| January 15, 2006 | Sunday | Zilhaj 14, 1426 |
To send a letter to the Editor
Click here
Truth behind Cindy Sheehan
Attack on HRCP delegation
Pindi park
Flight problems
Postal delays
Sajjad Zaheer
Rights of women in Islam
PTV plays
Mosque vs temple in Ayodhya
Residents’ problems
Quaid picture
REFERENCE letter “Dam controversy’ (Dec 22, 2005) by Mr Shafqat Masood, chairman, Irsa, it has become necessary to correct his statement that the “appraisal of any water project is not the responsibility of Irsa”.
Irsa is fully competent to appraise projects as mentioned in the preamble to the Irsa Act and in its powers and duties under Section 8(1)(f)(g), 8(2), 8(3) and paras 13 and 6 of the Water Accord.
Mr Masood also says that the decision regarding the rejection of the Kalabagh dam by Irsa on 22.10.1996 is not traceable in Irsa’s record. This is so because interested persons have stolen and destroyed it and part of the record was interpolated. In fact, Irsa rejected the hydraulic design of “restricted mid-level sluicing” of the KBD with a 4:1 majority after great consideration. The reason was the project’s wrong hydraulic design and poor location of the dam site. These factors will not evacuate heavy sediment inflow of about 540 million tons equal to 0.3 maf by volume. This will rapidly silt up the small and direct replacement storage component of 3.5 maf of the KBD at Attock. The KBD will draw a huge amount of silt from a vast catchment area of 110,500 square miles as it has been wrongly located by Wapda at the tailend of the Indus as per the TOR. The dam site location is against the principle of watershed management. It has the poorest CI ratio. Tarbela is fast losing its silt trap efficiency, and will not help the KBD.
The rejection of the KBD was in consonance with the recommendation of the KBD consultants who suggested an “unrestricted low-level sluicing design” to evacuate silt against the “restricted mid-level sluicing design” as dictated by Wapda. However, Wapda as a client did not agree with the suggestion of the project consultants.
The KBD consultants’ report further reveals that the KBD’s dependable power generation will be only 1,463 MW. In fact, the reservoir will be kept empty from June 1 to July 20 to pass floodwater. Therefore, the power generation gap is more than three months and during this period power will not be generated. Again, the reservoir’s hydraulic head is reduced from 925 to 915. This will further reduce hydropower generation. The actual power is much less than 1,400 MW.
Besides the above, the KBD is not a development dam to irrigate new land. This is because it is a purely replacement dam to replace storage lost due to the silting of Tarbela and Mangla. The KBD is not a power dam either nor is it a flood control dam.
A concrete structure higher than 160 feet is not feasible as revealed by KBD consultants Prof Simpton and A.W. Little. Moreover, the KBD is designed for operating on the basis of an earthquake up to a magnitude 7. It must be designed for a maximum credible earthquake up to a magnitude of 9.4. Due to hydro-geological problems, it has not yet been decided whether to have a stilling basin for the tunnel or a fill up bucket. The KBD will cost about $18 billion between 2006 and 2013.
Irsa rightly rejected the KBD with 4:1 majority on technical grounds under Section 8 of the Irsa Act (Powers and Duties of the Authority). The Irsa Act preamble states: “It has to provide for matters connected therewith and ancillary thereto”. In the event of failure of the KBD due to a weak foundation or poor earthquake design in spite of its location on a tectonic fault line with poor hydro-geological site conditions, it was suggested by Irsa to build a high barrage in place of a dam. The views of Mr Masood that project appraisal is not under Irsa’s powers and duties are not the views of the Authority, besides being incorrect.
ENGR. FATEH ULLAH KHAN
Former chairman, Irsa,
Peshawar
THE reality of who and what Cindy Sheehan was and is needs to be clarified so that the truth instead of propaganda prevails.
Cindy Sheehan was and remains an ultra liberal Democratic party activist, whose salaried career, off and on, has been paid for by the party.
She joined the all volunteer US military and served honourably with great spirit and dedication in the war on terrorism in Iraq.
Casey Sheehan’s loss is a great one, as are all losses in all wars resisting aggression as was the case of Iraq in 1990/1991 when Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait and the upper edge of Saudi Arabia, thereafter defying UN Resolutions (19 in total).
Pakistan was and remains a US ally from the 1991 Desert Storm I War to today’s broader, worldwide war on terrorism.
Finally, President George Bush took time out from his very busy wartime schedule to meet with Mrs Sheehan (as the mother of a deceased US soldier) in Seattle, Washington. However, Mrs Sheehan has pretended that this meeting did not happen in order to fuel her latest ultra-liberal political agenda of supporting all things Democratic.
America and it allies are at war bipartisanly. We so entered it and continue to bring democracy with a small “d” to the ordinary people of Iraq.
I’d like to see overseas Pakistanis, who by and large are good, educated, hardworking folks admit that they are here and you the reader are there, in Pakistan, because they found the epitome of democracy and free enterprise and professional university level education teaching and research positions only in America.
Mrs Sheehan has horrified thinking Americans by using her estranged son’s combat death as a platform to restart her liberal Democratic agenda which remains as much out of step with mainstream America today as it did when her late son was a boy.
COL (retd) GEORGE L. SINGLETON
Hoover, Alabama, USA
IT was very shocking to read about the attack on an HRCP delegation near the Punjab-Balochistan border. The delegation was on its way to Dera Bugti to review the current situation in the troubled areas of Balochistan and also to assess the authenticity of some disturbing reports that women and children were also among the victims who fell prey to indiscriminate firing from gunship helicopters during the operation against alleged “miscreants”.
Asma Jehangir blamed the security forces for attacking the delegation and alleged that they wanted to stop them from visiting Dera Bugti and Sui where a military operation was being launched.
According to press reports, the Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA), if any such thing exists, has accepted the responsibility for attacking the delegation. The statement of the so-called BLA spokesman was not very cleverly fabricated. This can be judged by the sentence: “Our (BLA) issue can be resolved only by the United Nations”. The BLA, perhaps, does not know that Ms Jahangir is also UN Rapporteur for extra judicial killings and forced disappearances. So, she is the most suitable person who can highlight the grievances of the Baloch, some of which are also shared by the BLA and Baloch nationalist parties. Indeed, the HRCP has sent quite a few high level fact- finding missions to Balochistan during the last few years and the mission’s reports have also been published.
ABDUL HAMEED GONDAL
Lahore
AS I’m in Rawalpindi during my winter break, I decided to take a walk in 502 park today. I have some of the most wonderful memories of this park. My father has been a regular runner here for the past 21 years. My grandmother took her last walk in this park before she died at the age of 81. My grandfather walks here to this day at the age of 86 because it’s accessible and gives him time with his, I quote, “park family”. It also happens to be the only play-area for children and walking track for adults living in the communities of Lalazar, Sherzaman, Adyala Road, Lalkurti, New Lalazar, Dehri, Tali Morri and Kamalabad.
Over the years we have seen 502 park emerge from a simple walking track with a couple of swings to a very entertaining and beautiful park. In other words, a lot of money and effort went into this park.
See the hanging monument that was erected with the proud names of the people who built the park here, hear the train and the whining start of the swings and if you don’t have respect for something that’s stood through the changing times, come out of your high offices on any of the upcoming holidays and see the people who laugh and run in this park.
Do you even realize what you’re doing? You’re about to demolish something that’s of such significance in our lives just in order to build a couple of houses for the army. Do you know what resentment you will bring upon yourselves because you are so self-centred? Take your housing society somewhere else. You’re not welcome here.
SIDRA OMER
Rawalpindi
I WAS to fly by a private airline flight # 407 at 9.30pm recently from Lahore to Karachi along with my ailing mother. After sitting an hour and a half on the plane, an announcement was made about cancellation of the flight due to thick fog and at midnight passengers were left at the airport at the mercy of radio cabs/taxis, etc.
The airline should have hired a bus to drop passengers at home in Lahore. At midnight in winter the passengers had to pay radio cabs/ taxis whatever was demanded.
We were informed that the cancelled flight would take off the next day (Saturday) at 10am, but it left at 1.15pm. On reaching Karachi airport at 3pm, a number of passengers were astonished to know that their baggage had not arrived and there was no one available to help them. After two hours of agony, we were informed that baggage would arrive by the 7pm flight and we were issued receipts for missing baggage after obtaining particulars and telephone numbers.
Not having received any information about the missing baggage, I called the airline office on Sunday evening when I was asked to collect it.
I wonder if the CAA has any rules for airlines for facilitating the passengers who suffer due to negligence of an airline.
SHAKIL AKHTAR QURESHI
Karachi
MY daughter was expecting important documents from Glasgow, UK. The documents mailed from there on Nov 14, 2005 were duly stamped and our address was also clearly written by the sender. The documents, as the postal stamp shows, reached Karachi on Nov 21, 2005. So far so good.
Unfortunately, the papers were delivered to us at the given address on Dec 29, 2005, some 30 days later.
Due to this inordinate delay in the receipt of the letter, my daughter could not take her interview in the UK High Commission, Karachi, which was fixed for Dec 12, 2005. She had to miss it for no fault of hers.
AFTAB AHMED BAIG
Karachi
DURING the recent 100th birth anniversary celebrations of Mr Sajjad Zaheer, he was projected as the sole founder of the All-India Progressive Writers’ Association, perhaps based on Mr Zaheer’s own version in Roshnai. Without taking anything away from him and to put the record straight, Mr Sajjad Zaheer was only one of the founders of the movement and association.
After the publication of Angaray in 1932, which was co-authored by Ahmed Ali, Mahmud-uz-Zaffar, Rashid Jehan and Sajjad Zaheer, the book was banned by the British government in March, 1933. The lives of the authors were threatened by religious zealots so much so that Sajjad Zaheer went away to London. Ahmed Ali and Mahmud-uz-Zaffar bore the brunt of the storm and together they announced in The Leader of Allahabad dated April 5, 1933 the formation of “A League of Progressive Authors” inviting like-minded people to join them. This, in fact, expanded and became the All-India Progressive Writers’ Association. Sajjad Zaheer two years later announced the formation of a branch of this in 1935 from London.
These original founders remained friends and together planned the first annual conference of the All-India Progressive Writers’ Association in 1936. In the first session of the conference, which was presided over by Munshi Premchand, Ahmed Ali read his paper: “Art Ka Tarraqi Pasand Nazaria (A Progressive View of Art)”. However, differences arose between Ahmed Ali and Sajjad Zaheer in 1937-38 over the editorial policy of the quarterly that Ahmed Ali was to edit for the association. Sajjad Zaheer, Mahmud-uz-Zaffar and Abdul Alim’s point of view was that only proletarian literature dealing with the proletariat and the peasantry could be considered progressive. Ahmed Ali held that progressivism could not be narrowed down to communist channels and would amount to propaganda and had to be applied to the middle classes and to the literature produced by them to which all the founders of the movement belonged (see “Afterword” to The Prison-house, Ahmed Ali, Akrash Publishing, Karachi; 1985).
The differences grew so much that Ahmed Ali parted ways with communist ideology and moved on to other things in life, but remained a progressive throughout.
History cannot be distorted due to differences in points of view. As co-founder of the All-India a Progressive Writers’ Association and Movement, Ahmed Ali chose to stay away from politics and stands out as the only literary figure of international repute from that original group of founders.
OROOJ AHMED ALI
Karachi
SYED Imad-u-Din Asad (“Rights of women in Islam”, Jan 6) has presented a comprehensive account of the rights and privileges Islam allowed to women more than 1,500 years ago — unimaginable even in the West before the inception of the movement for women’s suffrage in the 18th century. But the question here arises whether the rights permitted by Islam have actually been enjoyed by the women in the present-day Muslim social order.
The feudal-tribal structure of societies in most of today’s Muslim world does not treat women as equal to men. It is for this reason that, barring a few, in most of the Muslim countries more than 50 per cent of population has to stay ignorant. Even in many of the resource-rich Arab countries, women are not only denied participation in elections but are higher education. For this reason alone, almost half of Arab women cannot even read as disclosed in recent United Nations’ Arab Development report.
The negative concepts in western societies about the rights of women in Islam have, therefore, generally developed from the actual practice on the ground.
ALTAMASH MANZOOR H. KURESHI
Karachi
SYED Imad-Ud-Din Asad’s column on ‘Rights of women in Islam’ says “Islam has safeguarded the rights of women” and guarantees the equality of men and women.
But every Muslim country restricts the rights of its female citizens, in some cases refusing them the right to work or make a decion about themselves.
All religions and societies have their faults, but we should have the willingness to face our own faults, not to look to ancient history for intellectual support.
SHOUROV BHATTACHARYA
Sydney, Australia
THIS is with reference to a letter by Mr Umad Mazhar giving out the reasons for the decline in the standard of PTV plays (Jan 5).
It is correct that with the advent of foreign channels the viewership of PTV has decreased. With the passage of time PTV productions have not improved. Their dramas are lacklustre and they do not hold the viewer’s attention.
However, when both the writer and the director of a drama are good and work hard, then the result is satisfying — as in “Alpha Bravo Charlie” and “Gulls and Guys”. We can compete with foreign channels if PTV benefits from the services of intelligent, hard-working and professional persons.
RAFAT MAHMOOD ANSARI
Islamabad
THERE are persistent demands from Hindu hardliners to build the Ram temple at Ayodhya, the site of the now desecrated Babri Mosque in India.
It has been established and recorded in the geological study reports of the alluvial plains of the Indian subcontinent that river floods have been historically depositing silt on Indian river plains at the rate of “one foot every 250 years”. Therefore, if a Ram temple was actually built at Ayodhya, it must be buried below 27 feet of ground before Babar ventured into India. Going by the above findings, even in the wildest of imaginations, it would not be possible to think that Babar, who had the absolute power to build his mosque on any site in the country, would explore and dig out Ram temple from deep below the ground, then refill the site again to build the Babri mosque on top of it.
Alternately, if the siting of the mosque at Ayodhya was a coincidence, then there must be 27 feet of soil in between, separating the temple and the mosque. The Indian archeology department has failed to discover any such evidence.
M. SAEED
Islamabad
A PORTION of the road in Block-14, Gulistan-i-Jauhar, Karachi, beginning from Singapore Tower to the main road is in a very deplorable condition. Our complaints to the authorities concerned about this remain unattended.
Also, electricity supply to this locality is irregular. Every day power remains suspended for four to five hours. When it is there, the voltage mostly remains low. This problem can be improved by setting up a pole-mounted transformer.
DR SALEEM ULLLAH
Karachi
IN the Dawn supplement issued on the Quaid-i-Azam’s birth anniversary’ on December 25, 2005 a group photo on page III has been wrongly captioned as ‘‘Quaid-i-Azam and Miss Fatima Jinnah at the Pakistan Military Academy”.
In fact the photograph published is of the Quaid and Miss Jinnah with officers of the 2/14 Punjab Regiment, after the guard of honour ceremony at the Governor’s House, Peshawar, on April 16, 1948.
The 2/14 Punjab is now known as the 6 Punjab Regiment and has very proudly chosen the motto ‘The Quaid’s Guard’ to commemorate this unforgettable event and unique honour.
Majid Ehsan Islamabad
— The picture and caption were reproduced from ‘The Jinnah Anthology,’ compiled and edited by Liaquat H. Merchant and published by the Jinnah Society which is headed by the compiler. — Editor
You can also send letters to the Editor
Just send your message to the following address: letters@dawn.com
Make sure you include your full name, postal address, e-mail address, and in the case of Pakistan your day-time telephone number.