Author: Dr Khalil Ahmad

What’s happening at this time in Pakistani media has no precedent! It’s desperately trying to transform Dust into Gold using its science of alchemy and its alchemists.

As Asif Ali Zardari leaves the Presidency, Pakistani media slides into a frenzy to be all praise for him, forgetting all the names it has been calling him with. Probably all the television (may be radio also, do not listen to any) channels and almost all the English and Urdu newspapers are making a seer out of him. As is said in Urdu and Punjabi:

It may be translated into English as: a thief’s turning into a (sufi) saint

So the Pakistani media’s alchemy is transforming Asif Ali Zardari into a Great Democrat!

Today is the day when the five-year term of President Asif Ali Zardari has come to an end (writing this blog in the evening).

See the today’s newspapers. I guess almost in every paper there is a full-page ad. I saw 4 newspapers: Jang, Express, The News, The Express Tribune. The ad has been given by the Sindh Government, where Peoples Party is the ruling party.

In the ad with a photo of Asif Ali Zardari is printed:

I translate: “The trustee / preserver of democratic traditions”

Then the “achievements and the accomplishments” of this “trustee / preserver” has been counted.

In the end is printed: 

Sharjeel Inaam Memon

Minister for Information and Archives, Commerce and Industries

Government of Sindh

Obviously, Sharjeel Memon did not pay for these ads eulogizing his mentor. Nor the Peoples Party! This was done at the cost of taxpayers of the Sindh province.

I think

It’s just inhuman, against the very norms of the human world, that anyone be killed for his / her ideas. 

Everyone has ideas, good or bad, and nobody knows whose ideas are good and whose ideas are bad. 

Ideas are extensions of thinking beings. And, it’s ideas which have built this human world. It’s ideas which protect us in an unknown universe. Hence, killing human beings for their ideas amounts to killing this human world, our abode!

“Kabuliwala’s Bengali wife” was living inside the camp of the enemy and fighting the killers of this human world and her weapons were but Ideas!

See the full story carried by The New York Times:

Be informed that I have decided to separate the Urdu postings from English ones and put them together into another blog. 

For the Urdu posts, I am setting up, CivilPakistan: Urdu Blog. As the setting up of the Urdu Blog finishes, all the Urdu postings will be shifted there. 

This will let the Blog: NotesFromPakistan.combe available wholly for English posts.

By Huzaima Bukhari & Dr Ikramul Haq

All is set for the executive board of the International Monetary Fund (MF) to consider Pakistan’s request for a fresh bailout package on September 4, 2013 after Islamabad has purportedly “fulfilled all prior requirements” — the IMF has already circulated amongst members the Letter of Intent (LoI) it received from Islamabad. Reportedly, though the IMF has agreed to provide $6.6 billion under the Extended Fund Facility (EFF), Islamabad is insisting on $7.3 billion confirming its insatiable ‘debt addiction’.

Finance Minister Ishaq Dar, in a news conference on August 26, 2013, revealed that “in the first year, the IMF will give $2.2 billion while we have to pay back over $3 billion.” He conceded that Pakistan had no option but to borrow $12 billion “to retire its previous debts”. Dar said the “most vital precondition of the IMF for broadening of

By Huzaima Bukhari and Dr Ikramul Haq  

[This article first appeared in the Business Recorder of August 30, 2013.]

In 1997 the slogan of Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) was ‘Qarz Utaro, Mulk Sanwaro’ [retire debt, adorn country], which is reversed in 2013 as all efforts are underway to increase public debt – both domestic and external. The new slogan appears to be ‘Qarz Burhao, Mulk Bigarho’ [increase debt, damage country].

People of Pakistan have yet not forgotten the fate of ‘Qarz Utaro, Mulk Sanwaro’ Scheme announced by Nawaz Sharif on February 23, 1997 along with declaring Friday as weekly holiday instead of Sunday within one week of assuming his second term as Prime Minister [February 17, 1997 to October 12, 1999]. The Government of Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) [PML-N] in its third term is using the same old tactics-misleading the people on economic issues.

Finance

[Cost: Lives of 45 citizens of Pakistan. Lesson Learned: Fokkers grounded for passengers services. Outcome: No one is responsible!]

This time the temptation is irresistible. Long ago perhaps 15 years back I happened to go along with some kids to an entertainment park in Lahore. We bought tickets to enjoy rides, etc, inside the park. The back of the tickets read as: Ride at your own risk. I was staggered: are not the people running this business responsible for any mishap? I decided to write on this way of avoiding/evading responsibility, and thought we had accepted this way of behaving as moral and normal. The stream of thought also suggested that it is just like living in Pakistanat one’s own risk. I took care of one of the tickets and have still this ticket safe with me as I keep my National Identity Card.

But as happens with almost

Matta: Change in the offing can be observed in many ways – in changing attitudes, changing congregations, changing social dynamics. The recent book fair in Matta – held from August 14 to August 15 – saw all that, and more.

[The Express Tribune, August 28, 2013]

With discounted books on subjects ranging from general knowledge to literature, the fair became much more than just a gathering. It came to symbolize a beacon of hope for the residents of this militancy-scarred area.

[The Express Tribune, August 28, 2013]

In this vein, the hundreds of visitors that attended came not just for the pages – they also came to reclaim their town, to reassert their choice: Books over bombs.

A heavy recent past

Tehsil Matta, which