| September 24, 2006 | Sunday | Sha'aban 30, 1427 |
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World Heart Day
Poverty: actions, not words
Another brick in the wall
F-16 fighters
Woes of privatisation
BJP’s bigotry
Remembering Tabish Dehlvi
Suffering in the heat
Exercise in practicality
Readers are requested to restrict their comments to a maximum of 400 words. We reserve the right to edit letters for reasons of clarity and space. Letters, including those by e-mail, should carry the complete postal address of the sender. The views expressed in these columns do not necessarily reflect the views of the newspaper.—Editor
PRESIDENT Musharraf’s sojourn in the US is really a publicity tour for his book. It’s very strange that a sitting president has written a memoir and is plugging it openly. Most presidents write books after they retire. President Musharraf should not use Pakistan to gain wealth. I would suggest that he donate proceeds from the book towards women’s education, at least this way he can empower women to fight for their rights since he can’t seem to pass the women’s empowerment bill.
FAWWAD SHAFI
Lahore
DURING a White House press conference President Musharraf side-stepped questions by saying that he was honour-bound to the publishers not to comment on material discussed in the book before its release.
The general needs to know that his personal book and memoirs should not come in way of realities and purported threats to the nation.
The people of Pakistan and the world should know the facts as it affects all of them. It is not a personal matter related to Gen Musharraf’s personal life that is copyrighted to him. The general has acted in a unwise manner.
The laughter from the assembled journalists should have been upsetting for him . It now remains to be determined what national interest means to him. Is that closer to his heart than generating publicity for his book and assuring the sale of its copies so that he can generate money out of it? This whole episode is extremely disappointing.
Dr TARIQ JAWAID
Illinois, USA
THE revelation by Gen Musharraf that the US had threatened to bomb Pakistan ‘back to the Stone Age’ after 9/11 is more insulting than the threat itself.
Everybody knows that Pakistan was forced to join the so-called ‘war on terror’ because it had no other choice. But despite that, it is unwise to disclose in what circumstances Pakistan joined the war.
I can’t understand why the general felt it necessary to disclose such shocking information. It seems that Musharraf is determined to prove to the world how cowardly the Pakistani nation is. Gen Musharraf will continue to rule the country and remain in uniform until he is threatened himself. I think we are already in the Stone Age.
NASIR KHAN
Islamabad
BY stating that Pakistan would have been bombed back into the Stone Age had he not joined America’s war on terror, Gen Musharraf has in fact tarnished the image of the Pakistan army and demoralised its jawans. By uttering such a statement Gen Musharraf is clearly admitting that the army is incapable of defending Pakistan’s sovereignty and security from external threats. So much for the professionalism of the Pakistan army and the ‘deterrence’ value of our nukes.
MAJ (r ) IQBAL
Q. JHAKARANI
Karachi
DESPITE the fact that President Musharraf’s timing for referring to Richard Armitage’s conversation with Gen Mehmood was not appropriate and created unrest in the media, I would like to appreciate the president for handling the press conference tactfully. Once again he proved that he does not mince words. Anyone could make out that he was telling the truth. We are proud to have a leader who does not lie in the garb of diplomacy and can face situations squarely no matter what the forum.
SYED MASOOD HAIDER
Multan
A HEALTHY heart is vital to living life to the full, regardless of age or gender. Controlling the major cardiovascular risk factors by choosing a healthy diet, being physically active and by not smoking can prevent heart attacks and strokes and even help the heart to age more slowly.
That’s why this year the theme of World Heart Day (Sept 24) “How Young is Your Heart?” will encourage people around the world to adopt a heart-healthy lifestyle to help maintain a young heart for life.
Heart disease and stroke are the world’s greatest killers claiming 17.5 million lives a year. About 80 per cent of the world’s cardiovascular disease burden occurs in low- and middle-income countries. Research published in a leading medical journal has clearly proved that tobacco use is the greatest risk factor not only for heart attack and stroke, but it is also responsible for at least 30 other serious diseases, including lung cancer.
The number of smokers worldwide is currently estimated to be 1.3 billion of which 82 per cent are in developing countries. During the 20th century 100 million people died worldwide as a result of tobacco-related diseases. This number is expected to increase to one billion during the 21st century. About half of these dead will be middle-aged adults (35-69 years old), who will lose an average of 22 years of life. Tobacco smoking causes one-fifth of the cardiovascular disease worldwide, and if current trends continue, by 2030 some 10 million people will die of tobacco-related diseases — 70 per cent of which will occur in developing countries.
Risk is not by smoking tobacco only; in fact all forms of tobacco use including that used in ‘paan’ and ‘gutka ‘are extremely dangerous for the heart and lungs. Inhalation of second-hand smoke should also be discouraged because it is also a cause of heart attack and lung cancer.
The good news is that being physically active, choosing a healthy diet and not smoking can prevent disease. Physical inactivity greatly contributes to ageing the heart as it can lead to overweight and obesity, diabetes and hypertension. The government must take concrete measures to control tobacco use in the country.
The electronic and print media should use World Heart Day to educate the public to choose a healthy lifestyle. The message to public on this day is: “Eat less, walk more and don’t smoke”.
DR JAVAID A. KHAN
Aga Khan University Karachi
THIS refers to Ms Zubeida Mustafa’s article ‘Poverty: actions, not words’ (Sept 13). The article is well-written and is good for academic discussion. But its recommendations cannot be implemented practically under the existing ground realities.
The country is being ruled by powerful rich elites. As a policy, the masses are kept poor, illiterate/ignorant, sick and economically deprived. There are about 8,000 ghost schools with far more ghost teachers. Some of the school buildings are used as ‘autaq’, animal shed or storage. The situation in urban areas is not any different. There the school buildings are in a pathetic condition.
Similarly, there are ghost dispensaries and ghost doctors in rural areas. Thus the masses are deprived of the basic health facilities. The situation in government hospitals in urban areas is too pathetic. The patients are left to die due to lack of proper care and medicines.
The poor masses are economically exploited. There are bonded labour camps and private jails maintained by the waderas. Inmates escaping from these camps/jails are caught and delivered to the waderas. This is how waderas are obliged by government functionaries.
The ruling class is having best of the life. Most of them, corrupt to the core, have properties in Europe/America. They send their children to the best schools in Pakistan or abroad. Similarly, they get best medical treatment in top class private hospitals in Pakistan or abroad. Therefore, the ruling elites need to maintain status quo to remain in power. They would, therefore, continue to give lip-service for elimination of poverty and do nothing practically. There could be no ‘fair and free’ election in Pakistan.
Pakistan has one of the richest economical bases. Therefore, there should be no poverty if economic benefits are equally distributed, but unfortunately that is not so. The poverty that exists in Pakistan is created by the vested interests. There is no way out of the situation except that a brave, honest patriot on horse-back comes in and abolishes all the fortresses of feudalism (rural and urban), establishes a true democratic government through free and fair elections and goes back. His name shall ever remain as saviour of Pakistan.
A. SAMAD KHAN
Karachi
I MOVED here from London two years ago. Being a mother of a schoolgoing child, I was delighted to see Muhammad Ali Khan’s article ‘Another brick in the wall’ (Sept 17). Issues raised in the article highlights some of the nightmares faced by a majority of parents in this country. We are a nation of intelligent people, yet we don’t learn from our mistakes as no steps are taken by authorities or private schools to solve any of these problems.
Advancement of technology and communication has made it so easy these days to learn and follow examples of the developed world’s system of education.
Yet we are still facing the problems like new editions and shortage of books every year. As rightly mentioned by Mr Ali Khan that this problem can be easily solved through supplementary notes or even photocopies of the added text. If some schools can provide hiring facility of books for their students, why can’t all other schools follow suit?
As mentioned in the article, most of the teachers are pressured to finish the syllabus on time and hence they rush through it. Thus the learning process is nowhere to be seen in the course of action.
Since most of the school buildings are not purpose-built, there is, therefore, shortage of space. As there is no system of providing lockers to students in schools, children have to carry books to and from school daily. This makes their bags heavy which, in turn, causes back problems in many children. Mostly there is not enough natural light in classrooms, thus affecting their eyesight.
It’s about time serious thought was given to the education of our future generations.
SABAHAT AFRIDI
Karachi
IN his letter ‘F-16 fighters’(Aug 29), Mr Dennis Dey has made two observations. One, that the F-86 Sabre jets, Chaffee and Patton tanks (he’s forgotten the F-104 Starfighters) were supplied to Pakistan by the US for the purpose of fighting communism, but they were used against India in the 1965 and 1971 wars, leading to temporary military sanctions by Washington.
Two, F-16s and other military hardware, too, will be used against India in case of a war, although these are being supplied to fight ‘terrorism’. The only difference is that Pakistan is now technologically capable of circumventing any embargo the US may place, he says.
This raises several questions in one’s mind.
1. One believes there was no such condition that these weapons could only be used against one type of enemy (communists) that may threaten Pakistan but not another type, although some knowledgeable Pakistani government official from that era only could confirm this. Nevertheless, one remembers that a similar embargo had also been placed on India, which was a staunch ally of America’s enemy No. 1, the Soviet communists, and had just a small amount of American hardware, the argument being to prevent the use of US-supplied equipment by opposing parties. That this would affect Pakistan severely and India negligibly was well-known to the Americans.
2. The F-16s, cluster bombs and other hardware supplied by the US to Israel are mostly used to kill civilians, as was done recently in Lebanon despite the outrage it caused internationally. Instead of placing any embargo on Tel Aviv, the US expedited the shipments of the deadly bombs. In the 1967 and 1973 wars also, American weaponry was used by the Jewish state against Arab countries, at least one of which (Jordan) was allied to the US, but no sanctions were applied.
3. The US defends such aggression by Israel by saying it has a right to defend itself. Did Pakistan not have the right to keep India from occupying or dismembering the country, which it did in 1971? The US never faced such grave dangers from communism as Pakistan did from its larger neighbour.
4. India is interested in buying military hardware from the US, while F-16s/F-18s along with technology transfer are already on offer, as are the Patriot PAC-3 anti-ballistic missile systems. Will America place similarly harsh conditions on their sale to prevent them from being used against its “major non-Nato ally” Pakistan? Will India abide by them?
5. As far as the arguable capability of bypassing any future US embargoes by Pakistan is concerned, one problem would remain. Even if it can do that vis-a-vis the new version of F-16s, there would still be the American ‘experts’ who would be physically present on our air bases to monitor these aeroplanes and could disable them technically to prevent the PAF from using them.
6. When it comes to Muslims, the US is quick to apply rules and regulations, have adverse UN Security Council resolutions implemented or take punitive measures. However, where Israel is concerned, nothing seems to matter. Even its nuclear arsenal, which was confirmed by Israeli nuclear technician Mordechai Vanunu, is invisible to Washington whereas the non-existent Iraqi and Iranian WMDs get it all worked up.
In view of the foregoing and, as also noted by another correspondent in these columns (Sept 3), the US has utterly lost its credibility amongst the Muslims. Pakistan would be shooting itself in the foot if it buys the F-16s or other American armaments.
DISILLUSIONED
Karachi
DURING the last two or so decades the World Bank, a financial weapon invented by former colonial powers to keep the Third World still under their imperial thumb, was selling to its client states the idea of closing all ‘uneconomic’ operations. On the face of it, it was a sound advice and had elicited a positive response. But now, its slogan for the same category of states is to adopt ‘free market’ and ‘privatisation’.
The tragedy is that most of the countries, including our own (which claimed publicly to have broken the begging bowl), consider all such advice tendered gratuitously by the World Bank or the IMF as pearls of Platonic wisdom.
In our particular case, they offered us the services of their senior executive whom we made the ‘minister for privatisation’ and who was determined to leave no public sector undertaking ‘un- privatised’. He went back to his parent organisation without applying his hammer to so many nails in this county.
But now some European countries, especially the United Kingdom, are objecting to this kind of an economic crusader’s role assigned to itself by the World Bank and have asked it to de-link ‘privatisation’ from its recipe for the Third World. How soon, or how late, is our government going to react is anybody’s guess?
Frankly, no Karachiite who is suffering at the hands of the privatised KESC and no telephone subscriber like me whose telephone (4937240) is dead intermittently since July is prepared to hear the word ‘privatisation’. The proof of the pudding is in the eating is a wise adage.
JAFAR WAFA
Karachi
ACCORDING to a news report, the Hindu fundamentalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) had slammed the Indian government’s decision to exempt the Indian Muslims from compulsorily singing the ‘Vande Mataram’ because of the latter’s objection that it would amount to Hindu deity worship (Aug 31).
The BJP said that New Delhi’s climb-down smacked of discrimination and encouraged a lack of patriotism. One would like to point out that the most extreme of religious parties in Pakistan have never demanded of the local Hindus to eat beef at Eidul Azha because even they are tolerant enough of the latter’s religious beliefs.
In contrast, the BJP and its sister Hindu organisations have many a time called for a ban on cow slaughter in India. Their double standards once again stand exposed.
S. QADRI
Karachi
I AM writing in connection with the second death anniversary of poet Tabish Dehlvi. He is counted amongst the poetic personalities who have infused a sense of devotion to literature among the newcomers. He has been widely acclaimed for his masterly poetic renderings both in and outside Pakistan.
The reputed historians of Urdu literature have categorised Tabish Dehlvi as a very learned poet of his time. He holds a distinguished position amongst his cotemporaries and ranks high as a linguist. He gave new dimensions and directions to ancient words and their meanings.
He dominated the ‘mushairas’ he attended during his lifetime. The tone of his voice did not change despite his advance age. He was invariably requested to preside over ’mushairas ‘and other literary meetings.
At the instance of A.S. Pitras Bukhari, the then director-general of All India Radio who had developed a liking for his literary talent and rich voice, Tabish, who is known as Masood Tabish in the field of broadcasting, began his radio career. He was a newscaster par excellence and ruled over the skies for several decades.
In the post-1947 period he was regarded as the new country’s most prominent newscaster.
The masses would be glued to their radio sets in order to hear his sonorous voice presenting Urdu news bulletins. He could justifiably claim that he had announced many breaking news events.
He became nostalgic when recalling how he managed to raise the slogan of ‘Pakistan Zindabad’, which was not in the text, on the air waves just after the Quaid-i-Azam’s speech on June 3, 1947. Tabish received many awards in his lifetime and was finally decorated with the coveted award of Tamgha-i-Imtiaz by the government of Pakistan.
S.M.R. HASSAN
Karachi
I LIVE in the DHA Phase IV commercial area and for the past three nights have had no electricity from 12 midnight till 8 in the morning. In the current hot weather this is highly inconvenient and it’s impossible to go to work the next morning. My children are also suffering at school.
I feel it’s time the KESC was returned to the government which is its rightful owner as the situation was not as bad as when it was in control. The spokesperson employed by the company also keeps changing his stance the way a chameleon changes its colours.
FAHD SATTAR
Karachi
I REFER to the letter of Fakhir Hasan (Sept 21) asking Ardeshir Cowasjee to explain the omission of words Islamic and Pakistan in his columns. If Mr Hasan is an avid follower of Mr Cowasjee and other writers, he would know that such omissions are not done deliberately but only as a precaution to avoid falling in the trap of repetition.
I and my family love Mr Cowasjee and his columns which are never short of his trademark candour and wit. Being a member of the English-reading minority of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, I would like to ask Mr Cowasjee to please explain why the word Islamic was used no less than 10 times in his column ‘Let us grow up’ (March 31, 2002)?
S. NAVEED AHMED
Kowloon, Hong Kong
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