| August 17, 2007 | Friday | Sha’aban 3, 1428 |
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Schools at the mosques
After the CJ’s restoration
Chitral bazaar
Passenger-friendly schedules
Leadership quality
Corruption in Pakistan on the rise
Thanks to KESC
Issue of Palestine
KPT berths
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
UNDER the management of the Poverty Alleviation Fund, which unfortunately functions through the network of NGOs, we have seen poverty rising with every passing day and poverty is crossing into beggary. Therefore, it is necessary that the government take public opinion into consideration and dissolve the PAF and assign this function to a civic body, to be formed, on the government's invitation, by the intelligentsia and not by the NGOs.
Thanks to the vision of President Gen Pervez Musharraf in setting up city governments at the grassroots’ level. In fact, union councils can be the best source for enumerating the genuine poor — their age, disability and orphanage — in their respective council population. Then the UC data should be compiled at the levels of tehsil, district and province and then all collected to produce a national figure of the deserving poor in the country.
Only then a real and clear picture will emerge of the poor in the country. Then a foolproof system should be devised to distribute authorised ration cards to all those poor souls. The ration cards should be distributed among the enumerated/registered poor through the same channel of union councils. All aids in the form of food, money, clothes, shelter and medicines should be recorded on the authorised ration cards.
Vocational training centres should be created to function side by side to impart various trade skills that are in demand in the country. The training should be given only to the registered poor, the ration card holders only. When a trainee succeeds in finding a job at a salary of skilled labourer, his ration card should forthwith be cancelled.
This is the way to effectively reduce poverty on paper and in reality. Ration card holders should be warned not to marry and make families until they become wage earners, or run the risk of losing their authorised ration cards.
Did the PAF or their NGO network ever conduct the exercise of enumeration? Due to the involvement of NGOs, the aid of food, shelter, medicines and money either never reached the waiting poor or reached so late and was so meagre that a waiting soul could no longer stand the suffering of his kith and kin from hunger and disease and was forced to beg for help from the masses. This is how the poverty has been crossing into beggary with every passing day.
Civic bodies from among the intelligentsia of the country should be formed to take up and lead this programme, instead of allowing this new programme to be handled again by government officials who have learned only to rule and are not fit to handle humanitarian services.
Moreover, the term ‘alleviation’ must be replaced by ‘eradication’ to reflect a resolve to do so. If these suggestions are taken into consideration and implemented forthwith, then in about 10 years poverty and beggary will be eradicated from Pakistan.
M. M. KHAN
Karachi
ALL mosques constructed after the Partition in new colonies were built from the funds provided or contributed to by the residents of the area, who still contribute monthly funds for staff salaries and maintenance charges. Generally, a masjid committee is formed by residents to look after the affairs of the mosque in their area.
Almost in all cases, after completion of the mosque, the maulana in charge of the mosque asks people to contribute for the construction of a madressah for teaching Quran to the children of the locality; after some time it takes shape of a fully-developed madressah for teaching ‘fiqh’ and ‘hadis’.
After some time a hostel is constructed for the students who are from the far-flung areas of Pakistan. They are provided free religious education, with board and lodging.
These madressahs keep expanding and the numbers of students are increased year by year. The madressah’s fund is maintained exclusively by the maulana in charge.
When the thousands of students, who are mostly in the teenage years, are ready to obey every order of the maulana, he feels himself to be the most elevated, honoured, respected and pious person of the area.
Unfortunately, the masjid committee does not have any control over the affairs of the madressah.
The residents of the area do not know what is taught in these schools and who the enrolled students for education are and how the funds of a madressah are obtained or used.
Hatred is taught in these schools against the people who are not religious according to the understanding of these maulanas. People who do not observe purdah or who do not grow beards are not considered proper Muslims.
To curb extremism, the area residents have a right to control the affairs of the madressah of their area. The courses at such madressahs should include modern subjects of science, mathematics and English together with religious education.
The Saudi Arabian government has ordered that English as compulsory language should be taught in all Saudi schools. The ministry of religious affairs should form the courses and a separate examination board to conduct examinations of these madressahs.
The residents of the area should form different committees to look after the different affairs of their madressahs, such as the admission of students, curricula, salaries of staff and teachers and their appointments and qualifications, and control of the fund.
They should also decide about the students who should be given admission because these students will live in their area for the next 10 years.
It is a hard fact that the schools run by the Christian churches provide the best possible education to their students. Why can the same not be done in Muslim schools?
If we take these measures seriously, then the affairs of Lal Masjid would not be repeated in future.
MIRZA S. BARLAS
Karachi
SUCH have been the earthshaking implications of the restoration of the chief justice of Pakistan that the entire world was riveted in anticipation. For us too, and I must confess I had long forgotten that there was more than one pillar that held up this tottering state, the judgment came as a shock, albeit an ecstatically received one.
History, and history has not been too kind to us so far, will record whether this judgment marks a watershed for the nation.
Will the nearly destroyed institution of the judiciary re-establish itself from the ashes? Will this be the turning point where the legislature is spurred on to work for the welfare, progress and better future of the people?
Will the executive now work within the confines of the Constitution and rule of law? Now, as a welcome diversion from wondering whether we will be sooner exterminated by our own home-grown terrorists or western adventurism, we have something else to look forward to and indeed to want to live for!
The continuous conviction of the legal community was amazing and probably, even for them, astonishing.
Their unswerving activism generated unprecedented outpourings of mass public support. Much credit for this goes to the media for driving home, in real time, the events across the country.
This was the domino effect of the true ‘power of the people’. It would probably not be incorrect to suggest that this gave constitutional strength to the hands of the deliberating judiciary.
Two new pillars of the state have risen. The judiciary and the media have shown that they can play pivotal roles in bringing us into the comity of nations rather than remaining baskets in a banana republic.
As the euphoria of the moment settles into harsh reality, we, the otherwise silent and / or chattering majority, pray that these pillars will continue to strengthen, support and sustain each other and help build an edifice firmly supported equally on the four, or our five, pillars.
Within the framework of the Constitution and the rule of law that emanates from its Unity, Discipline and not just irrationally blind Faith can guide this nation as Mr Jinnah envisaged.
There is great hope if all parties show the emotional maturity and magnanimity to keep national interests supreme from this point on. Otherwise, as history repeats itself in, ‘what will the future be? Que sara,sara!’
DR MERVYN HOSEIN
Karachi
I WOULD like to draw the attention of the authorities concerned towards the location of poultry shops in the heart of the Chitral city.
These poultry shops have been set up on Governor Cottage Road, which is considered an important locality in Chitral.
This road is surrounded by densely-populated villages of Rehankot, Goldur and Chitral bazaar. The existence of poultry shops in such an important and busy area creates a foul smell and other forms of pollution for the nearby villagers, business community and common people.
This route serves as the shortest route for the people of the nearby villages to reach the bazaar, but due to the smell coming from these poultry shops, they are compelled to use an alternative route which is distant and away from the central bazaar.
Thus, it wastes the time of students, patients and female students who take long route to reach their destinations.
These poultry shops also cause the spread of various diseases and many cases have been registered in the surrounding villages. It is very strange that government functionaries, who travel on this road, do not take notice of this problem or deliberately ignore it.
Affected people of the surrounding areas have complained several times against the existence of poultry shops in the centre of the city and brought it to the notice of the district and the tehsil administration, but no action has been taken so far.
These shops can be accommodated outside the city area, because these are suitable sites for such markets. If these shops were shifted away from the thickly-populated areas and the central bazaar, then it would benefit the city dwellers as well the owners of poultry shops.
BASHIR H. AZAD
Chitral
IF PIA expects me to go to Karachi to catch a flight for Jeddah from Peshawar, it does not want my revenue.
The loss is PIA's and the gain is of foreign airlines that fill the void. There are not enough passenger seats offered by PIA either from Peshawar or Islamabad for Jeddah, for the thousands that want to perform Umra.
No wonder the airline is piling up losses, while the federal government continues to foot the deficit financing by frequent injection of funds. Is this the remedy for PIA, or is that a political priority for this regime.
Perhaps an independent judicial probe will uncover the evil nexus that is responsible for all this.
NASIR KHAN
Peshawar
THE quality of leadership in a nation or organisation will vary depending on whether those entrusted with offices of responsibility desire to lead or mislead, to care for or condemn, to enlighten and empower or delude and disenfranchise, to open up new choices and possibilities or control and frustrate.
Power and knowledge can be used to undermine and degenerate, to judge and condemn, to accentuate the bad rather than the good in people, to lead away from justice and compassion, just as it can be used to save and to deliver from dependency and delusion.
Self-interested greed and lust for power and control can lead people to fuel the bases for increasing want, despondency, dependency, delusion, and suffering. It can mean we deny others the time and the awareness of the kind of spiritual and soul devotions and disciplines that may help to open or restore to them potentials for new and higher purposes and directions.
Social, communal, and environmental conscience and awareness are regarded as being bad from the perspective of the kind of self-interested consumerism that has become foundational for the Darwinian opportunism that has come to define much of global commerce.
Commerce that is devoid of social justice and communal conscience cannot lead people away from temptation or deliver them from the evils of addiction and dependency.
Addiction or dependency on something that demeans or degenerates implies an inability or a lack of desire or state of awareness to resist, to say "no" to, to not conform.
To deliver people from delusion, dependency, or addiction means more than providing them with a temporary means of salvation, one lasting several years.
For salvation to be sustained and flourish, the bases for salvation, deliverance, and enlightenment must not only be firmly established and promoted but appreciated and revered within each community.
It means continuing to extend the circle of salvation within each consecutive generation to the extent that awareness of the need for ongoing enlightenment and deliverance are sustained and strengthened, even after rebirth, through the cycles of birth and death.
The economic, social, cultural, and political bases for salvation described in the covenants, conventions, and declarations of human rights to which many nations are signatories cannot be sustained through the ordinary efforts of ordinary people, set on living self-interested lives, devoted to material gain.
Only through a critical mass of people maintaining the desire for the glory and universal deliverance in others can the paths to salvation be maintained and progressed.
Our central treasuries of knowledge, wisdom, and wealth in culture, the institutions and articles of faith that have come to define civilised society, must be appreciated, protected, and developed above all else.
BRUCE TERRY
Tasmania, Australia
THE head of the Commonwealth, Don MacKinnon, during a seminar in Malaysia pointed out that corruption in South Asian countries is increasing manifold and, unfortunately, Pakistan is at the top of the list.
He alleged that funds provided for elimination of poverty are being misappropriated with impunity, adding that 80 million people will cross the poverty line provided corruption is not checked in South Asia.
The Commonwealth has identified corruption as the single fatal obstruction to economic and social development in Third World countries, including Pakistan. Corruption undermines development by distorting the rule of law and deteriorating the institutional foundation on which economic growth depends. Its fatal effects are visible in our society.
The detrimental effects of corruption are especially relentless on the poor, who are hit hardest by economic degradation and decline.
They are most reliant on the provision of public services, and are least capable of paying the extra costs associated with bribery, fraud, and the misappropriation of economic privileges.
Corruption in Third World countries sabotages policies and programmes that aim at reducing poverty which is why eliminating corruption is essential and critical to the achievement of the UN Millennium Development Goal.
Unfortunately our country, whose poor people are forced to sell their visceral organs and commit suicide, is entirely dependent on the assistance of the UN and the Commonwealth. No pro-poor people programme has materialised except exhortations and tall claims in the convention hall of Islamabad.
PROF ABDUL Q. MANGI
Sukkur
THANKS to the KESC, my 10-month-old son is not afraid of the dark anymore. He has learned to cope with the instant pitch-black darkness caused by the frequent power failures. He is learning to cope with the scorching heat and temperature in the absence of electricity.
Thanks to the silencerless rickshaw, bikes and vehicles having pressure horn, he is now getting used to the roaring loud sounds and music of the pressure horn. Thanks to the city government for digging up the roads, he is getting used to the dust and mud, and his lungs are getting immune to the dust particle.
Still more thanks to the city government for the bumpy roads, he has started to enjoy roller coaster rides at such a young age, whereas he might not be allowed to take a roller coaster ride in an amusement park before he reached the age of 12 years.
We are all contributing to making our generation tougher and stronger by letting them get exposed to such a face of society at such a young age. This will surely help them grow stronger and tougher.
WAQAS A. PAI
Karachi
THIS is with reference to Khalid Naqshabandi’s letter regarding Palestine (July 23) and other letters talking about the Muslim world and Palestine. Many of these letters repeatedly harp on the words ‘Muslim world’, ‘injustice’ and ‘Palestine problem’.
I have always wondered if the Muslim world could accept the Partition of India based on religion, then why could it not accept the partition of Palestine based on religion way back in 1948? What Mr Naqshabandi says applies to India and Pakistan too.
Similar to the Balfour declaration, was there not a Muslim League declaration asking for a separate home land in Pakistan? So why these double standards?
What was the reason for all the Arab states to attack Israel after it was formed? What was the reason for all the wars? Did not the Arabs want to conquer Israeli territory during these wars, including the 1967 war where they built up massive troops to taunt Israel and shut it out from the Suez Canal?
Would the Arabs have returned territory if they had won them in the wars? If the answer to this question is yes, then why go to war in the first place itself? Why was not the state of Palestine established way back in 1948 itself?
Who prevented it? It was not Israel; the territory they won in 1967 was part of Jordan as the Palestinians and Arabs never established their own state.
Why was this part of Jordan in the first place? Rather than blaming others, it would be far better to set your own house right. India is not blaming the British for what happened so long ago.
Nobody in India bothers about the Partition right now; the younger generation does not even care as they are more busy making money to live a lifestyle they want to.
It was the Arab leadership that denied Palestinians an opportunity and only spread hatred of Israel.
K.S.K. SHAUKAT ALI
Chicago, Illinois
LIGHT showers, with wind force minimal on Beaufort scale, have damaged KPT berth Nos 14 and 15 which have collapsed, while berth No. 10 has caved in. God has been kind that no casualty took place, though ships were at jetty but not working due to rains.
Port experts attribute damage to maintenance neglect. It is an irony when port management and berth maintenance are supervised by supply officers and the port is busy in constructing roads/parks, ignoring its real job.
SHIEKH IQBAL
Karachi
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