,” Chitral Welfare Association’s general secretary Advocate Sam Saam Ali Khan said, adding that it was the alleged corruption among the high-ups which had drained the resources of the organization.
A resident of Ovirik village in Garamchamshma, Mohammad Afzal, said: “We live in the 21st century, the age of motorways, but it is disappointing that people in Chitral still remain imprisoned for half of the year in the valley and the government has failed to mitigate their sufferings.”
The decision would affect the people, particularly those living in the far-flung villages of the valley. The government should bear the losses, if any, and provide better air travel facilities to the people in winter until an all-weather route is constructed linking the area with other parts of the country, a local trader said.
About the unending communication-related problems of the district, District Nazim Shahzada Mohiuddin told Dawn that he had recently taken up the issues with President Pervez Musharraf, NWFP governor and the corps commander of Peshawar. He said the army’s district supporting team had also assured him that C-130 planes and helicopters services from Peshawar to Chitral would be operated after the closure of the Lowari Pass, besides the normal 14 flights a week Fokker service to the district. He said the provincial government should take steps keeping in view the peculiar geography-related problems of the area. ==== It has been a longstanding demand of the people of Chitral to the successive governments to construct an all-weather road to the valley. In the early 1970s, the first PPP government had sanctioned the Lowari tunnel project, work on which was started in 1975 from the Gujar post in the Dir district at an elevation of 7,880 feet. During 1976-77, the Frontier Works Organization had completed about 2,000-foot of digging work on the tunnel from the southern side in collaboration with the Lowari Tunnel Organization. The then coalition government of Maulana Mufti Mahmood and Abdul Wali Khan in the Frontier being at loggerheads with Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, the project soon fell prey to their political discord. Subsequently, work on the site was abandoned after spending millions of rupees. With the passage of time, the estimated cost of the project has gone up. In 1994, the National Assembly was informed that the cost of the project — according to the National Highway Authority’s estimate — had touched a three-billion-rupee mark from Rs500 million in 1975. Since then the project has remained in cold storage. Keeping in view the hardships of the area, President Pervez Musharraf, at the conclusion of the Shandur polo tournament in June last, had promised the people that work on the project would start in 2002. Earlier, on April 27, 2001, NWFP Governor Syed Iftikhar Hussain Shah had asked a foreign-funded NGO and the European Union to help in the phase-wise construction of the tunnel. Despite all these promises and assurances there seem no prospects of solution to the imbroglio.
People wanting to become UK citizens will now have to pass compulsory English language tests as well as and an exam on life in British, and an oath or “citizens pledge” would be introduced for applicants to help them embrace British values, laws and customs.
The proposals announced by the government recently are at the heart of a radical new package of immigration and asylum reforms by the Home Office. But many foreigners who have been living in this country for several years and who want to become British citizens have criticised the proposals stating the reforms were aimed at squandering away their right to choose their own values.
Mr Blunkett says migrants fluent in English stand much better chances of getting work. “At the same time we will require knowledge about British society and institutions for those taking on UK citizenship — helping us secure integration with diversity.” The UK government believes the new laws will clamp down on the practice of fraudulent marriages where one of the parties aims at getting a British passport.
To discourage this trend the government says that the probation period for new marriages would be doubled to two years in a bid to sniff out sham relationships. Each year more than 30,000 people obtain the right to live in the UK by getting married to a British national.
By strict laws the authorities in this country can discourage the fraudulent marriages but when the government says that it should work on stopping “forced marriages” in the Asian society, it is indeed entering into a danger area.
Forcing the families not to choose a spouse for their children would be seen by many in the Asian and Muslim communities as a direct interference in their personal lives. To discourage forced marriages needs a lot of community work and which has not been done so far. But the Home Secretary Mr Blunkett says “We believe there is a discussion to be had within those communities that continue the practice of arranged marriages as to whether more of these could be undertaken within the settled community here.”
There has been a tradition of families originating from countries like Pakistan, India and Bangladesh wanting to bring spouses from arranged marriages to live with them in the UK. This is an old tradition in the Asian community of Britain and a large number of such marriages fail because of problem