| October 30, 2006 | Monday | Shawwal 6, 1427 |
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Archaic decision
Appeal for help
Affront from Paris
Encroachment of public road
Waterfront development
A new doctrine of necessity
Cricket and religion
Not above criticism
Eid day
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
THIS is with reference to the Higher Education Commission’s recommendation for a military man as university VC. What seems to have been ignored while taking this decision is that having a uniformed background does not guarantee good administration and sound planning of educational policies.
Similarly, this imposition also does not guarantee an upward growth in the standard of education at university level. The HEC ought to realise that university staff and students are not battalions or companies of jawans in the battlefield who a uniformed gentleman would command and set everything right with his boots.
It is not a question of heading an institution alone; it is the question of bringing reform to our already dilapidated structure of education. Will the HEC or for that matter the army recommend a competent VC to replace a brigadier for a position in the military service? No. Because it remains a question of defence of the country’s borders and educationists are not qualified for that.
Thus, it needs to be realised that only an educationist can suggest and implement effective measures for the good of the educational institutions. And to take such well-informed decisions on educational planning and reform, a person with a sound background in education, not military, is the fittest choice. It is a known fact that there are faculty members in many universities who are not sincere with their duties. Will the higher authorities call in the army then to carry out their duties as well? There has been caustic criticism of the policies of the HEC itself. Dare I then ask when Dr Atta-ur- Rehman is to be replaced by a military man? Or is this already on the cards? Why are we being given to understand that deputing military men on every civilian seat is a panacea for all prevailing ills whereas the results of such actions have proved horrendous in many an arena?
SHAHRIAR DAUDPOTA
Hyderabad
(II)
THIS refers to your editorial ‘Another army man as VC’ (Sept 29) and Dr Hassan Askari Rizvi’s letter on the same topic (Oct 10). Both of you are correct in arguing that a retired army man having a one-year MSc in defence and strategic studies from the National Defence College (NDC) is by no means suitable for the position of a vice-chancellorship of a university. The first and foremost qualification of a vice-chancellor is to “have a recognised track record in research” (Economist, March 25).
A 100-page paper submitted at the NDC does not confer scholarship on its author. The scholarship comes after a dedication to research for decades. It is ironic that when the appointment of generals is criticised, the performance of a retired bureaucrat as the vice-chancellor of Sindh University has not come under scrutiny. His qualification for the post is also a master’s degree from the NDC. It is also paradoxical that for running a university a general has to satisfy only one constituency: the GHQ. But the retired bureaucrat has to please three constituencies.
First, the GHQ, which has thrice elevated him to this position. Second, the chancellor, who has to implement his party’s programme about higher education. Third and most significant, the elected members of the syndicate. He has been trying to please them all. In 2005, he invited Gen Musharraf to deliver a lecture on the Kalabagh dam and also implemented the much despised four-year degree programme which has blessings of the GHQ.
In order to please his second constituency, he has opened the Badin, Mirpurkhas, Dadu and Larkana campuses, whereas the university main campus lacks sufficiently trained human resources.
In order to please his third constituency, the bureaucrat VC has to appoint anybody in the academia and administration that enjoys the approval of the ‘leader’. He also harasses the critics of the ‘leader’. Indeed, the vice-chancellor of Punjab University, a retired general, at the expense of the institution, forced Dr Hassan Askari Rizvi to seek an early retirement because of his non-conformist views about the army intervention in politics.
The university has declined so markedly that the HEC has ranked it as number nine out of 23 general universities, 11 of them were established less than 10 years ago.
DR MEHTAB ALI SHAH M
Jamshoro
IN a recent news item covering review of progress on development projects held under the chairmanship of the Sindh Governor, a decision was taken to construct soak-pits for residences and industrial establishments to obviously reduce the need for sewerage lines and treatment plants in the city.
It is not known how this archaic decision was entertained in the Water and Sewerage Board and ultimately in the city government. If viewed in the perspective of the governor’s earlier off-repeated commitment to turn Karachi into a beautiful city, this decision seems ludicrous.
We are past soak-pit stage. Soak-pits preceded the advent of sewerage disposal through laying lines underground and setting up treatment plants to facilitate recycling of sewerage water. This is the modern route to keeping the city clean. And no plausible alternative to it has been conceived yet.
Soak-pits ultimately create salinity as the disposed of water raises the water table. The menace destroys land, its surroundings, it deters planting and growth of trees and plants, presenting a horrible picture of environment.
Besides, it is a misconception that the arrangement is cost-effective. Even if individual residents and entrepreneurs incur these costs, it has to be accounted for.
In addition, cleaning of the soak-pit is not an easy job. People who had their soak-pits before the sewerage line was laid in their areas know it well. The crucial problem is the disposal of sewerage and sewerage water. Where will it be disposed? If it is to be treated, without which there would not be natural manure available, the entire effort of treating it for use would have to be attended to but we would have lost 70 per cent of the water which has seeped into the bowels of the earth, raising water-table and sending salts on top of the earth.
If the decision is to cover those areas where sewerage lines have not been laid, even then it is wrong and should be reviewed.
Karachi has a very large population. We have allowed this to happen. We did not try to restrict it through imaginative efforts in order to maintain proper balance with the available and expected growth of infrastructure in the city. The problem of sewerage disposal is one of them.
The current technology of sewerage disposal has been tried all over the developed world. But we adopt the system without proper care. We have not built adequate number of treatment plants, resulting in waste of water, destruction of marine life and line bursts which are too often. Our indifference to wasting water is phenomenal. According to a rough estimate, if water consumed in mosques of Karachi (in ablution) is some how stored, the entire city can be turned into a garden.
Collection of disposables is also an area which eludes our grasp. Without a proper arrangement of house-to-house collection of disposables, functioning of the sewerage system encounters problems. Similar deficiencies exist in other sectors like education and health. Provision of the above has fallen far too short of our growing requirements, which are our own creation.
It is hoped an in-depth analysis of our failures in these critical areas would be attempted urgently before remedial measures are suggested and approved.
SYED AZIZUDDIN
Kent, UK
REFERENCE FIR 619/05, filed on Oct 10, 2005, Garden Town PS, Lahore, I appeal to the president, the prime minister, the Punjab chief minister and the PML-Q president to personally intervene and oversee an effort to recover my family’s life savings amounting to over one-third of a million dollars from those who stole it and the elements in the government who are protecting them.
I had been in Pakistan for two years, away from my family, tirelessly pursuing these people, meeting and writing to everyone who is anyone, but to no avail.
Top officials have consistently protected the usurpers of my children’s money to the extent that even inquiries from the FBI and Interpol, Washington, DC, go unanswered.
Your gatekeepers have kept my repeated appeals from your eyes because I know had you actually seen them, you would have acted as you are men of action and conscience.
Three years have passed since my family’s money was stolen and we continue to suffer immensely. That money represented 25 years’ worth of hard work and sacrifice in the United States.
President Musharraf spoke to American investors while in the United States telling them that their investments in Pakistan were 100 per cent safe and guaranteed. I plead with you to make good on that promise.
Muhammad Ali Jinnah once said: “All men are equal in the eyes of God.
And your lives and your properties are all sacred; in no case should you attack each other’s life and property.”
Let my ordeal serve as a reminder that the Quaid-i-Azam’s vision has not been fulfilled in letter or in spirit, nor have those bureaucrats who help run Pakistan lived up to the responsibility placed upon them by Pakistan’s founder.
I urge you all, please help.
ROBINA AKBAR
Princeton, New Jersey, USA
I RESPECT the parliament of France but I feel amused by the law enacted by it that the denial of genocide of Armenians under the Turkish Ottoman rule will be a punishable crime (Oct 13).
Have the alleged lawmakers in this august house lost their sanity. I refuse to believe that eminent lawmakers of France have enacted this ridiculous and silly piece of intensely biased legislation. It is the most grotesque piece of legislation in parliamentary history and has no validity in international law.
The old animosity of many European powers for the Turkish Empire seems to persist even today and this comic law of the French parliament is a reflection of it. The French lawmakers will have to revise thousands of books on European history to enshrine in new history books the French version of what the Turkish rulers did to the Armenians by way of alleged genocide.
The French colonial rulers will also have to account for the suppression they inflicted on the Muslims of the Maghreb.
Must old wounds be opened now to sow hatred between peoples and nations. I deny the accusations of Turkish genocide against Armenians and I will be glad to defend myself in any kangaroo court anywhere in the world. I sympathise with my Turkish brethren in Islam but appeal to them to respond in a cool-headed manner to the affront from Paris. During my visit to the USA I met some naturalised Americans of Armenian descent and they knew not a word about the alleged genocide.
QUTUBUDDIN AZIZ
Karachi
ENCROACHMENT is common in our country and the worst examples are prevalent in Karachi.
In this city where corruption reigns, roads are quickly turning into parking lots after greasing some palms.
The newly-paved service road on Mai Kolachi has been taken over by a cab company that deems it their right to park their ever growing fleet of cabs right on the road while denying the surrounding residents the right of way.
The situation is worse, especially in the mornings and evenings when the whole cab fleet is parked everywhere. Will the authorities concerned look into this encroachment?
A RESIDENT
Karachi
THE words investment and development naturally should kick off welcome responses in any country of the world. However, in this part of the globe, the motive of shooing away any interest that would trigger our economy and help employment seems priority of the day. The most recent example is the Waterfront Development Project (WFD) and the cogeneration project of the DHA.
For those who are still unaware of this major development, the WFD is a public-private venture that is being put together with foreign collaboration — Dubai and Malaysia being its major players. The initial investment involves about $600 million, which will help develop 14 kilometres of Clifton beach, from the popular Casino site to the DHA golf course in Gizri Creek. This would be divided in seven zones and each zone is planned to be a complete activity centre on its own, having amusement parks, jogging areas, amphitheatres, piazzas, marina jetties, boardwalks and other public utility facilities that the city of Karachi has never seen, also qualifying to be the first in Pakistan.
Pick up any Karachiite and he will agree that our city is starved of places and means of recreation. Here there is investment coming in and assurance of employment and progress alongside it is, one hopes, the first step towards replicating the successful examples of Dubai, Thailand, etc; yet what do we do? Try to toss it out of the window, of course.
The second target of the critics is the cogeneration project, also co-sponsored by the DHA, that would essentially provide a solution to the problems of scarcity of water and electricity being faced by the residents of the DHA. When finally the sensible solution of installing the cogeneration plant has been taken, some NGOs are adamant on opposing the DHA’s plans citing concerns that have already been addressed by the DHA.
The NGOs are warning the citizens of hazardous environmental impact of the cogeneration project whilst the DHA has time and again made efforts to ward off their apprehensions. The DHA authorities assert that these plans are open for public review and would welcome any suggestion which would add to the efficacy of the project.
The Sindh Environmental Protection Agency has studied and validated that emissions from cogeneration plant are harmless to the coastal and oceanic life. As the power plant is of 94 MW, it is also exempted from environmental assessment which becomes necessary by law only if it is equal or more than 200MW power.
The DHA also provides warranties that the cogeneration plant would have emissions levels which are lower than national environmental quotient, i.e., the residue discharged to the sea would not affect the marine life. They also deny the environmental hazard by the increase in temperature, saying that it would only increase the temperature to 40 degrees, which is well below the allowed temperature of 43 degrees.
Efforts are under way not only to uplift the beachfront but also to improve the existing DHA residential infrastructure. The cogeneration plant would provide additional three MGD water and 94 KW of electricity exclusively to the DHA’s residents. The cogeneration would provide water for a sum of Rs150 as opposed to Rs600 currently being paid to water tankers functioning in the area.
In a nutshell, the DHA is in dire need of revamp and facelift. Since it has scarcity of funds, it has undertaken the waterfront development project to upgrade the existing seaside residential and commercial areas through foreign direct investment. In the long term, such upcoming facilities would place Karachi at par with other tourist capitals of the region and would earn the crucial foreign exchange for the country. Let us progress please and let’s not shoot ourselves in the foot.
AYESHA HODA AHMAD
Karachi
THE German criminal police department will help our FIA to probe crimes, particularly extremism and terrorism (Oct 12). There can be no denial that this would further enhance the government’s goals to fight against extremism and terrorism.
The matter of fact is that the Germans, their social and many other policies and systems have all the competence for which we may also seek their cooperation for the sake of benefits of our country and the people.
One such step can be a new rule, like theirs, that ‘every family to own a house’, that henceforth all residential plots can only be sold by the government. This will bring in sanity to the cost of the plots which has already gone beyond the hope of the large majority of the people for a decade now.
To start with, because of known difficulties, the government may do so up to 200-square-yard plots and simultaneously develop, say, one 100,000 new plots of 100-sqyd each all over the country for poor and middle class families without a house, which should become a part of our poverty eradication programme.
Every day holds the possibility of a miracle, else what about applying the doctrine of necessity for us, too?
Z. A. KAZMI
Karachi
I HAVE read the statement by Dr Nasim Ashraf, the new PCB chairman, who is advising our national cricketers to avoid mixing cricket and religion. Being Muslim and a citizen of Islamic Republic of Pakistan, I condemn his statement because when, during the days of Imran Khan and Waseem Akram, our cricket team was not practising the teachings of Islam, they were embarrassed with various scandals.
Nobody has the right to prohibit a person from practising their religion. Therefore, Dr Ashraf is requested to avoid issuing any statement on the matter. As chief patron of the PCB, President Musharraf should intervene in this matter and pass a code of conduct that prohibits any official from speaking about Islam and its practice.
Islam needs practical Muslims rather than those who only talk about religion. Inzamam has given the right statement to Dr Ashraf by saying that he is not pressuring anyone into practising Islam.
RAFIQUE KHAN
Karachi
THIS is in reply to Jalaluddin Hussain’s letter on the above subject (Oct 23). While giving the example of Canada, he says that “Pakistan is a democratic country.”
I am sorry, but Pakistan is not a democratic country. If Pakistan is a democratic country, then can you please define democracy? On a question asked on the BBC regarding pardon for Mirza Tahir Hussain, President Musharraf said: “I am not a dictator”.
Sir, even if you were not a dictator, the Constitution of Pakistan allows you to grant clemency to a person on death row. And this specific case deserves it.
IMAD QURESHI
Indianapolis, USA
MUSLIMS come under more than enough criticism that Eid day cannot be decided in advance. But about this we don’t have to worry, as there are grounds for this in the Shariah.
However, to have two Eids in the same country makes it worse. And to have two Eids in the same province (NWFP) and three in the same country (Pakistan) surpasses all precedents. It is high time the ministry of religious affairs was called in to play some role to make sure that evidence regarding moon-sighting in any part of the country, once validated, is accepted throughout the country.
MAJID
Cambridge, UK
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