| May 19, 2007 | Saturday | Jamadi-ul-Awwal 02, 1428 |
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Protection to minorities
Intellectual exploitation
Separation of religion and state
Revamping CAA
Brides from overseas
Reinventing the government
Advertising Gwadar
Executions
Time for objective decisions
What power crisis?
Lawyers
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
I FULLY endorse your demand through the editorial (‘Battlefield Karachi’, May 15) that there should be a judicial probe into Saturday’s carnage. The crimes committed that day are too horrendous to be ignored.
The nation has the right to know why the police and the fabled paramilitary rangers disappeared, who barricaded the key traffic junctions and was manning some of the roadblocks with weapons in hand, what party or organisations the killers belonged to, and whether the Sindh government did all that it did on Saturday on instructions from Islamabad to frustrate Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry’s programme in Karachi.
Furthermore, I would also like to know why it took more than six hours for the LEAs to respond to Aaj TV’s desperate call for help, when the home secretary promised help within 30 minutes (I heard this live).
NAZIM F. HAJI
Karachi
WHILE Karachi has been the epicentre of political upheaval and mayhem, the recent carnage witnessed on May 12 speaks of the selfish, self-centred attitude of the rulers of the country.
If it were not for political gains and to show their strength with the entire state machinery at their disposal, one fails to understand the need of confrontation with the chief justice.
Did the powers feel so insecure or threatened that they had to spend millions from our taxpayers’ money to organise a frivolous show in Islamabad and carry a bloodbath in Karachi, where human lives were lost and millions lost due to closure of business?
How greedy and corrupt can man be, that he disregards human lives for his selfish gains, forgetting the Hereafter.
AYESHA MAHMUD
Karachi
ONCE again the streets of Karachi were flooded with bodies and bullets. It seemed the death of innocents was like bullets being fired from inhumane weapons.
May 12, one of those ‘red and black’ days which will be remembered by the citizens of Karachi when the freedom, peace and harmony in this city were darkened by the blood of my brothers.
On May 11, day before this unforgettable mayhem, my friend and I were at a dairy shop. There we saw a rally of young people. And my friend said, “Look! Where is the generation of Pakistan going?” My heart cried and I had nothing to say but to accept the reality.
When I think of doing something for this country, Pakistan, my future becomes bleak; my passion for this country becomes weak. I want to know answers to questions from those who talk about serving and currently leading this country that what are the tools you need to make this country one of the strongest nations in the world? In terms of peace, economy, education, employment and beauty, do I need to have passion and education or do I need guns, rallies, hatred and violence?
Skeptical I am. Has my country, Pakistan, enough of the traitors, corruption, violence and thirst for power? Where power only means guns in hands, blood of innocent lives, and prejudice against women. Where education is an expense, not an investment. Where religion is being disgraced in the name of modernisation.
These are the questions that need be answered by those who are sitting on one of the best wooden chairs in the world.
Every bullet which was fired went right through the heart of my Quaid, Mohammad Ali Jinnah, who had a lion's heart, spoke the truth and fought for justice. Whose passion for Paki stan was the strongest of all those who claim today. Who had built this country on the pillars of justice and equality. But today's power-hungry have destabilised my country's value, beliefs and ethics.
Now what will happen after this? Each party and sect will start blaming each other. The media will get the chance to give more coverage on it. Some people will make money out of it. And the rest of the nation will be left in obscurity of lies and deceits.
Sigh! In the end I just would like to pray for those souls who gave up their lives just for crossing the road, for visiting their family members and for making an effort to make both ends meet.
God bless Pakistan.
SAAD KAZEE
Karachi
THERE are reports in Sindhi dailies that a Hindu woman in Badah town, Larkana district, was killed by dacoits the other morning. The dacoits forced their way into her house and while the victim's family took shelter in one of the rooms, the dacoits opened fire killing the housewife instantly.
This was not the one and only isolated case; as six members of the Hindu community in the same town of Badah have been killed in the last seven years. Thus almost every year one person from the minority community is killed alone in Badah town.
It would be worth mentioning here that two years ago Santosh Kumar, a leading businessman coming from a highly respectable and philanthropist family of Nasirabad (Larkana), was kidnapped and kept hostage for more than two months and was freed after paying a heavy ransom. Before this, a reverend father, known for his piety and generosity, was killed by dacoits to the great shock of the people of the area.
Recently Aum Kumar, a little boy from Jacobabad, was kidnapped and reportedly released after paying a ransom of Rs1 million. The Tharparkar region, from where the chief minister hails, also has become a den for dacoits and law-breakers as in the last three years several cases of murder and kidnapping for ransom have been reported intermittently.
This is shocking as the people of Sindh and Balochistan believe in secular life and a mixed culture of Muslims, Hindus, Christian and Sikhs enjoying peace and tranquillity, participating in each other’s gatherings with fervour for centuries together.
The government of Sindh must ensure proper safety and security of all the persons living in the province, particularly of the minority community which has been living an endangered life for the last several years. I also demand equitable amount of compensation for the aggrieved families by the government of Sindh and appropriate action against the culprits.
MANSOOR UL HAQUE SOLANGI
Karachi
I AM sick of watching repetitions of drama serials, of which ‘Tere Pehlu Mein’, telecast by a local channel, has exceeded all limits by going back again and again to several weeks before.
What do they get out of it. Really no benefit, but a kind of repulsion for viewers who wish to watch the new episodes in correct sequence. ‘Mehndi Wale Haath’ is another serial doing the same thing.
If they think that they earn more ad revenues by telecasting previous episodes, they are sadly mistaken. As the audience who are supposed to watch those ads turn off their TV in anger when they watch a repeat.
So let them play ads for hours together, who cares. In fact, the losers are those products which put their ads in such repeats.
I strongly propose formation of a TV viewers society, represented by its office-bearers from the intellectual class of society, who would not permit this practice of TV channels and will have the legal right to take them to court of law for causing mental duress and unnecessary tension to TV viewers.
Only then will the TV channels learn to behave and stop intellectual exploitation by re-running umpteenth times the episodes already shown. Besides this, the subject of a drama serial also needs scrutiny and approval by the TV viewers society. Support from the government is solicited in the formation of such societies to check irregularities.
M. M. Khan
Karachi
I FULLY appreciate Talha Bin Hamid’s response (letter, April 30) to I. H. Mahmmod’s letter ‘Separation of religion and state’ (April 17), defiantly suggesting elimination of collective Islamic practices from daily life.
Islam stands basically to gather together Muslims, as in the mosques for obligatory prayers five times a day and once in a year for pilgrimage to Makkah, those who can afford as a mark of ‘tauheed’. While such is the divine intention and scheme, as practised and sanctified through tradition, one would have to be stranger to Islam to urge elimination of all ritual gatherings. Mr Talha has quite rightly categorised dissidents as a class of the West’s foster children.
The history of progressive and liberal thinkers began under the glow of colonial control. They are an offspring of the leadership of elites incubating under the warmth of colonial patronage.
Therefore, to them, westernisation alone makes sense. Islam is a ‘deen’, not just a religion, in which exoteric and esoteric dimensions have been inextricably interwoven to form a single whole, embracing each and every one of its diverse aspects of individual and collective existence. The whole of Islam being divine dispensation, no one can fiddle with it. It has remained sacrosanct and will never suffer to be desecrated.
AKBAR KHAN
Karachi
IT IS commonly said that our organisations have become corrupt and inefficient. Most of us accept this and sit back and criticise the deteriorated status quo. However a few of us are asked to help stem the rot.
A little while ago, the current DG of the Civil Aviation Authority was mandated to reorganise and galvanise the CAA, a potential cash cow for the public sector. By most accounts he is doing just this.
Plans are under implementation to construct Islamabad airport, a mega project which will be largely financed from the CAA’s own sources. Privileges to so-called VVIPs, such as unlimited use of CAA vehicles and drivers, have been withdrawn. Large deals that paid commissions to middlemen on purchase of overinvoiced equipment have been cancelled. Management reorganisation is under way to empower and hold CAA officials responsible for their duties. In short, the objective of making the CAA an efficient and responsive organisation is taking shape.
It has only been a couple of months since the effort to revitalise the CAA was kick-started but already big noises are being made in the press and the assemblies regarding Mr Rahmatullah’s competence for holding the DG position in the CAA. It is not a prerequisite to have flying or aviation experience to hold the position. What is required is management experience of the first magnitude.
OMAR H. K. BANGASH
Karachi
ALL over the world men wish to find the perfect wife. Of course, women, too, desire to have the ideal husband but men are usually the ones who have more money, so it is easier for them to get the partners of their choice.
According to a report, some men in Taiwan are choosing brides through a TV show that airs photographs and biographical details of Vietnamese women looking for husbands. The women are willing to marry men sometimes decades older than themselves to exchange a life of poverty at home for the relative affluence abroad (May 6).
Taiwan men looking for brides favour Vietnamese women, who they consider to be particularly submissive. Often rejected by local women, these men are seeking wives willing to have babies and help their ageing parents. Unfortunately, many of these men dump there wives after some time, who then have to fend for themselves by working despite facing obstacles and may also be having to raise children.
The brides are sometimes ill-equipped to deal with the cultural and other issues, including large age differences with their husbands and demanding in-laws. Lack of Chinese language skills can also cause problems. Worse still, some of the men hold their wives captive by taking their ID cards and preventing them from contacting other Vietnamese women, said a Vietnamese lady from a support group, who gets 10 distress calls a day.
This is very sad. In South Asia many women from Bangladesh and Nepal get trafficked out to India, Pakistan and further away. When marriages are undertaken for material purposes rather than love, the results are distressing and exploitative of the poor damsels.
Perhaps the authorities in Taiwan and such other countries can advise their men who uproot women from thousands of miles away and then abandon them, to consider how they would feel if forced to live overseas with and look after their wife's family and then get thrown out. Legal measures must also be taken to protect the dispossessed women's and their children's rights.
They could also be reminded of this beautiful saying:
A good wife is heaven's best gift to man, his gem of many virtues, his casket of jewels; her voice is sweet music, her smiles his brightest lay, her kiss the guardian of his innocence, her arms the pale of his safety, her industry his surest wealth, her lips his faithful counsellors, her bosom the softest pillow of the cares.
No man or woman is perfect and it would help much to learn to be contended with what one has: "True contentment depends not upon what we have, a bath tub was large enough for Diogenes but a world was too little for Alexander." Another lesson to remember is that man cannot degrade woman without himself falling into degradation; he cannot elevate her without at the same time elevating himself.
M.P. CHISHTI
Karachi
THE article of Tasneem Noorani, ‘Reinventing the government’ (April 4), is very informative and realistic. It is actually reformation of the government.
There can be other views and proposals. It would be better if the report/proposals finalised by the National Commission on Government Reforms are made public, comments invited from all shades of opinion, debated fully and the workable and reasonable proposals added in the report, so that our country, nation and society may have the servants, facilitators, sociologists and good managers instead of ‘touch-me-nots’.
We should not have any doubt in the capability of Dr Ishrat Hussain, basically a CSP officer, heading the committee.
Focus must be given on how to benefit the masses by these reforms.
For this, effective, realistic and accountable measures/reforms may be hammered out for the grassroots level institutions of local bodies, which have to deliver to the common man potable water, sewerage, roads and streets, sanitation and public hygiene, gardens and playgrounds, safety and fire-fighting, development and overall social welfare.
The common man is the least concerned with the federal and the provincial government.
M. ASLAM PATHAN
Ex-Additional Secretary,
Sindh, Karachi
ADVERTISEMENTS regarding Gwadar are constantly flashed on every TV channel in the country, Gwadar is shown as gorgeous city of skyscrapers and sprawling two-lane/three-lane roads lying alongside the coastline emerald green, pristine, seawater.
This is simply not the reality. For marketing gimmicks, the skylines of other cities are being presented as still barren and unpopulated Gwadar city.
This mispresentation of underdeveloped Gwadar is simply criminal. It says that, by showing these pictures, the unscrupulous elements have already sold pieces of ‘water’ instead of pieces of land to unassuming general public.
And, strangely, there is no authority, nobody to take notice of these unethical and probably even illegal practices of making general public fool. The government seems to be least pushed to ‘show’ its writ in such issues.
I hope the authorities concerned will take notice of this and control these misguiding advertisings.
SYED SAYEF HUSSAIN
Islamabad
LAST week, Saudi Arabia beheaded four Pakistanis in three days on charges of drug trafficking. As a citizen of Pakistan I would like to know first if this method is fair, and if so, aren’t our leaders, ministers or the responsible people supposed to inquire about these incidents?
In this day and age where everyone goes on about the importance of human rights, it is utterly unacceptable to behead someone. These means must be condemned and not condoned.
We Pakistanis must make it a point to express our views and our foreign minister must speak up and make sure that he ends this inhumane treatment of the Pakistanis.
HUSSAIN GULRAZE MIR
Warwick, United Kingdom
IN today's world the media plays a central role in formulating people’s opinion and any attack on its freedom is a direct assault on people’s right to know.
I think President Musharraf should broaden his definition of enlightenment in order to include the concept of freedom of expression in its semantics.
In the last few months the media has been targeted at different levels.
This has naturally sent a harsh message to the nation that the establishment is above every possible means of criticism and that they are not answerable to the people of Pakistan for their actions.
The denial of this right automatically negates all the efforts Gen Musharraf has made to establish his regime as a real democracy.
I think it is important for the president to think objectively on the issues of his uniform and presidential elections.
SABA OSAID
Mississauga Canada
IT is hard to understand why the government feels the country is short of power. It disallowed the business and trading community from earning their livelihood in the evenings but still manages to find plenty of electricity to light up the Islamabad skyline for government-sponsored rallies.
I would like to ask the relevant officials of Wapda, who pays for the electricity bills for lighting up these rallies?
If Wapda has extra or special funds for such displays of government opulence, then they should reduce the unconstitutional surcharges and duties levied on consumer electricity bills, if not the power tariffs itself, in the next month's budget.
SYEDA SADAF ALI
Arlington, Virginia, USA
NUSRAT Beg has been uncharitable to the lawyers by quoting Akbar Allahabadi’s couplet depicting them as Satan’s progeny.
Many of our founding fathers were also lawyers, most notably Mr Jinnah and Allama lqbal. It would be almost blasphemous to refer to them as such.
One has nothing to do with the legal profession but it must be said there are good and bad people everywhere and the whole group should not be stereotyped. The correspondent owes an apology.
S. KARIM
Karachi
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