| July 15, 2008 | Tuesday | Rajab 11, 1429 |
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Rehabilitation plan
Partition and friendship
Increase in EOBI pension
Building roads
System of judicial appointments
A. Q. Khan
Save children
A state in denial
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
GENDER budgeting, an exclusive budget reserved for women in development, education, health, social and welfare sectors, etc, is being practised all over the world, including the US, Australia and our neighbour India.
This budget defines policies and plans for women to achieve equal benefit and equal output compared to menfolk. It provides them opportunities as per their population ratio in every department of life.
In the 2007-08 budget the allocation in this regard was a niggardly Rs30 million. It’s the need of the hour to introduce gender equality programme.
Annually every district in Sindh is getting a sum of Rs3 million in the name of Gender Reform Action Plan, though it is another matter that a substantial portion of this amount is either misused or misappropriated by the corrupt in the administration. For example, a fair amount of money allocated in 2007 for the release of eligible and deserving women prisoners confined in jails in default of payment of fine, after completing their sentence, was misappropriated.
Although women constitute 52 per cent of the population of the country, their needs, development and progress are being deliberately ignored. They need an equal amount in the country’s budget, specifically in healthcare, including child healthcare and reproductive health.
We need high literacy ratio among women because good mothers are a great source for making a good nation. Likewise women development budget for shelter homes, training schools, skill-building centres, day-care centres, free health, etc, is needed to strengthen the women and in turn strengthen the nation along with the male population.
I had made some such proposals during the second tenure of Benazir Bhutto (1993-1996), who started the Prime Minister’s Women Health Programme.
Now we hope to reactivate the programme, to be known as Shaheed Benazir Bhutto Women Health Programme, in which recruitment of lady doctors and health visitors will be a top priority of the government which should re-allocate appropriate funds, specifically for child and maternal health care and provide maternal facilities at union council level of every district.
The gender budgeting proposals include:
• Women teachers’ appointment at primary level.
• Scholarships for girl students from Classes V to X.
• Introduction of women recruitment/employment policy in every sector of life.
• Change in discriminatory promotion policy for women.
• Hostels for working women and shelter homes for shelterless women.
• Appointment of more women judges in family courts.
• Reactivating of women police stations
• Reactivating of women banks
• Providind easy credit for small-scale businesses, including cottage industries, the minimum credit amount being Rs300,000 without any guarantee and security.
• Appointment of women medical legal officers immediately at district hospital level.
• Provision of agricultural lands to women farmers and landless women
• Rehabilitation of health training institutions.
• Cows and buffaloes at subsidised rates will be given to women in rural areas to increase their incomes.
• Low -cost housing schemes for divorced, needy and suppressed women, etc.
• Plan to ensure equal opportunities for rural women and those living in remote areas.
• Exclusive budget to minimise death ratio.
• Separate line in Zakat and Baitul Maal fund for women.
• Introduction of adequate Jehaz Fund.
• Stipend for girl students of primary and higher schools.
• Training opportunities for women in textile, garments and IT sectors.
• Expansion of microfinance for targeting poor women, particularly in rural areas of Sindh and urban slums.
• Establishment of mother-child health centres.
As a member of the provincial assembly I have submitted such proposals to the Sindh chief minister to allocate a separate gender budget.
Women need equal identification, equal rights, equal wages, equal representation in decision-making process if our country wants to progress.
HUMERA ALWANI
MPA, Thatta
THIS refers to a news item, ‘Rehabilitation plan knocks at Bahawalpur’s old gates’ (June 4). The decision by the district government to rehabilitate all the five historic gates of the walled city is most welcome and deserves appreciation. It is a right step towards preserving our heritage for future generations.
Similarly, restoration of the clock towers of the century - old Sadiq Dane High School and the swimming pool of the Bahawalpur (Dring) Stadium, which was once regarded as one of the best in Asia is highly commendable.
Here I would suggest that old and historical Janaza Gah of Bahawalpur should be also restored to its original design and style. There are many old and historical mosques in and around the walled city which deserves attention of the district government for preservation and renovation.
A committee of senior citizens, scholars, architects and media persons should be form-ed to coordinate with the district government in this regard.
DR RHAIM YAR ABBASI
Chairman,BahawalpurM
Heritage Research Society
International
FOR many years I had been searching for Suvira Mann to condole her husband K. C. Mann’s death, I just could not find her.
K. C. Mann, member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of India, and Suvira were very good friends of Mazhar’s, my husband, and mine when they lived in Lahore. We worked together and she was a great help. She happened to know much more than I did and always gently corrected me when I went wrong. She sang very well and had a melodious voice. Whenever asked to sing, the room echoed with her divine voice.
After years I located her brother. Alas it was too late. He gave me the sad news of Suvira’s death last April. It came as a bolt of lightning. I was not expecting this news and my heart was numb. It felt like our country, our land and our hearts were hacked and partitioned.
Though I had found a dear friend for whom I was searching for so many years, I am now unable to go across. I feel like a prisoner who is in self-confinement with no crime to vouch for this sentence in a mental penitentiary. Words alone cannot simply describe the pain and mental misery and physical anguish I am going through.
I now realise with ample pain that our land was butchered and aimlessly cut into pieces. We cannot easily reach out to those we love in times of stress and grief.
I remember another occasion when I felt equally helpless when my friends Sonnu and Midow, daughters of the first Indian principal of Government College, Lahore, lost their father. It was not easy to cross the border. Now I mourn Suvira, a friend with whom on many occasions I walked miles and miles to attend a women’s meeting. We were friends who were committed to the same cause for which we were prepared to sacrifice our lives, we believed in a future which would bring happiness for all. Such was our friendship.
Let us hope that our children and grandchildren never have to face such a partition, where hearts are torn asunder and minds are helpless.
We must not allow a partition of land to divide hearts and souls as 1947 did. It drew us away from our dear friends. Longing for friends thus lost and recalling the memories of their company is the most painful experience one can go through.
TAHIRA MAZHAR ALI KHAN
Lahore
AS announced in the budget 2008-09, the government is carrying out amendments to labour welfare laws and the Minimum Wages for Unskilled Workers Ordinance 1969 to be enforced from July 1.
One such amendment pertains to increase in the minimum amount of pension paid under the Employees’ Old Age Benefits Act 1976 from the existing Rs1,500 to Rs2,000 per month. This pension was also increased one year ago from Rs1,300 to Rs1,500 per month.
All the EOBI pensioners were required to personally visit the respective regional offices of the EOB institution along with their pension books for the purpose of verification and endorsement of increase in the pension amount.
This process was a nightmare both for the pensioners and the EOBI officials as it created a chaos and caused great inconvenience, especially to the old and weak pensioners. As more than 20,000 pensioners are registered with each regional office of the EOB Institution in Karachi, one could see long queues of pensioners waiting for their turn in sweltering heat starting from early hours of the morning till the afternoon.
The number of pensioners must have further increased over the last one year. In order to avoid the afore-mentioned ordeal this year, I suggest that the job of verification and endorsement should be assigned to the National Bank of Pakistan, which is the custodian of EOBI’s huge funds and is responsible for the disbursement of monthly pensions. If it is not feasible, then some alternative solution to this serious problem should be found out by EOBI to avoid the last year’s painful experience.
PARVEZ RAHIM
Karachi
THIS is apropos of A.M. Kureshi’s letter (June 23) asking for preserving trees and not to build any more of the wider and better roads in our cities, especially in the capital city of Islamabad.
This attitude is not right. We have to make progress in all fields, and better roads are the very basis of any such move forward.
Just take a look at any metropolis in any country of the world and you will see such broad roads and highways smack in the centre of all these cities.
We Pakistanis many times hear about some environmental issues and then just plead for them blindly without giving a thought to other implications at all. This attitude is harmful.
We cannot do without broadening our roads and building new highways right now. This vital aspect of our future needs cannot be delayed one iota.
FIDA AHMAD KAKA
Islamabad
FEROZE Shah Gillani in his letter (July 5) has explained the system of judicial appointments in England by a commission of 18 members with unimpeachable quality and integrity and no political activist can be its member. He further says that in Pakistan a political executive with his own merits appoints the judges which results in tragic consequences.
Thank you Mr Gillani for putting the political leadership wise only if they will exercise their wisdom and apply this yardstick while reinstating the judges.
As a citizen of Pakistan I will appeal to the political leadership that while discussing the judicial package in the National Assembly the following facts may be fully highlighted:
a. Mr Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry has not only turned out to be a political activist but a full fledged politician by leading and addressing political processions in all parts of the country, specially during the long march when he led a political procession of the PML(N), JI and PTI during which he was also presented a golden crown which he accepted, though it is unbecoming of a chief justice who is still drawing the salary from the government.
b. Charges levelled against him in the judicial reference have been buried under the weight of judgment by 13 judges who did not touch the ‘charges’ but dismissed the case on technical grounds. Before he is reinstated, he owes it to the nation to clarify his position and refute the charges because President Musharraf still vehemently holds that charges in the judicial reference were correct.
c. During his address to all the bars, the deposed CJP has spoken on all issues but on charges levelled against him. He has followed the dictum: “Judges don’t speak.” Yes, but while hearing the cases. When personal conduct of the judge is involved, not only he speaks but even shouts like his lawyers have been doing inside and outside the courts and TV talks but none has denied the charges formally in the apex court by confronting the documents attached with the judicial reference.
BRIG (r) QURBAN ALI BARLAS
Rawalpindi
IN response to the statement of Gen Qudwai, I would like to say that Dr A. Q.Khan is a human being and can make a mistake but it should be kept in mind that he is a hero of the nation also. So we should not try to malign him, nor should we issue any statement that can be termed antagonistic.
So the government should restore the official status of Dr A. Q.Khan, provide him security and abstain from confining him.
M.KHUSHNOOD MALIK
Islamabad
THE government should build modern shelters in Fata for children who have lost their parents and other loved ones as a result of the US war on terror.
Such children are easy targets for militant groups who use them for their nefarious designs, hence destroying their future.
By building such shelters, lives of the children would not only be saved but they would also be able to get education, enabling them to contribute in a positive way to society.
HAMDAN SIDDIQUI
Karachi
IN his column, ‘A state in denial’ (June 21), lrfan Husain has cited the new western allegation that designs for miniaturised atomic warheads have been found in the computers possessed by a Swiss family that was said to have worked with Dr A. Q. Khan in the past.
He has also stated that as a consequence the western governments will exert pressure on Islamabad to ensure that Dr Khan is kept in custody rather than being freed.
The columnist has used this and other accusations against the nuclear scientist and the subsequent resistance of most Pakistani civilians and officials against accepting these to prove that we are a state in denial.
It may be noted that the foreign office has issued a statement reported in the same day’s issue rejecting the claim that Pakistan’s nuclear blueprints were available in the international black market and that they were accessed by foreign scientists (such as the Swiss ones).
It has also raised a very telling objection: if the Swiss files have relevance to Dr Khan, then why were they destroyed? They should have been shared with Pakistan if they were genuine and relevant to Dr Khan.
This is a very valid question and was perhaps the only way to verify the correctness or otherwise of the allegation. That this wasn’t done raises serious doubts about the intentions of the accusers.
Furthermore, Dr Qadeer Khan himself has been quoted in the same report as saying that “an international network, which had been actively working even before Pakistan started its nuclear programme, is responsible for selling nuclear technology even today in the international market.”
Another very significant incident points towards an apparent western conspiracy to trap Dr Khan and malign Pakistan. About a year ago there had been a report in Dawn according to which the file of the case pertaining to the scientist’s trial in Holland some three decades back regarding the charge of having stolen centrifuge designs from his former employers over there had gone missing from the court.
The Dutch judge dealing with this issue had accused the American CIA of having stolen the whole file.
This raises the question of why was that done? The answer would become clear if it were recalled that the trial court had absolved Dr Khan of the accusations against him and dropped the case.
Thus, by removing that file, all the evidence in support of the gentleman would no longer be accessible to anyone. The new allegation is also a mere ploy to keep the scientist in continued detention.
The foregoing facts should enable Mr Husain to realise that instead of going along unquestioningly with the western detractors of our hero and our nuclear programme, objectivity demanded that he should also have considered what contrary arguments exist.
K. NAQSHBANDI
Karachi
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