KHAIRPUR, Nov 6: “Literature around the world is based on beauty, goodness and truth. Technology has connected the world and we should use it to promote literature,” said Prof Dr Anwaar Ahmed, the chairman of the Pakistan Academy of Letters while speaking on Tuesday at the opening ceremony of an international seminar ‘Literature and co-existence’ organised by the Urdu department of the Shah Abdul Latif University.

Dr Hens Welser, a professor of South Asian studies from Sweden, said that co-existence would help bridge gaps between the East and the West and also enable new horizons to emerge in literature.

The chief guest, Sindh Minister for Local Bodies Agha Siraj Durrani, who also inaugurated the conference, said that discussing co-existence was the need of the hour. He said that the idea of universal brotherhood which wasn’t so popular around a hundred years ago found much support today in the age of technology. The minister said that the time was critical for mankind and we could no longer afford to perpetuate negative attitude in the people.

He said that the recognition of essential oneness was the ultimate reality and cut directly at the root of attitudes leading to selfishness, fear and conflict.

In her address, SALU Vice Chancellor Prof Dr Parveen Shah said that the world was under the threat of a nuclear technology and the fate of all the people was bound together.

Dr Khalil Toqar from Istanbul University talked about the message of peace in works of Turkish Sufis.

Prof Dr Ghulam Ali Allana and other scholars from Malaysia, Turkey, Sweden, Denmark, Spain, Japan, Qatar, Egypt, South Africa, Germany, Iran and China also participated in the conference besides a large number of students and faculty members.—BoC