A plan gone awry

The original plan was probably to hijack all the elected members of the PPP, get them to accept Musharraf’s tailored ‘democracy’ in return for lucrative offices in the government, leaving Benazir Bhutto and Asif Zardari holding the empty sack, she in self-exile and he in jail. But at the end it seems General Musharraf’s in- and out of uniform minions have succeeded only in snatching ten each at the Centre as well as the Punjab and in Sindh they seem to be engaged in a battle for their life. The original plan was simply uncanny. Makhdoom Amin Fahim, the president of People’s Party Parliamentarians, was seen, immediately after the election results were declared, pushing for a government of ‘national unity’. Clearly, he was extending a hand of cooperation to both the PML(Q) and the MMA with whom his Party had fundamental ideological differences. His leader, Benazir Bhutto, also seemed to be backing him in his efforts in this direction. But more than her, the regime was seemingly doing overtime to suck Amin into a trap by encouraging him into thinking that what he was doing was the right thing to do and that the powers that be would give him a helping hand to consolidate his position when the time came.

The argument forwarded at that time by Amin’s upfront advisers in support of this plan was that in order to facilitate a smooth transfer of power from the Army to the civilian rule, such compromises were essential. And on the issue of Benazir’s return and Zardari’s release, they claimed that after the transfer of power Amin himself will go to the airport along with her spouse (Zardari) to receive her. But Benazir seemingly was not taken in by these empty promises and, perhaps, started insisting by the end of October that she wanted to see the colour of the money before she agreed to let the PPP make the so-called essential compromises.

The Establishment in order to force her to give up defiance played its trump card at this juncture. The Makhdoom from Jhang started talking to the press at about this time making it clear that there would be a rebellion within the Party if his leader refused to cooperate with the regime on government formation. Benazir Bhutto countered this by opening contacts with the MMA through Nawabzada Nasrullah Khan. She had already established contacts within the MMA earlier by getting Asif to talk to his close friend Maulana Fazlur Rehman. So, without making a formal promise, Benazir had created the impression that PPP will back the Maulana for the post of the PM.

Meanwhile, the Nawabzada, perhaps, either in his naivete or, perhaps, driven by an overwhelming desire to undermine Musharraf had brought the MMA and the PPP by the end of October to a point where the two had started talking of putting up joint candidates for the PM and the Speakership. This made Musharraf’s minions properly panicky and they promised the Moon to Amin if he could ask for a postponement of the oath-taking session of the NA. They suckered Amin into this by making it appear as if they needed time to complete the legal formalities for the release of Zardari and for facilitating BB’s immediate return. For the military regime it was an unthinkable situation — a coalition government of MMA-PPP at the Centre! So, it wanted time to come up with a plan to counter this possibility.

As the official minions made the PPP delay its agreement with the MMA by making the party believe that what it wanted was just about to be delivered, the ‘B’ team of the regime led by Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain went back to the MMA to woo it away from the PPP. At this point, the MMA played a fast one on the regime by giving the impression that it was ready to make its position flexible on the issues of LFO, the NSC and uniformed president. And within 24 hours it appeared as if an agreement between the MMA and PML(Q) was all but signed and sealed. This made the regime heave a sigh of relief and consequently it duly notified a date for the oath-taking session of the National Assembly. But the next day, the MMA expressing its disappointment with the government for not accepting its demands announced that it would contest for the PM slot come what may. Now since the NA session could not be postponed further and also since there was no time for playing new tricks the regime did the unthinkable — it grabbed and ran with whatever it could get from the PPP and allowed Faisal and his nine cohorts to announce shamefacedly the formation of the forward bloc called the PPP(P) declaring at the same time that they would vote for Jamali. Thus Jamali scraped through by a majority of one vote the next day as the regime’s attempt to hijack the entire PPP simply collapsed.

After having lost the battle in the National Assembly, the regime turned its attention towards the provinces to do damage control in Sindh and Balochistan and also tailor the upcoming Senate elections. First it got ten from PPP to defect to President’s PPP(P) in the Punjab assembly so as to reduce the party’s quota of Senate seats by, perhaps, one in this province. Next, in Balochistan, it released two JUI members nabbed by the NAB for gobbling up millions in return for MMA’s vote for its Chief Minister Jam Yousuf. This shamefaced deal between the two so-called guardians of Islamic and Pakistani ideology — the military and the MMA — needs to be contrasted with the day in and day out tirade against Benazir Bhutto’s alleged attempts to trade PPP’s votes for her return from self-exile and Zardari’s release. The same party which had refused to vote for PML(Q) candidate for the PM at the Centre and its CM’s candidate in the Punjab because of Q’s support to LFO, was found voting for this party’s CM in Balochistan soon after it succeeded in cutting a deal with the NAB. In retrospect now it seems that all this principled stand of the MMA on the LFO, NSC and uniformed President was only to get what it wanted in Balochistan — the release of two of its members from the NAB.

Finally, the regime got the Muttahida Qaumi Movement to withdraw its support from the government and declare that they would not vote in the elections for the Sindh Assembly speaker, deputy speaker and the leader of the house ostensibly protesting against continued occupation of ‘no-go’ areas by the MQM-Pak. Seemingly it was all a put up job on the part of both the regime and the Muttahida and the purpose was to provide a justification for the postponement of the provincial assembly’s oath-taking session. Most likely, the Sindh Assembly will now be called only when the King’s alliance, the GNA, succeeds in securing enough votes (at the cost of PPP) to make the government in Karachi. If this happens, the PPP is also likely to lose its ability to win its full quota of Senate seats in the Sindh Assembly.—Onlooker

University fulfills longstanding demand

CURRENTLY there are 23 degree colleges in Sargodha division (defunct) where 3,252 students are studying in graduate and postgraduate classes. After the establishment of Sargodha University, the 14 degree colleges of adjoining districts of Mandi Bahauddin, Hafizabad and Chakwal could be attached to it.

In this way, students could be saved from the inconvenience of travelling long distances to Lahore and Islamabad for higher education. Many old divisional headquarters of Punjab like Lahore, Faisalabad, Bahawalpur, Multan and Rawalpindi had their own universities, but Sargodha was denied one.

Now Governor Khalid Maqbool has accepted the longstanding demand of the people of Sargodha division. Initially, it has been decided to set up the university on the campus of the Government College, Sargodha, already running postgraduate classes in English, Urdu, economics, chemistry, physics and Islamiat. There are 68 lecture rooms in it having a capacity for 40 to 75 students. There are six postgraduate laboratories for 30 students and six under-graduate laboratories for 50. There are two information technology laboratories, while the postgraduate section has three libraries containing a thousand books. The main library has 55,000 books.

This building has one auditorium, which can accommodate 250 students, and three offices. It required five teaching laboratories and two research laboratories for pharmacy, three laboratories for food tech. and two for microbiology. The computer sciences section required six laboratories, two lecture rooms and six offices. The business studies department required two IT labs, while the admin block can be temporarily housed in the existing buildings.

The number of PhD teachers is three in science and six in the arts, while there are six in M.Phil sciences and 129 MA/MSc and 78 non-teaching staff whereas the requirement is 30 Ph.D, M.Phil and MA/MSc each for teaching and 91 non-teaching staff for Sargodha University.

District Nazim Amjad Ali Noon and DCO Hasan Iqbal have estimated that the number of intermediate students will increase from 2,450 to 2,500, graduates from 1,320 to 2,000, postgraduates from 438 to 1,500 while 500 students will join short courses.

According to preliminary calculations, the initial input required is worth Rs95 million while recurring expenses are Rs42.94 million.

The Government College, Sargodha, will be considered a constituent institution and the agriculture institute can cater to pharmacy, food, technology and micro biology. It is learnt that Rs50 million are being disbursed during the current fiscal year, while Rs90 million will be disbursed in the next budget.

It is also learnt that the governor has promulgated an ordinance for the setting up of Sargodha University. It is thought that the entire setup will start operating on the pattern of the Quaid-i-Azam and Punjab universities.

The area earmarked for the new campus for the construction of buildings for lecture rooms and hostels is 250 acres on Lahore Road, about six kilometres from here.

Sargodha University will not only share load of the Punjab University, but will also be income-generating.

‘By a partial, prejudiced and ignorant Historian’

I HAVE not been keeping any too well these past few weeks. In fact, I was obliged to go on leave and abandon ship — or nearly. Days at home led one into periods of gloomy introspection. Time had come, I was sure, for me to make a valedictory speech. Throw in the towel, make your last bow. Take leave of your friends. Farewell, friends. It has been good while it lasted but now’s the time for me to say that even bad things come to an end. I’m grateful to you all for having suffered me all these years. Be happy and wait for my successor who’ll be much better than I ever was.

These were my thoughts on my sick bed. And then came hope. The turnaround. From London came a young friend from the Urdu Service of the BBC, Asad Ali by name. He brought for me the briefest of books on history. Actually, it is not a book but a booklet. It is titled, The History of England by a partial, prejudiced & ignorant Historian. It was written by Jane Austen and the note on the bottom of the title page said: N.B. There will be very few Dates in this History. I am reproducing parts of this delectable history which I am recommending as essential reading for Pervaiz Elahi, Shujaat Husain, Fazlur Rehman, Husain Ahmad and similar other birds. It is also recommended for a very dear friend in Chakwal-Bhagwal-Islamabad or wherever else he may be of a sleepy winter’s afternoon.

The second thing that helped me to shake off my lethargy was a letter that I received from Karachi. Written by Dr.Khalid Khan, consulting anaesthesiologist, Liaquat National Hospital, it was a heart-warming get-well-soon message which made me feel instantly better. “Get up, lazybones, and do something about it”, it seemed to order me and I obeyed. So, you see, messages do matter and they matter most when they come from a very special lady in Lahore.

The Jane Austen history begins thus: “Read me anything but history, for history must be false.”: Sir Robert Walpole.

“History is just the portrayal of crimes and misfortunes... All ancient history is no more than accepted fiction.”: Voltaire.

“The History of England from the reign of Henry the 4th to the death of Charles the 1st. By a partial, prejudiced and ignorant Historian.

“To Miss Austen, eldest daughter of the Rev George Austen, this work is inscribed with all due respect by.

“The Author “N.B. There will be few Dates in this History.

And the history begins:

HENRY THE 4TH: Henry the 4th ascended the throne of England much to his own satisfaction in the year 1399, having prevailed on his cousin and predecessor Richard the 2nd, to resign it to him, and to retire for the rest of his life to Pomfret Castle, where he happened to be murdered. It is to be supposed that Henry was married, since he certainly had four sons, but it is not in my power to inform the reader who was his wife. Be this as it may, he did not live for ever. But falling ill, his son the Prince of Wales took away the crown; whereupon the King made a long speech, for which I must refer the reader to Shakespeare’s plays and the prince made a still longer. Things being thus settled between them, the King died, and was succeeded by his son Henry who had previously beat Sir William Gascoigne.

HENRY THE 5TH: This prince, after he succeeded to the throne, grew quite reformed and amiable, forsaking all his dissipated companions and never thrashing Sir William again. During his reign, Lord Cobham was burnt alive, but I forget what for. His Majesty then turned his thoughts to France, where he went and fought the famous Battle of Agincourt. He afterwards married the King’s daughter Catherine, a very Agreeable woman by Shakespeare’s account. Inspite of all this however he died, and was succeeded by his son Henry.

HENRY THE 6TH: I cannot say much for this monarch’s Sense — Nor would I if I could, for he was a Lancastrian. I suppose you know all about the wars between him and the Duke of York who was of the right side; If you do not, you had better read some other History, for I shall not be very diffuse in this, meaning by it only vent my spleen against, and shew my hatred to all those people whose parties or principles do not suit with mine, and not to give information. This King married Margaret of Anjou, a woman whose distresses and misfortunes were so great as almost to make me who hate her, pity her. It was in this reign that Joan of Arc lived and made such a row among the English. They should not have burnt her —- but they did. There were several Battles between the Yorkists and Lancastrians, in which the former (as they ought) usually conquered. At length they were entirely overcome; The King was murdered —- The Queen was sent home and Edward the 4th Ascended the throne.

EDWARD THE 4TH: This Monarch was famous only for his Beauty and his courage, of which the picture we have here given of him, and his undaunted behaviour in marrying one woman while he was engaged to another, are sufficient proofs. His wife was Elizabeth Woodville, a widow, who, poor woman, was afterwards confined in a convent by that Monster of Inquiry and Avarice Henry the 7th. One of Edward’s Mistresses was Jane Shore who had a play written about her, but it is a tragedy and therefore not worth reading. Having performed all these noble actions, his Majesty died, and was succeeded by his son.

EDWARD THE 5TH: This unfortunate Prince lived so little a while that nobody had time to draw his picture. He was murdered by his Uncle’s contrivance, whose name was Richard the 3rd. Jane Austen’s history continues, and if my friend in Chakwal likes it, he’ll have more of it next week.

Denying the obvious

THE tendency by some of our more well-known politicians to deny the obvious can be quite frustrating. The recent election of the prime minister and the subsequent jostling for power in the provinces has brought to light several examples of politicians and party leaders explaining with a very straight face to television cameras and journalists that their actions have been in the supreme national interest. In the run-up to the election of the prime minister, the leader of the PPP’s forward bloc —- and now rechristened the PPP (Patriot) —- Makhdoom Faisal Saleh Hayat came on all the various television channels and said that the decision by him and nine other colleagues to not follow the party line had in fact been done in deference to “conscience”. Asked repeatedly by the Islamabad correspondent of Geo TV, Mr.Hayat —- now the interior minister —- had said that he had made the decision without any pressure from anyone and without expecting any kind of reward in return from the military government. The same day, a government minister was also asked whether the fact that Mr.Hayat’s detention by the National Accountability Bureau sometime back, and his eventual release before the election had somehow been a factor in his (Mr.Hayat’s) decision to form a forward bloc in the PPP.

The answers were to be expected, really, in that how many people will actually admit that they are doing something wrong, and that, too, on national television? This was a few days before the leader of the house was to be elected, in fact, the weekend before and news of the forward bloc in the offing for many days according to various newspaper reports, was carried live by Geo. However, as it turns out other than voting to satisfy his “conscience” Mr Hayat got a pretty neat bargain in the process, bagging the very important and powerful interior ministry.

Similarly, his other colleague, MNA-elect from Okara and a former PPP Punjab president, Rao Sikandar Iqbal who, no doubt, must have also decided to rebel against his party because of his ‘conscience’, managed to get the rather enviable post of senior federal minister with the portfolio of defence. In fact, three of the fourteen posts of federal minister and three of the seven for minister of state went to the forward bloc of the PPP. And the moral of the story is that it really does pay to vote according to one’s ‘conscience’, doesn’t it?

Then around the same time, a television reporter asked the MQM’s Farooq Sattar whether the opening of the so-called ‘no-go’ areas in Karachi was in any way linked to his party’s vote in favour of the prime minister. Now, as they say in the courts, the heavens would not have fallen had Mr.Sattar quite frankly admitted that his party’s vote for the PML-Q candidate was swayed in large part by Gen.Musharraf’s directives to the Sindh government to “ensure the removal” of these no-go areas.

Strange, though, that after insisting for years that these ‘no-go’ areas did not even exist, the government all of a sudden not only admits their presence but even goes to the extent of risking violence in the city by vacating them of the Haqiqis.

The last example of this double speak comes from the mighty general himself who all throughout the post-election and pre-PM election phase kept telling the media that he was not trying to influence the election of the leader of the house. Well, perhaps, in the strict sense of the word, he himself wasn’t trying to influence the process of selecting the prime minister, but certainly members of his government, especially some of his closest confidants and those with direct access to him, certainly were. The Dawn of Nov 23 had a photograph of the-then Leader of the House walking out of the Balochistan House in Islamabad with PML-Q leader Pervaiz Elahi and the president’s secretary, Tariq Aziz (taken on Nov 22, a day before the election of the prime minister). And, Onlooker in his View from Margalla column of Nov. 25 (‘Musharraf’s sand castle’) wrote pretty much the same thing saying that the president’s secretary had camped at Balochistan House in the run-up to the PM’s election and the formation of the federal cabinet.

The obvious question that comes to mind following the pronouncements of these people in the media and newspapers is: why deny the obvious? Do these individuals really think that people are that dumb that they will buy this mumbo-jumbo about voting according to one’s ‘conscience’ and not because a juicy ministry is on offer? So, it really is a coincidence that the MQM vote for the PML-Q candidate happened at the same time as hundreds of policemen and rangers were ‘opening up’ Karachi’s ‘no-go’ areas. So, too, is the fact that the current interior minister, in the not too recent past, was being hounded by some of the very agencies that will now come under his control.—OMAR R. QURAISHI

(E-mail: omarq@cyber.net.pk)

Romeo and Juliet recalled

THIS past week was the week that was. And, for all we can divine, it may continue that way: a whirl of confusion, conjectures and misgivings. Also of hope. The wish now is that the hope does not turn out to be the hope against hope. This sounds like a real conundrum. That’s just what the past week has been. We have seen the protagonists going round and round, so far, ending up nowhere.

It is a riddle that has remained unanswerable even for the most seasoned and accomplished of the players of the game of politics, such as we have. The easy going would have called it a game or fun festival of musical chairs. But while it certainly has been a lot about chairs, in the place of music we have had spells of stillness or mere cacophony. No melody of any description.

Not that we were short of action. There was more of it than we could keep track of, digest and assimilate to any wholesome effect for the health of this city that continues to defy definition. Some poet had once said “things are not what they seem.” He must have had Karachi, plus Sindh, - or Sindh plus Karachi - in this poetic vision. The two are integral, yet so often so far apart.

Once again the MQM, rather the MQMs, are caught in what is in effect crossfire, at the moment ignited not necessarily by themselves. It has generated incandescent heat that threatens to consume the two of them and no one else. Most probably to the amusement of those watching the fireworks from a safe perch nearby. If the spectators are not exactly fuelling the fire, they are indifferent to its flames.

For the unbiased observers, this is a pretty perplexing drama, not unfamiliar though. From the very beginning the active players in Karachi’s arena have been proactive puppets that have tended to get out of the control of their manipulators. And then, after a while, gyrating out of their own control into something suggesting the dance macabre. A sad scene, indeed.

This emphatically points out once again that the bane of this province and its gigantic capital city is that the two elements that should have been pals were beguiled into becoming rivals and contenders. Antagonism between these two was planted by the powers above, because they foolishly thought it suited their wayward wails. Since they were found to be self-willed and nobody’s fools, the main players in Sindh/Karachi were set against each other.

That was a plot hatched many years ago. The pity and shame is that the leaders of these two majors in the life of Sindh and Karachi have persisted in believing they are masters when they were actually being unwitting tools. Apportioning blame is a futile enterprise. So, facts be stated and the judgment left to the community.

Playing with the sentiments of Sindh and Karachi began early in Pakistan’s life. In the hands of Field Marshal Ayub it assumed the status of state policy. Zulfikar Ali Bhutto tried to be even handed.

To what extent he succeeded is a question better left open. Then, his ‘talented cousin’ settled down to set at naught whatever good ZAB might have intended. This was a deliberate conspiracy.

Dictator Zia began his game with a gnawing guilty conscience. He saw foes all over the Bhutto native territory - Sindh and Karachi - and pumped poison into it. Unwisely, ZAB’s own daughter pursued the shadows that had kept Zia at the edge of his nerves as far as the Sindh/Karachi entity was concerned. What no other Karachi-baiter had done, Benazir did and revelled in doing.

Her two governments remained at loggerheads with Karachi. For most of the time she, and her lieutenants in Sindh, carried on this line with a relentless vengeance. The two who had been at loggerheads, in time, became at daggers drawn. It is still very hard to muffle the strident tone of BB as prime minister. Her interior minister Gen Babar declared war on this city, giving police orders to shoot at sight. A heartless thing to do in a civil situation.

So far no one has been able to see that there will be no peace for this province, this city and ease for the country as a whole unless bygones are called bygones and a new day is ushered in with the two major elements in the politics of Sindh/Karachi are truly and sincerely reconciled. Between the two there is now a backlog of puerile mistrust, rooted in misunderstandings contrived by those that saw these two as too self-willed to be tamed into subservience.

What we have been witnessing for so many weeks once again teaches the lesson that should have been learned years ago. It is that, given simple common sense, the PPP and the MQM, or whatever they represent regardless of their nomenclature, are natural friends — and wholly unnatural foes. The rival tribes of Romeo and Juliet came to their sense after the tragedy of their children, didn’t they?

When will this lesson go home to those who have already sacrificed so many of their Romeos and Juliets here in Karachi/ Sindh?

To know right from wrong

Ethics have become quite important of late in managing companies and in making decisions. A friend recently went to a lecture on the role of ethics in decision-making. He managed to write a small report for the Diary:

“Ramiz Allawala, who has spoken considerably on ethics to audiences all over the country, talked about ethics being essential to our survival. He said that the very scale of our production and operating systems, the scale of our technology itself, is multiplying the importance of ethics in brand new ways. Whether the people making decisions are at the top of the decision-making hierarchy or lower down, our increasing reliance on technology almost guarantees that every person and worker will face many more difficult challenges today than in the past. And what goes on in the conscience of these individuals directly determines the way such systems are used.

“The definition of ethics he used is: ‘Ethics is enforcing that which is unenforceable’. What is enforceable by external means becomes law. So by extension, if a law cannot be enforced for any reason, then any illegal activity falling under that law also becomes unethical. For example, it is illegal to go through a red light at a traffic intersection in any part of the world. But in Pakistan, since traffic laws are not implemented this becomes an ethical issue as well. So when ethics is enforced by external means it becomes law. It is enforced from outside. Our responsibility as citizens is then reduced simply to avoiding punishment. The inherent message is that it’s OK to do what you want as long as you don’t get caught.

“What happens when we don’t enforce our own ethics and we don’t self regulate? Simple, we get regulated by others. Mr Allawala told the audience that as our reliance on external regulation grows, our primary habit becomes that of avoiding punishment and our ability to self-regulate diminishes.

“The speaker said that moral virtues are more important than following laws and rules. Obeying rules may lead to virtuous ends but a person’s moral worth is derived from fulfillment of moral and not legal requirements. For example, a person might dislike doing something which is ethical but does it out of obligation. Is he then virtuous?

“So, ultimately we find ourselves in a circular trap. If we don’t regulate ourselves we get regulated by outside forces and if outside forces regulate us we lose our willingness and ability for self-regulation. And we unwittingly become partners with forces that want to dominate and control us. So if we want independence and freedom, we have to first become free from our reliance on external controls, punishments and rewards.”

The talk was arranged by a courier company.

So yet another Eid is upon us. The usual hustle bustle is here this time too with bazars staying open till very late. And just like previous Ramazans, this one too has people driving like lunatics just before iftar time.

Shopping centres all over the city and the more upscale malls in Clifton and on Tariq Road have launched a huge publicity campaign to draw customers. According to one estimate, the amount shops can expect to earn from sales in the pre-Eid shopping period is equal to six months of sales.

However, this Eid is going to be slightly different from previous ones because of a general sense of uncertainty created by the unstable political situation, both at the centre and in Sindh. In fact, it would be fair to say that people living in Sindh can feel singled out because their provincial assembly has not met even once.

This isn’t about what Bapsi Sidhwa said on Tuesday at the official launch of her omnibus by Oxford University Press since that would be repeating what has already been reported about the event.

However, readers should hear of the ridiculous way in which the question-answer session that followed Ms Sidhwa’s talk was conducted. In fact, it was not conducted or moderated at all. The venue was full of people, in fact there was not even any standing room. Given that the writer had not spoken about her books but rather about 9/11 and its consequences, there was bound to be a flurry of questions.

Unfortunately though, one has yet to go to a seminar or a lecture where during the question and answer session members of the audience actually ask short and pointed questions. Usually what happens is that they take control of the mike (or shout if there is no mike) and hold forth endlessly, in the thoroughly mistaken belief that the rest of the audience is somehow interested in their listening to their ‘comments’ or ‘observations’. This is precisely what happened at the end of Ms Sidhwa’s talk, perhaps partly because she told the audience that they were free to not only ask questions but also give comments.

One man went on the stage and gave his ‘observations’ to the audience, and frankly speaking they were quite hackneyed and trite. Then, another man went and stood near the stage and launched a tirade against America. Now, this is a view many in the audience would have probably agreed with but most of them weren’t there to hear things that they already knew, and that too from some unknown person.

To top it all off, this woman then went on stage and proceeded to tell the by-then-restless audience (iftar was very near) her whole life story of coming from a large middle-class family, emigrating to America and finding it almost like a heaven on earth. At the end she also managed to tell us, in the presence of the OUP MD Ameena Saiyid, that she too was writing a book which she hoped would one day make her as well-known as Bapsi Sidhwa. Talk about being modest.

The point here simply is that when people go to listen to a lecture or a talk by someone particularly well-known then the last thing they want to hear is some old fuddy duddy or some egotistical man/woman go on and on about how bad America is or how bad the country’s political system is (as if either statement is a revelation).

Perhaps organizations that hold such events should ensure that question and answer sessions, which can otherwise be quite interesting, are not held hostage by people who love the sound of their own voice.

Several people emailed in response to the piece ‘We lost the war?’ that we carried a couple of weeks back on the 1965 war. Amna Iqbal, a student at the Lyceum, wrote in saying that she did not all agree with what the initial correspondent, Ayesha Arif Bawany (herself a student at Mama Parsi) had written.

Ms Iqbal wrote: “According to her [Ms Bawany] the defence day celebrations are a farce since we lost the war. She based her arguments on two grounds: First, on the question framed by the British examiners [which asked students to explain why Pakistan had “lost” the 1965 war] and second, on the terms of the Tashkent Declaration. What she fails to understand is that there have been instances of GCE examiners framing questions that are historically incorrect. It is possible that they had their facts mixed up and included an incorrect question.

“Historical evidence supports the fact that Pakistan was successful in driving out the invading Indian forces from Lahore and Sialkot. Had we lost the war, both these cities would have become a part of India. British examiners should not be seen as the ultimate authority on matters relating to our national history. As for the Tashkent Declaration, it was a conference held on neutral ground designed to bring a peaceful settlement to the conflict. It tried to, as its language said, ‘resolve all disputes by peaceful means’. Nowhere was it implied that Pakistan had lost the war.

“The defence day celebrations, therefore, are not a mass political conspiracy designed to fool a nation. Contrary to what the writer thinks, the whole nation is not made up of brain-dead individuals. Moreover, it is also possible that there are differences in historical perspectives. No nation is above bias and most write histories based on glorified visions of their own nationalism. What is Mutiny to some is the War of Independence to others. Therefore, a different perspective on the part of British examiners may also have led them to frame that particular question regarding the outcome of the 1965 war with India.”

— By Karachian

E-mail: karachi_notebook@hotmail.com

Court marriages getting popular

COURT marriages are on the rise. Noor Naz Agha, a high court advocate, has conducted “over 50 such marriages” in the past few years. And she knows of several lawyers who have done the same.

Couples go for court marriage either because of parent’s opposition to marriage, or because they fear opposition. This occurs in marriages particularly that cross religious and ethnic lines.

In most cases, estranged parents of the girl retaliate by charging the boy with abduction and by putting pressure upon their daughter to testify this in court. If she refuses they may even level a charge of Zina against the couple. “The case can become complicated if the couple do not marry immediately after they leave home,” according to Rashida Patel, the President of the Pakistan Women’s Lawyers’ Association (PAWLA).

The boy can then suffer several months of imprisonment. If a case of Zina is filed, the girl is also put behind bars. At the time of writing, there were six girls in the women’s jail who had either contracted court marriage or were preparing to do so. However, Swaleha Naeem, a lawyer who regularly visits the prison, believed that some of these girls would soon be released on bail.

One such case, recounted by advocate Javed Iqbal Burqi, is that of Afshan and Adnan (Kulf Masih, Christian name). They left home with the intention to marry after Afshan’s family refused Adnan’s proposal as he was a recent convert to Islam. However, they were apprehended by police before the court marriage, at the behest of Afshan’s family. Afshan in her confessional statement denied the charge of abduction and even submitted herself to a medical test, to avert the charge of abduction or Zina by her family. Thereupon, the investigation officer (IO) filed a statement under section 169 of CrPc that “the couple is innocent.”

The judicial magistrate, however, did not release Adnan who was put behind bars on the grounds that there was “no proof whether Adnan had really accepted Islam.” The IO filed a challan and the case was transferred to the ADJ 1V East. Afshan refused to return to her parent’s house, and she spent 14 months in Darul Aman before relenting. On her return, her parents married her to a man of their choice. Adnan, meanwhile, has been in prison for two years. None of the complainants appear in the court as witnesses despite summons and bailable and non-bailable warrants. The court is yet to decide the case.

Because of the likelihood of a charge being levelled against the boy, and perhaps even the girl for marrying without their parent’s consent, lawyers, like Zeb Jawed, are cautious when approached by a couple. “First, I ensure that the girl is above 16 years and the boy above 18 years. No lawyer that I know would conduct a court marriage of such a couple as that would be against the law. Secondly, I ensure that the date of departure of a girl from her home and that of her court marriage is the same in the form. Here, the girl testifies she is marrying of her own free will. I also make it a point to attach the girl’s photo on the form in case she later denies that it was she who got married.”

This form is then attested by a judicial magistrate. The Nikah is read by the Nikah Khwan and four copies are prepared - for the boy and the girl, for the Nikah registrar and for the local government.

When PAWLA makes the arrangement for such a marriage it advises the girl and the boy to keep the copy of the free will certificate with them, along with the Nikahnama, so that if accused of Zina they have a valid defence. The need for this particularly arises because when the legality of such a marriage is questioned in court, the local government often fails to produce the needed Nikahnama because records are not systematically maintained. This causes complications, and so Rashida Patel’s insistence that the procedure be streamlined. She is also of the view that the Zina ordinance which leads to victimization of such couples should be amended, if not repealed. “The MMA has said they will review the laws so that injustices do not occur. Let’s wait and see.”

One step that could alleviate much suffering is holding the trial of the couple against whom a case has been filed in the family court rather than lodge a criminal suit against them, according to several lawyers questioned. Senior advocate Wallail Gohar on her part ensures that the boy writes down the Meher amount in the contract so that the marriage which lacks social sanction is not easily broken. “I also ask the boy to bring along a ring.”

She says the couple only resorts to such a marriage because they face opposition. “Parents forget that Islam enjoins the couple getting married to like each other. If parents can accept this, then this would prevent much bitterness that occurs in families.”

But there are also lawyers like Uzma Khan who refers all couples approaching her for a court marriage to some other lawyer. “I don’t approve of such marriages,” she says. “It’s not right for a girl to deceive her parents. Besides, ninety percent of such marriages end in failure because one is carried away by one’s emotions while reality is something different. Such marriages lack social support, and worst of all, the girl suffers the most.”