Khuda Hafiz Dr Israr Ahmed 

Filed under: Blog on Thursday, April 15th, 2010 by Wasim | No Comments

The passing away of Dr Israr Ahmed is a loss I feel personally and a pain I bear with a heavy heart. Indeed writing a post on the fountain of knowledge that was Dr Israr Ahmed does not come easy. I draw solace from the fact that Pakistan and the Muslim masses at large are mourning the passing away of the greatest Islamic scholars to have graced us in recent times.

Dr Israr Ahmed was both passionate and principled and served Islam and Pakistan selflessly with distinction and without compromise. As a principled opponent to some of  his views I respected his views and his tolerance in hearing and responding to dissenting views with intellectual rigour demonstrating a knowledge of almost every field from physics to history. 

I personally became enchanted with Dr Israr Ahmed’s passion during a debate series on aspects of theology aired on ARY TV many years ago where he debated with Dr and Justice Javed Iqbal (the lucky son of Allama Iqbal) and Professor Mehdi Hasan, a Pakistani Historian par excellence. From that day nearly five years ago  to this day I have a fondness for all three men who have served Pakistan with distinction in their respective fields.

Tears are never far away as I mourn the passing of Dr Israr Ahmed. I will draw solace from knowing that Dr Israr Ahmed will be missed by millions across the world to whom he spoke to almost every day via his Dars-ul-Quran on Islamic TV channels such as Peace TV. 

A torch lit by luminaries like Allama Iqbal showed Dr Israr Ahmed the way and today Dr Israr Ahmed’s torch will show the next generation the way forward in achieving success in this world and the hereafter. May ALLAH grant Dr Israr Ahmed paradise and for his family and followers fortitude. 

Khuda Hafiz Dr Israr Ahmed Saab.

India’s Water Terrorism 

Filed under: Blog on Sunday, April 11th, 2010 by Wasim | 2 Comments

A post on India’s ‘water terrorism’ against Pakistan will not sit well amidst the supposed Pakistan-India love fest a la Shoaib Malik and Sania Mirza. It needs to be stated at the very start that Other Pakistan strongly supports peace and friendship between Pakistan and India, indeed a recent post detailed our support for the Aman ki Asha initiative as shown here.

That said it is fact that India has been far from a friend and more of a foe to Pakistan since 1947. A history lesson in Pakistan-India relations is not necessary for the scars of wars and water theft to name two irritants are still raw and painful today. It is the latter that is the subject of this post and relates to the Pakistani consensus regarding India’s water terrrorism against Pakistan. Water is no small or side issue, indeed water will make or break both Pakistan and India, even the much celebrated shining India!

Ayub Khan the first khaki king and dictator of Pakistan and India’s Jawaharlal Nehru signed the Indus Water Treaty in 1960 in Karachi as the photo above shows. The Indus Water Treaty is essentially a water-sharing treaty that mainly gave Pakistan rights to the Western rivers along the Indus River and the Eastern rivers to India. Since then the treaty has been violated unilaterally by India time and time again with violations to many to mention, Baglihar to Kishanganga being only two .

Many of the key aspects and disputes concerning India’s violation of the Indus Treaty are complex and technical. However an independent and expert analysis written by John Briscoe who is an World Bank water expert has recently been published in The News and I share it with a view to beginning a debate on this key issue and it is shared below:

War or peace on the Indus? by John Briscoe

Anyone foolish enough to write on war or peace in the Indus needs to first banish a set of immediate suspicions. I am neither Indian nor Pakistani. I am a South African who has worked on water issues in the subcontinent for 35 years and who has lived in Bangladesh (in the 1970s) and Delhi (in the 2000s). In 2006 I published, with fine Indian colleagues, an Oxford University Press book titled India’s Water Economy: Facing a Turbulent Future and, with fine Pakistani colleagues, one titled Pakistan’s Water Economy: Running Dry.

I was the Senior Water Advisor for the World Bank who dealt with the appointment of the Neutral Expert on the Baglihar case. My last assignment at the World Bank (relevant, as described later) was as Country Director for Brazil. I am now a mere university professor, and speak in the name of no one but myself.

I have deep affection for the people of both India and Pakistan, and am dismayed by what I see as a looming train wreck on the Indus, with disastrous consequences for both countries. I will outline why there is no objective conflict of interests between the countries over the waters of the Indus Basin, make some observations of the need for a change in public discourse, and suggest how the drivers of the train can put on the brakes before it is too late.

Is there an inherent conflict between India and Pakistan?

The simple answer is no. The Indus Waters Treaty allocates the water of the three western rivers to Pakistan, but allows India to tap the considerable hydropower potential of the Chenab and Jhelum before the rivers enter Pakistan.

The qualification is that this use of hydropower is not to affect either the quantity of water reaching Pakistan or to interfere with the natural timing of those flows. Since hydropower does not consume water, the only issue is timing. And timing is a very big issue, because agriculture in the Pakistani plains depends not only on how much water comes, but that it comes in critical periods during the planting season. The reality is that India could tap virtually all of the available power without negatively affecting the timing of flows to which Pakistan is entitled.

Is the Indus Treaty a stable basis for cooperation?

If Pakistan and India had normal, trustful relations, there would be a mutually-verified monitoring process which would assure that there is no change in the flows going into Pakistan. (In an even more ideal world, India could increase low-flows during the critical planting season, with significant benefit to Pakistani farmers and with very small impacts on power generation in India.) Because the relationship was not normal when the treaty was negotiated, Pakistan would agree only if limitations on India’s capacity to manipulate the timing of flows was hardwired into the treaty. This was done by limiting the amount of “live storage” (the storage that matters for changing the timing of flows) in each and every hydropower dam that India would construct on the two rivers.

While this made sense given knowledge in 1960, over time it became clear that this restriction gave rise to a major problem. The physical restrictions meant that gates for flushing silt out of the dams could not be built, thus ensuring that any dam in India would rapidly fill with the silt pouring off the young Himalayas.

This was a critical issue at stake in the Baglihar case. Pakistan (reasonably) said that the gates being installed were in violation of the specifications of the treaty. India (equally reasonably) argued that it would be wrong to build a dam knowing it would soon fill with silt. The finding of the Neutral Expert was essentially a reinterpretation of the Treaty, saying that the physical limitations no longer made sense. While the finding was reasonable in the case of Baglihar, it left Pakistan without the mechanism – limited live storage – which was its only (albeit weak) protection against upstream manipulation of flows in India. This vulnerability was driven home when India chose to fill Baglihar exactly at the time when it would impose maximum harm on farmers in downstream Pakistan.

If Baglihar was the only dam being built by India on the Chenab and Jhelum, this would be a limited problem. But following Baglihar is a veritable caravan of Indian projects – Kishanganga, Sawalkot, Pakuldul, Bursar, Dal Huste, Gyspa… The cumulative live storage will be large, giving India an unquestioned capacity to have major impact on the timing of flows into Pakistan. (Using Baglihar as a reference, simple back-of-the-envelope calculations, suggest that once it has constructed all of the planned hydropower plants on the Chenab, India will have an ability to effect major damage on Pakistan. First, there is the one-time effect of filling the new dams. If done during the wet season this would have little effect on Pakistan. But if done during the critical low-flow period, there would be a large one-time effect (as was the case when India filled Baglihar). Second, there is the permanent threat which would be a consequence of substantial cumulative live storage which could store about one month’s worth of low-season flow on the Chenab. If, God forbid, India so chose, it could use this cumulative live storage to impose major reductions on water availability in Pakistan during the critical planting season.

Views on “the water problem” from both sides of the border and the role of the press

Living in Delhi and working in both India and Pakistan, I was struck by a paradox. One country was a vigorous democracy, the other a military regime. But whereas an important part of the Pakistani press regularly reported India’s views on the water issue in an objective way, the Indian press never did the same. I never saw a report which gave Indian readers a factual description of the enormous vulnerability of Pakistan, of the way in which India had socked it to Pakistan when filling Baglihar. How could this be, I asked? Because, a journalist colleague in Delhi told me, “when it comes to Kashmir – and the Indus Treaty is considered an integral part of Kashmir — the ministry of external affairs instructs newspapers on what they can and cannot say, and often tells them explicitly what it is they are to say.”

This apparently remains the case. In the context of the recent talks between India and Pakistan I read, in Boston, the electronic reports on the disagreement about “the water issue” in The Times of India, The Hindustan Times, The Hindu, The Indian Express and The Economic Times. (Respectively, http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Water-Pakistans-diversionary-tactic-/articleshow/5609099.cms, http://beta.thehindu.com/news/national/ article112388.ece, http://www.hindustantimes.com/News-Feed/india/River-waters-The-next-testing-ground/Article1-512190.aspx, http://www.indianexpress.com/news/Pak-heats-up-water-sharing/583733, http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics/nation/Pak-takes-water-route-to-attack-India/articleshow/5665516.cms.)

Taken together, these reports make astounding reading. Not only was the message the same in each case (“no real issue, just Pakistani shenanigans”), but the arguments were the same, the numbers were the same and the phrases were the same. And in all cases the source was “analysts” and “experts” — in not one case was the reader informed that this was reporting an official position of the Government of India.

Equally depressing is my repeated experience – most recently at a major international meeting of strategic security institutions in Delhi – that even the most liberal and enlightened of Indian analysts (many of whom are friends who I greatly respect) seem constitutionally incapable of seeing the great vulnerability and legitimate concern of Pakistan (which is obvious and objective to an outsider).

A way forward

This is a very uneven playing field. The regional hegemon is the upper riparian and has all the cards in its hands. This asymmetry means that it is India that is driving the train, and that change must start in India. In my view, four things need to be done.

First, there must be some courageous and open-minded Indians – in government or out – who will stand up and explain to the public why this is not just an issue for Pakistan, but why it is an existential issue for Pakistan.

Second, there must be leadership from the Government of India. Here I am struck by the stark difference between the behaviour of India and that of its fellow BRIC – Brazil, the regional hegemon in Latin America.

Brazil and Paraguay have a binding agreement on their rights and responsibilities on the massive Itaipu Binacional Hydropower Project. The proceeds, which are of enormous importance to small Paraguay, played a politicised, polemical anti-Brazilian part in the recent presidential election in Paraguay. Similarly, Brazil’s and Bolivia’s binding agreement on gas also became part of an anti-Brazil presidential campaign theme.

The public and press in Brazil bayed for blood and insisted that Bolivia and Paraguay be made to pay. So what did President Luis Inacio Lula da Silva do? “Look,” he said to his irate countrymen, “these are poor countries, and these are huge issues for them. They are our brothers. Yes, we are in our legal rights to be harsh with them, but we are going to show understanding and generosity, and so I am unilaterally doubling (in the case of Paraguay) and tripling (in the case of Bolivia) the payments we make to them. Brazil is a big country and a relatively rich one, so this will do a lot for them and won’t harm us much.” India could, and should, in my view, similarly make the effort to see it from its neighbour’s point of view, and should show the generosity of spirit which is an integral part of being a truly great power and good neighbour.

Third, this should translate into an invitation to Pakistan to explore ways in which the principles of the Indus Waters Treaty could be respected, while providing a win for Pakistan (assurance on their flows) and a win for India (reducing the chronic legal uncertainty which vexes every Indian project on the Chenab or Jhelum). With good will there are multiple ways in which the treaty could be maintained but reinterpreted so that both countries could win.

Fourth, discussions on the Indus waters should be de-linked from both historic grievances and from the other Kashmir-related issues. Again, it is a sign of statesmanship, not weakness, to acknowledge the past and then move beyond it. This is personal for me, as someone of Irish origin. Conor Cruise O’Brien once remarked, “Santayana said that those who did not learn their history would be condemned to repeat it; in the case of Ireland we have learned our history so well that we are condemned to repeat it, again and again.”

And finally, as a South African I am acutely aware that Nelson Mandela, after 27 years in prison, chose not to settle scores but to look forward and construct a better future, for all the people of his country and mine. Who will be the Indian Mandela who will do this – for the benefit of Pakistanis and Indians – on the Indus?

The Briscoe article and its conclusions are clear, Pakistan and India can make peace or war over the Indus. The drumbeats of war over water in South Asia are becoming louder as Pakistan suffers from an acute shortage of water thanks to India. Therefore it is vital that Pakistan and India act as per the Indus water treaty as war will serve no purpose for both countries, for the Pakistani government it is high time they deal with the India’s water terrorism as priority number one, anything less will be a betrayal to the nation.

Hail The 18th Amendment 

Filed under: Blog on Monday, April 5th, 2010 by Wasim | No Comments

Today President Zardari will address both houses of Parliament and will hail the 18th constitutional amendment and I hail it too. Credit goes to the PPP government for achieving this milestone in returning power to the parliament and the prime minister. Above all credit goes to the much sneered at committee for constitutional reforms headed by Raza Rabbani.

The consensus achieved by Raza Rabbani’s committee in complex often controversial policy areas such as provincial autonomy, judicial appointments and the role of the executive shows that the political class in Pakistan has matured and can act in the national interest. The 18th amendment will renew the 1973 Constitution and rid it of its anomalies planted by many a khaki king during their evil dictatorships. The key reforms as listed by Dawn include the following:

  1. Repeal the Legal Framework Order of 2002, along with its amendments, as having been issued without lawful authority, as well as the 17th Amendment of 2003 based on it.
  2. Amend Article 1 to rename the NWFP as Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
  3. Amend Article 6 to include suspension of the Constitution and putting it in abeyance among acts of high treason which no court will validate.
  4. New article 10A to confer right to fair trial.
  5. New article 19A to give every citizen the right to access to information in all matters of public importance.
  6. Article 25A to make the state provide free and compulsory education to all children aged five to 16 years.
  7. President to act on the prime minister’s advice to dissolve the National Assembly, set a date for the general election and appoint a caretaker government.
  8. Repeal Article 58(2)B empowering the president to dissolve the National Assembly.
  9. Amend Article 59 to increase Senate seats to 104 from the present 100 with one representing non-Muslim minorities from each province.
  10. Amend Article 61 to increase working days of Senate in a parliamentary year to 110 from 90.
  11. Amend Article 70 and omit Article 71 to do away with provisions for the constitution of a mediation committee in case of difference between the two houses on a bill and revert to calling a joint sitting of parliament in such an event.
  12. Amend Article 89 to bar promulgation of an ordinance when either of the two houses is in session, rather than only the National Assembly, and restrict re-promulgation to only one time and that too in compliance with a resolution of either house.
  13. New article 90 to substitute previous one to provide for exercise of the executive authority of the federation “in the name of the president by the federal government consisting of the prime minister and federal ministers, which shall act through the prime minister, who shall be the chief executive of the federation”. Abolish the concurrent legislative list and some subjects in the federal list 1 included in federal list.
  14. Amend Article 92 to restrict the strength of the federal cabinet, after the next election, to 11 per cent of total members of parliament and of the provincial cabinets to 15 members or 11 per cent of an assembly, whichever is higher, and of advisers of the prime minister or chief minister to a maximum of five.
  15. Amend Article 101 to provide for a provincial governor to be the resident and voter of the same province.
  16. Amend Article 104 to provide for a speaker of a provincial assembly to be acting governor.
  17. Amend Article 127 to increase working days of provincial assemblies to 100 days from 70 days.
  18. Amend Articles 153 and 154 to provide for the Council of Common Interests to consist of the prime minister, provincial chief ministers and three members from the federal government to be nominated by the prime minister, have a permanent secretariat and meet at least once in 90 days.
  19. Amend Article 157 to bind the federal government to consult a province’s government before deciding on the construction of a hydro-electric power station there.
  20. Amend Article 160 to provide for the share of provinces in each NFC award not being less than given them in the previous award.
  21. Amend Article 167 to authorise provinces to raise domestic and international loans or give guarantees on the security of the provincial consolidated fund within limits and conditions specified by the National Economic Council.
  22. Amend Articles 168 and 171 to set auditor-general’s tenure at four years and to provide that the auditor-general’s reports will come to both houses of parliament.
  23. Amend Article 175 to provide that, subject to existing commitments, mineral and oil and natural gas within a province or its adjacent territorial waters “shall vest jointly and equally in that province and the federal government”.
  24. New article 175A to provide for the constitution of a seven-member judicial commission — for naming judges for appointment to superior courts to be confirmed by a parliamentary committee — consisting of the chief justice (chairman) and two senior-most judges of the Supreme court, a former chief justice or judge of the same court to be nominated by the chief justice, federal minister for law and justice, the attorney-general and a senior advocate of the Supreme Court to be nominated by the Pakistan Bar Council for two years.
  25. Amend Article 213 to provide for the prime minister to send, in consultation with the leader of opposition in the National Assembly, three names to a parliamentary committee for confirmation of one of them as the chief election commissioner and in case of difference, both of them to send separate lists.
  26. Amend Article 232 to provide for declaration of emergency after a resolution passed by the assembly of that province and that if the president declares emergency “on his own”, the proclamation to be presented before both houses of parliament for approval within 10 days.
  27. Amend Article 242 to provide for appointment of the chairman of the Federal Public Service Commission by the president on the advice of the prime minister and of the chairman of a provincial commission by the governor concerned on chief minister’s advice.
  28. New article 243 to provide for appointment of chairman of the joint chiefs of staff committee and chiefs of staff of the army, navy and air force by the president on the advice of the prime minister.
  29. Repeal Article 268 containing the Sixth Schedule.

The amendments are not all to my pleasing however as a democrat I support the consensus document and praise the Raza Rabbani committee for doing great work in the service of Pakistan.

Indeed I finish by paying tribute to all of the member by their name, the PPP’s Raja Pervez Ashraf, Babar Awan, Haji Lashkari Raeesani and Mian Raza Rabbani, PML-N’s Ishaq Dar, Sardar Mehtab Ahmad Khan and Hassan Iqbal, PML-Q’s Wasim Sajjad, S.M. Zafar and Humayun Saifullah Khan, Muttahida’s Dr Farooq Sattar and Haider Abbas Rizvi (MQM), Afrasayab Khattak and Haji Muhammad Adeel (ANP), Rehmatullah Kakar (JUI-F), Justice (retd) Abdur Razzaq Thaheem (PML-F), Srarullah Zehri (BNP-A), Prof Khurshid Ahmad (Jamaat-i-Islami), Mir Hasil Bizenjo (NP), Aftab Ahmad Khan Sherpao (PPP-S), Abdul Rahim Mandokhel (PMAP), Shahid Hasan Bugti (JWP) and Munir Khan Orazkzai (Fata).

The fact that the Balochi, Sindhi, Pukhtun and Punjabi have all worked to achieve consensus bodes well for the future of Pakistan and its federation. Pakistan Zindabad.

March 2010′s B-side 

Filed under: Blog on Tuesday, March 30th, 2010 by Wasim | No Comments

March 2010′s B-side enters new territory in its coverage of a religious edict in the form of a fatwa  The missing persons of Pakistan are in the spotlight whilst the final article evaluates the Obama policy for Pakistan. March 2010′s B-side contents include:

  • My Fatwa Against the Terrorists Creed by DR TAHIR UL QADRI
  • Into the Terrifying World of Pakistan’s Disappeared by ROBERT FISK
  • Victory for Obama from an Unlikely Quarter-Pakistan by FAREED ZAKARIA

Religious edicts in the form of a fatwa, do not make news too often. A fatwa issued by Dr Tahir ul Qadri has made headline news and rightly so.

My Fatwa Against the Terrorists Creed by Dr Tahir ul Qadri

I have been compelled to issue a fatwa – a comprehensive theological refutation of Islamist terrorism – because of what has been happening in Pakistan over the past year. Terrorists are bombing mosques during Friday prayers, they are burning schools, killing women. They are digging bodies out of graves, cutting off their heads and hanging the bodies from trees.

My 600-page fatwa is based on all four schools of jurisprudence: Hanafi, Shafii, Hanbali and Maliki, and the Shia school of Jafari. I have consulted hundreds of classical Islamic texts, the scholars, fiqh and the Hadith. The main theme is this: any act of terrorism such as suicide bombing cannot be justified in any way. There are no conditions, no pretexts or exemptions. It is condemned by the Quran and the Sunna.

Killing Muslims and non-Muslims through terrorist activities and using violent aggression to impose their mistaken and misplaced ideology is a fundamental rejection of faith. Such acts make the people carrying out the attacks unbelievers, or kufr.

Some scholars have said to me that we know suicide bombing is forbidden but to say that this is an act of an unbeliever is going far. I am not saying anyone who kills is an unbeliever. I say one who is committing acts of terrorism on the basis that it is sanctioned and lawful by Islam is an unbeliever.

The Quran says those who kill in mosques, burn people, blow them up, they will suffer the torments of hellfire. This is one aspect.

A second aspect I have examined is the justification that Muslim rulers in Arab countries or non-Muslims are not enforcing Islamic law so there is an obligation to fight against them. This is absolutely wrong. In no context is any organisation allowed to take up arms on their own and say we are defending Muslim land or we are avenging the aggression of non-Muslim powers. This is a matter for a state and its government.

The holy Prophet Mohammed told his companions that bad rulers would come and the people would curse them and the rulers would curse their people. The companions asked should they not fight them with swords if this time comes? And the holy Prophet said that no, they were not allowed as far as they were Muslims.

As for adopting the defence that the attacks are against foreign aggression, this is the privilege and responsibility of the state to stand up and to fight according to international law. If groups and individuals start taking revenge it will create global anarchy and there will be no rule of law, there will be just killing of mankind.

There is a prophecy of the Prophet Mohammed. He mentioned that the Kharijites would emerge continuously in Islamic history. The Kharijites believed that whoever did not agree with their philosophy was an unbeliever and should be killed. They wanted to resolve everything through the sword and through power. They rose up in the time of the rightly guided Caliphs, Usman and Ali, and fought against them.

This hadith, which appears in dozens of books, says the holy Prophet Mohammed said they would emerge again and again in different centuries until the final time of the anti-Christ. They would arrive more than 20 times. They would keep changing names and appear for the last time as part of the anti-Christ’s army. They would slaughter people.

Al Qa’eda is an old evil with a new name. They are the Kharijites with a new name. They are misguided today like the Khawarij youth were misguided at that time. They were brainwashed although they were religious people who prayed and fasted.

Those who have already decided to become suicide bombers are totally brainwashed. I exclude them from this discussion because they are blind. I am trying to reach the majority who have not reached that stage but have extremist tendencies and are proceeding in that direction.

There are thousands of extremists running websites and applying misguided ideas. The radicals who have no access to classical authorities are misguided and give the wrong concept of jihad. This religious ruling is particularly important for Britain and the western world, where the majority of Muslims are of south Asian origin.

We have seen examples of extremist groups targeting vulnerable young people from these communities to carry out their acts of violence – from training them as suicide bombers to brainwashing students across British universities. I am sure that the hundreds of authorities I have quoted will allow them to rethink, to see that whatever they were taught was wrong.

The fatwa has appeared in Urdu, and English and Arabic translations have been started. It will be translated into many other languages and distributed through the internet accompanied by videos, summaries and talks. We will do whatever is possible to reach the youth with the Almighty Allah’s help and grace.

Already it is happening. We have been contacted by the Afghan president Hamid Karzai’s office and they want a copy to translate into Persian and Pashto. And so it will go.

There have been many other fatwas that condemn suicide bombings and there have been verbal resolutions against it. They were very brief, maybe one or two pages signed by hundreds of scholars and they did not contain many references. These brief declarations were not able to answer the questions or address all the concerns. I thought there was a need to address every major concern, every major and minor aspect which has already been planted in people’s minds.

In Pakistan, some religious scholars have condemned the military action in the Swat valley and North-West Frontier Province, or they have said they already have condemned suicide bombings and acts of terrorism. Some have felt they have fulfilled their duty. But by simply condemning the Pakistani military action or staying silent they are creating doubt in the minds of the common people and youth.

While Muslims resist and fight terrorism and are not ready to accept its remotest possible link with Islam, there are some who are also seen supporting it. Instead of opposing and condemning it openly they confuse the issue.

After this fatwa more scholars will become courageous and stand up.

A few are scared. A friend of mine who recently condemned suicide bombing in Pakistan was assassinated.

This grand fatwa, when it is in the hands of everybody, will give people courage, clarity and motivation.

Published in The National

WASIM VIEW- Suicide bombing is a Satanic curse that haunts Pakistan and the wider Muslim world daily. It is an act of rebellion against ALLAH and a crime against humanity and is haraam or forbidden in Islam. Thus the detailed fatwa against suicide bombing by Dr Tahir ul Qadri’s is most welcome and the need of the hour.

Qadri’s fatwa is coined by him to be a ‘grand fatwa’ and it is grand because it is ‘a comprehensive theological refutation of Islamist terrorism’. A comprehensive 600-page fatwa based on all four schools of Islamic jurisprudence found that ‘any act of terrorism such as suicide bombing cannot be justified in any way. There are no conditions, no pretexts or exemptions. It is condemned by the Quran and the Sunna’.

Qadri’s fatwa is a great service to Islam, because it reaffirms the Islamic viewpoint and tackles head-on the Muslim apologists for terrorism as well as those supporting Jihadi enterprises across the world. Qadri makes it crystal clear for all when he declares that ‘killing Muslims and non-Muslims through terrorist activities and using violent aggression to impose their mistaken and misplaced ideology is a fundamental rejection of faith. Such acts make the people carrying out the attacks unbelievers, or kufr. I say one who is committing acts of terrorism on the basis that it is sanctioned and lawful by Islam is an unbeliever’.

The modern day Muslim delight in undertaking jihad across borders is also tackled head-on especially the justification that Muslim rulers in Arab countries or non-Muslims are not enforcing Islamic law so there is an obligation to fight against them. Qadri rightly declares this ‘as absolutely wrong, in no context is any organisation allowed to take up arms on their own and say we are defending Muslim land or we are avenging the aggression of non-Muslim powers. This is a matter for a state and its government’.

Qadri too rules on acts of foreign aggression and states clearly that ‘this is the privilege and responsibility of the state to stand up and to fight according to international law. If groups and individuals start taking revenge it will create global anarchy and there will be no rule of law, there will be just killing of mankind’. Qadri’s labelling of Al-Qaeda as the infamous and doomed Kharijites is noted especially when he declares ‘Al Qa’eda as an old evil with a new name, they are misguided today like the Khawarij youth were misguided at that time. They were brainwashed although they were religious people who prayed and fasted’.

Qadri’s fatwa is comprehensive and a must read for all Muslims as it can serve to save the fools amongst us our midst especially those in Pakistan who apologise for the Taliban. The universal acclaim the fatwa has received is well deserved and I am encouraged to know that it is being translated in many languages. Dr Tahir ul Qadri has served humanity and Islam in authoring the grand fatwa against suicide bombing, terrorism and Al-Qaeda and I commend him for his efforts.

The second article is more of a report written by one of my favourite journalists, indeed he is an institution, Robert Fisk.

Into the Terrifying World of Pakistan’s Disappeared by Robert Fisk

If you want to know how brutally Pakistan treats its people, you should meet Amina Janjua. An intelligent painter and interior designer, she sits on the vast sofa of her living room in Rawalpindi – a room that somehow accentuates her loneliness – scarf wound tightly round her head, serving tea and biscuits like the middle-class woman she is. And although neither a soldier nor a policeman has ever laid a hand on her, she is a victim of her country’s cruel oppression. Because, five years ago, her husband Masood became one of Pakistan’s “disappeared”.

It is a scandal and a disgrace and, of course, a crime against humanity. Ask not where Masood Janjua has gone – Amina does ask, of course, all the way up to the President – for he has entered that dark world wherein dwell up to 8,000 of Pakistan’s missing citizens, men, for the most part, seized from their homes or from the streets by cops and soldiers on the orders of spies and intelligence agents and Americans since 11 September, 2001. In Lahore alone, there are 120 “torture houses” just for the missing of the Punjab. Their shrieks of pain from the basements could be heard by residents – who complained only that the buildings might provoke bomb attacks. In Pakistan today, preservation counts for more than compassion.

Masood Janjua was 44 when he was “disappeared” on 30 July 2005. He ran an IT college and a travel agency, the father of two boys – Mohamed and Ali, and a girl, Aisha. He just never came home. Nobody saw what happened. Amina, who was 40 at the time, glows when she speaks of him. “We were so extremely close, so happy, our world was so heavenly – we were always visiting friends, having parties at home. He was so caring and kind to our children, so affectionate. That he should be taken from me! I think it was a very big mistake that they did. But when they do it – like this – they never say they were wrong.”

“They”. Everyone I talk to here talks about “they”. Many refuse to talk in case it provokes “them” to undertake a quick execution. “They” is the Inter-Services Intelligence. “They” is military intelligence. “They” are the Americans, some of them present – according to the few “disappeared” who have been released – during torture sessions. The Defence of Human Rights Pakistan (DHRP), the movement which Amina founded with 25 other bereft families, has gathered evidence of English-speaking interrogators who calmly ask victims questions during their torment. Ironically, Amina lives in a military district of Rawalpindi, beside an old British barracks, where US soldiers are observed in Pakistani uniforms – sometimes female American soldiers dressed, so she says, in the uniforms of Pakistani military paramedics.

Even more ironic was the first word she had of her husband after he disappeared. “When I went to the Supreme Court to demand his return, witnesses came forward to say they saw Masood inside an army barracks here in Rawalpindi, very close to his family. Just think – it was within walking distance from our home! He was inside a cell at 111 Brigade barracks. It was so sad for me – it was as if they were being cynical, to keep him so close to his family.”

Amina Janjua found that one of the court witnesses lived in Peshawar and she travelled to the North West Frontier Province to speak to him five months after her husband disappeared. “He had been in the army facility in Rawalpindi. The prisoners were kept in solitary confinement and only when they were taken to the lavatory did they come close to other prisoners. They were forced to wear big hoods – hoods that went right down and covered their shoulders – and the detainees would get no chance to talk to another human being. This man said my husband was there – he even heard the guard call him ‘Janjua’.”

There is evidence that Pakistan’s “disappeared” are moved around, between barracks and interrogation centres and underground torture facilities in different towns and cities. There are also terrible rumours – fostered, some say, by the security authorities – that the army has thrown detainees from helicopters, that the cops dispose of bodies at night by dumping them in swamps or in open countryside so that decay and animal mutilation will cover the marks of torture before the bodies are found. But Amina Janjua believes most of them are alive. You might say she has to believe that.

“After 9/11, everyone was worried. People were ruthlessly disappeared after the New York attacks. No one knew why their loved ones were taken. The first few months were like hell for me. Then I regained my consciousness and said I could not accept all this. I said I would fight. I said I would get my husband back.” Brave words. Brave lady.

So she turned to the only brave institution still fighting in Pakistan: the lawyers and the judges and the courts. So far, the Supreme Court in Islamabad and the Lahore High Court have squeezed around 200 detainees out of the maw of the country’s security apparatus – those, that is, who were still in Pakistan. Many are known to have been freighted off to the tender mercies of the Americans at Bagram in Afghanistan, where Arab detainees have long ago testified to being beaten and sodomised with broom sticks. There have been prisoner murders, too, in Bagram, the jail that President Barack Obama refuses to close.

“At the beginning, I went to the International Red Cross about Masood,” Amina Janjua says. “I saw them over several months. There was no progress. My father-in-law went to many people, he even went to President Musharraf – he trained in the military with Musharraf and they knew each other very well – and Musharraf said, ‘I will do something for you’– but he never did. After that, when we called the President’s house, they would start avoiding us. We wrote to all the Pakistan intelligence agencies. All said my husband could not be found.”

Many families have been given false hopes. “In some villages way out in the country,” Amina recalls, “families were told by the authorities that their sons were coming home. These were poor people but they were so happy, so delighted. They would hold a party and give out sweets and slaughter valuable animals to show their happiness. But then the sons didn’t come home. Can you imagine treating people like this?”

Amina Janjua’s fraudulent hope came in a phone call in 2006, a year after Masood’s disappearance. “We had our first breakthrough when the military secretary of the President called Masood’s father to say that his son was alive and that they had heard about him, though he had been ill – in a fever. That was our first sign of relief.

“Then he started avoiding us again. There was no message after that. Then we were told ‘No, he is not with us, but we are making every effort because the President has made this request to help you.’ I went on asking senior people in the army what had happened to my husband, and they – I put it like this – they started shivering. They would shudder. They could not disclose any information.”

Teaching herself law and fighting her own case, Amina Janjua returned to the Supreme Court. “When I did this, I started hearing of many other cases and things that are happening. And that’s when I realised. It’s not about ‘missing’ people – this is about abduction. I started organising files on these abducted people and eventually I had 788 families on my list and I started conducting research. And we got about 200 prisoners released. The courts ordered this. They were all still in Pakistan. Others, we know, had been taken to Bagram, three or four to Guantanamo Bay where at least we knew they were alive.”

But Amina’s research could prove terrifying. She discovered not only that abducted men were alive. They were also dead. “I suspected some of them had died,” she said. “I know of three prisoners who are dead. One was Mohamed Shafiq; he was a coach driver and they released his death certificate – it said he died of ‘some illness’. He was in his 40s. One of the prisoners, a businessman called Said Menon, died shortly after he was released.

“All of the 200 we got released had been tortured. Initially, it was very ruthless – they were not allowed to sleep; there were beatings and thrashings; they were hanged upside down. There was loud music. There were actual torture rooms where the things were done to them. The prisoners told us they didn’t think their torturers were human beings at all. The faces of the torturers, they said, were horrifying. It was no longer a real world for them. The torturers seemed so powerful, like monsters, so big.”

The questions they were asked were repetitive, according to Amina Janjua. Where are the guns? Where are the weapons? Where is Mullah Omar? Two prisoners described to Amina’s committee how they were made to wear orange jumpsuits, shaven till they were bald and taken for questioning to Islamabad. “They were interrogated by foreigners – they could see them. They were English-speaking. They didn’t know if they were Americans or British.”

The DHRP now holds public protests in all the cities of Pakistan where the prisoners have their homes – in Lahore, Sagoda, Quetta, Faisalabad, Karachi, Peshawar – but the families focus on Islamabad where they demonstrate their fury and their anguish outside the Supreme Court and the offices of President Asif Ali Zardari and the Prime Minister, Yousuf Raza Gilani. The DHRP files show that there are 1,700 missing from Baluchistan alone. At least 4,000 appear to be in the hands of the Pakistani interior ministry, while 2,000 have been handed over to what the DHRP describes as “foreign agencies” – usually, the Americans. Perhaps 750 of the missing Pakistanis are believed to have been taken by the Americans – illegally, of course – to Bagram, the Policharki prison outside Kabul, or to Herat in western Afghanistan.

Published in The Independent

WASIM VIEW- Robert Fisk is an a colossus in the field of journalism and one of the most respected journalists in his field. Fisk is in Pakistan at present and he is very welcome as are his writings.

Fisk reports on the missing people of Pakistan and the story of Mohammed Janjua who disappeared during Musharraf’s rule and remain missing today. Fisk is right to declare this as the brutality of the Pakistani state and right again in declaring such evil as a crime against humanity.

The real news of the Fisk report is that it brings to focus the true cost of 9/11 which is felt in Pakistan to this day.  Writing for a mainly Western audience, his readers will benefit from knowing how Pakistani citizens have had to pay for 9/11 in drones and in the disappearances of ordinary citizens. Thus the real cost of the 9/11 revenge war are laid bare in Fisk’s writings and it is this, ordinary Pakistanis have paid and continue to pay the highest price.

The final article is written by Fareed Zakaria who looks at the never-ending headache, Pakistan-US relations.

A Victory for Obama from an Unlikely Quarter-Pakistan by Fareed Zakaria

President Obama gets much credit for changing America’s image in the world—he was probably awarded the Nobel Prize for doing so. But if you asked even devoted fans to cite a specific foreign-policy achievement, they would probably hesitate. “It’s too soon for that,” they would say. But in fact, there is a place where Barack Obama’s foreign policy is working, and one that is crucial to U.S. national security—Pakistan.

There has been a spate of good news coming out of that complicated country, which has long promised to take action against Islamic militants but rarely done so. (The reason: Pakistan has used many of these same militants to destabilize its traditional foe, India, and to gain influence in Afghanistan.) Over the past few months, the Pakistani military has engaged in serious and successful operations in the militant havens of Swat, Malakand, South Waziristan, and Bajaur. Some of these areas are badlands where no Pakistani government has been able to establish its writ, so the achievement is all the more important. The Pakistanis have also ramped up their intelligence sharing with the U.S. This latter process led to the arrest a month ago of Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, the deputy leader of the Afghan Taliban, among other Taliban figures.

Some caveats: most of the Taliban who have been captured are small fish, and the Pakistani military has a history of “catching and releasing” terrorists so that they can impress Americans but still maintain their ties with the militants. But there does seem to be a shift in Pakistani behavior. Why it’s taken place and how it might continue is a case study in the nature and limits of foreign-policy successes.

First, the Obama administration de-fined the problem correctly. Senior ad-ministration officials stopped referring to America’s efforts in Afghanistan and instead spoke constantly of “AfPak,” to emphasize the notion that success in Afghanistan depended on actions taken in Pakistan. This dismayed the Pakistanis but they got the message. They were on notice to show they were part of the solution, not the problem.

Second, the administration used both sticks and carrots. For his first state dinner, Obama pointedly invited Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh—clearly not Pakistan’s first choice. Obama made clear that America would continue to pursue the special relationship forged with India under the Bush administration, including a far-reaching deal on nuclear cooperation. But at the same time, the White House insisted it wanted a deep, long-term, and positive relationship with Pakistan. Sens. John Kerry and Dick Lugar put together the largest nonmilitary package of U.S. assistance for the country ever. Aid to the Pakistani military is also growing rapidly.

Third, it put in time and effort. The administration has adopted what Central Command’s Gen. David Petraeus calls a “whole of government” approach to Pakistan. All elements of U.S. power and diplomacy have been deployed. Pakistan has received more than 25 visits by senior administration officials in the past year, all pushing the Pakistani military to deliver on commitments to fight the militants.

Finally, as always, luck and timing have played a key role. The militants in Pakistan, like those associated with Al Qaeda almost everywhere, went too far, brutally killing civilians, shutting down girls’ schools, and creating an atmosphere of medievalism. Pakistan’s public, which had tended to downplay the problem of terrorism, now saw it as “Pakistan’s war.” The Army, reading the street, felt it had to show results.

These results are still tentative. Pakistan’s military retains its obsession with India—how else to justify a vast budget in a small, poor nation? It has still not acted seriously against any of the major militant groups active against Afghanistan, India, or the United States. The Afghan Taliban, the Haqqani group, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, Lashkar-e-Taiba, and many smaller groups all operate with impunity within Pakistan. But the Pakistani military is doing more than it has before, and that counts as success in the world of foreign policy.

Such success will endure only if the Obama administration keeps at it. There are some who believe that Pakistan has changed its basic strategy and now understands that it should cut its ties to these groups altogether. Strangely this naive view is held by the U.S. military, whose top brass have spent so many hours with their counterparts in Islamabad that they’ve gone native. It’s up to Obama and his team to remind the generals that pressing Pakistan is a lot like running on a treadmill. If you stop, you move backward, and, most likely, you fall down.

Published in Newsweek

WASIM VIEW- Fareed Zakaria is an Indian-American foreign policy analyst who has struggled to contain his loyalties to both flags in the article above. The Indian view on Pakistan and her alleged terrorism against India comes through in each paragraph, implied politely amidst the big story of President Obama’s success in Pakistan which Zakaria deems to be deserving  of a round of applause.

Zakaria bases his views on the recent successes against the Taliban and he is right to highlight improved Pakistan-US coordination in intelligence and military circles. However such successes are arbitary and come and go, as do the more regular bouts of mistrust in the world of Pakistan-US relations. For a respected foreign policy analyst like Zakaria to declare recent successes as the almost final word on Pakistan being a successful foreign policy experiment for Obama is plain and simple, an untruth.

Evidence against Zakaria’s hypothesis is plentiful with the much sexed-up Pakistan-US strategic dialogue of recent days ending with laughs and very little in substance. Zakaria should rather take note that the Obama Administration are failing in Pakistan with every drone attack that degrades Pakistan and  increases the body count of innocents,. These are ordinary Pakistanis who have perished and will perish in the coming months of April and May and many moons thereafter, die only to feed the monster of revenge that is America, and this is success?

Pakistan Zindabad 

Filed under: Blog on Thursday, March 25th, 2010 by Wasim | No Comments

GUEST BLOG by Nadeem Arif Najmi

Pakistan Zindabaad

Baad qurbaniyon ka jo mila saibaan

Zindabaad

Pakistan Zindabaad

 

Shaheedon ke lahoo main likhi dastaan

Zindaabaad

Pakistan Zindabaad

 

Qadar vaali raat ka tohfa

rehmath e ramazaan

Zindabaad

Pakistan Zindabaad

 

Islam ka qilaa, shaan e musalman

Zindabaad

Pakistan Zindabaad

 

Iqbal ke khwabon ki takmeel

Quaid ka azeem ehsaan

Zindabaad

Pakistan Zindabaad

 

Yeh baat teek hai mayoosi hai har suu lekin

Ghabratha nahin musibath main musalman

Zindabaad

Pakistan Zindabaad

70 Years of The Pakistani Dream 

Filed under: Blog on Tuesday, March 23rd, 2010 by Wasim | No Comments

Today we mark 70 years of a dream called Pakistan. It is a day that should serve as a day of renewal, a day to renew our Pakistaniat and our love of Pakistan.

It is also a day to stand together and above all a day when we decide as individuals and as a collective that we will realise the dream of Pakistan. It is a Pakistan, dreamt by Allama Iqbal that would above all provide bread for the poor. It is a Pakistan comprising of Pakistanis united on faith, unity and discipline as envisioned by the Quaid-e-Azam.

An effort by Geo TV shows us the way in how we can all unite as Pakistanis, with Geo bringing together Pakistan’s music talent to sing the national anthem with one voice. The words of the national anthem and Geo TV’s effort in uniting Pakistan show us the way forward for Pakistan and it is shared below:

 

The journey behind Geo TV’s effort is even more inspiring and it is shared too courtesy of Adil Najam of ATP who has drawn my attention to it.

Pakistan Zindabad

Hunza Landslide Threatens Pakistan 

Filed under: Blog on Thursday, March 18th, 2010 by Wasim | 10 Comments

The people of Hunza in Gilgit-Baltistan have had many, indeed too many a sleepless night since January after suffering a massive landslide in Attabad. The impact of the landslide has been considerable and has led to the forming of a natural dam in the Hunza River forming a lake that is consuming villages as it moves upstream.

Catastrophic effects are feared if the dam breaks with a tsunami-like flash flood of up to 20 metres high being feared which will have the potential to devastate not just the heaven that is Hunza, but Pakistan more widely as far and wide as the Tarbela Dam. In such a calamity, experts on the issue opine that the water would sweep down from an altitude of nearly 2,500 metres, being replenished by first the Gilgit River and then the Indus, before hurtling down the narrow northern stretches of the Indus Valley towards the Tarbela Dam, 40km north-west of Islamabad.

Indeed British colonial records from the 19th century report that two similar incidents caused flash floods that killed several thousand people and inundated huge areas of modern Pakistan. One, in 1858, was near the current disaster zone created a dam and a resulting lake appeared, one larger than the one in 2010 and history records show that when the dam broke, it unleashed a torrent of water that lasted for days and swept past Attock Fort, a few hundred miles south.

The lazy and lethargic PPP government has finally shown some interest in dealing with the impending disaster and has tasked the Army’s Frontier Works Organisation to level grounds with a view to making a spillway for the water to pour through. According to Dawn who have led the way in their media coverage as seen here, workers have removed more than 130,000 cubic yards (100,000 cubic meters) of debris with officials hoping the spillway will be open by mid-April.

A media report carried in The National sheds more light on the challenge of saving Hunza from the flash flood and it is shared below:

Race to Save Pakistan’s Shangri-La Valley from Devasting Flash Flood

Army engineers are battling against time and the threat of seismic shakes to save a 500km stretch of northern Pakistan from being devastated by a potential flash flood. The threat has been building since January 4, when a massive landslide temporarily dammed a river in the mountainous area of Hunza, widely believed to be the inspiration for the fictional kingdom of Shangri-La, creating a lake that continues to rise steadily.

The landslide removed 120 metres of mountainside, destroyed the village of Ata-abad, killing 19 residents, isolated 25,000 residents upriver from the landslide-dam, and severed a two-kilometre stretch of the Karakorum Highway, Pakistan’s only land link with China. The temporary lake, fed by glacia meltwaters, has since grown dramatically, and now stretches 15km back from the blockage, and is more than 70 metres deep.

Engineers of the army’s Frontier Works Organisation have been working since last month on the construction of a spillway that authorities hope will gradually drain the water.Scientists said the lake could grow to 20km in length by the onset of summer as, from April onwards, rising temperatures would significantly increase glacial melt and water flow into the lake. Although the scientists, who have surveyed the site, have endorsed the engineers’ strategy, they warn that the instability of the dam made the eventual outcome unpredictable and potentially disastrous. The 900-metre-long mass of landslide debris that formed the dam is largely made up of powder-like sediments.

David Petley, director of the International Landslide Centre at Durham University in the United Kingdom said: “The most likely scenario is that the water will flow over the dam when it reaches the top. The other scenario is that the overflow could wash away the top of the dam, after which there would be rapid erosion and collapse. It’s very difficult to forecast, “it would be a prudent conclusion to assume the worst when the water reaches the top, at which point it would be sensible to evacuate all the people downstream”. He stressed that a flash flood was “by no means an inevitability”, but historical evidence and a report submitted by Nespak, a state engineering firm, have highlighted the potential for disaster.

The National Disaster Management Authority, which is overseeing recovery efforts in Hunza, has told local legislators that the collapse of the dam would send a 20-metre-high tsunami-like flash flood crashing down the Hunza Valley. In that event, the water would sweep down from an altitude of nearly 2,500 metres, being replenished by first the Gilgit River and then the Indus, before hurtling down the narrow northern stretches of the Indus Valley towards the Tarbela Dam, 40km north-west of Islamabad. British colonial records from the 19th century report that two similar incidents caused flash floods that killed several thousand people and inundated huge areas of modern Pakistan.

The force of the flash flood would wreak catastrophic damage, destroying all communities and infrastructure, including most of the Karakorum Highway, a marvel of modern engineering built between 1966 and 1978 that ended centuries of isolation for the people of the region, now known as Gilgit-Baltistan, the scientists said.

The region is also among the most seismically active in the world because it is located at the junction of the Asian and Indian geological plates, where the Himalaya, Karakorum and Hindu Kush mountain ranges meet. Much of it sits upon an island plate squeezed between the two continental landmasses, when they collided hundreds of millions of years ago.

The danger of a massive landslide at Ata-abad had been apparent since February 2003, when a huge crack appeared in the terrain four months after an earthquake hit the region, the officials said. Authorities have since been urging residents to relocate, but they have refused to move unless they were provided with alternative residential and farming land.

Officials, backed by community-based non-government organisations sponsored by the Aga Khan, the spiritual leader of Hunza’s predominantly Ismaili population, finally persuaded people living at higher altitudes to move just days before the landslide.

The weight of evidence last week prompted Hameed-ullah Jan Afridi, Pakistan’s environment minister, to order preparation of an emergency plan, including mass evacuations. “Preparations must start immediately,” he said in an official statement. However, local politicians said the government had wasted vital time dithering, unwisely focusing all initially on relief efforts and issuing unrealistic estimates on how long it would take to remove the debris before finally deciding who would undertake the mammoth task.

Nazir Sabir, a local politician and Pakistan’s premier mountaineer, said: “There were serious errors in understanding the longer-term threats posed by the artificial lake and formulating a strategy based on the right perspective. “There was too much bureaucracy, both in terms of decision making and assignment of blame [for the landslide], for due attention to be paid to the complicated process of debris removal.”

David Petley featured in the article above, is a landslide expert from Britain’s Durham University who has advised the Pakistani government and has visited Hunza in recent days. Indeed he continues to monitor the landslide via his personal blog and readers can follow it here. Pamir Times is another source of information being a blog focused entirely on Gilgit-Baltistan. Indeed it has the best and most updated news and readers can follow it here.

It is time for urgent action on the part of the federal government who must tackle this issue on a priority basis. It is also a time to pray for Hunza and her people some of whom have perished already owing to the landslide. Pakistanis inside and outside of Pakistan must work together to raise our voices to force the go-slow Gilani government into urgent action to save Hunza and Pakistan and do so quickly, for time is not on our side.

Fantastic Farrukh Ali Moon 

Filed under: Blog on Saturday, March 13th, 2010 by Wasim | No Comments

This post is all about one Master Moon, otherwise known as Farrukh Ali Moon. I urge readers to view a Pakistani genius in the making via the video clip below:

After the satanic Taliban attacks on Lahore of recent days, Pakistan and Pakistanis are in dire need of some relief. It is hoped that the genius of  Farrukh Ali Moon will make us smile again, and provide us all much needed hope.

Another gem from Master Moon is essential listening for one and all, and it too is shared below:

Credit for this post goes entirely to Adil Najam of ATP who wrote about the magician master that is  Farrukh Ali Moon here.  The boy clearly has immense talent and a source of inspiration just like Mai Jori Jamali see here.

The fantastic Farrukh Ali Moon will make Pakistanis smile again and it is hoped he makes us smile for many moons yet (no pun intended), for Master Moon is a talent that must be realised.

Electing Mai Jori Jamali 

Filed under: Blog on Tuesday, March 9th, 2010 by Wasim | 1 Comment

Mai Jori Jamali is making big news in Pakistan, and for all the right reasons. Mai Jori Jamali has decided to stand in the bye-election for PB-25 Jaffarabad-1. What makes her candidature newsworthy and even inspiring is her bio-data and the fact that she is an ordinary citizen who seeks only to improve and serve Pakistan.

Mai Jori  is the illiterate wife of a poor farmer and the mother of nine children. Her daily chores include a walk of  two kilometres to fetch water for the daily needs of her poor household. Mai Jori has lived and is living a life of sweat and toil as are the ruled of Pakistan who number in their millions, whilst the rulers and fatcats of Pakistan plunder and plot away. For Mai Jori Jamali, the rubicon has been crossed, the poor in Jaffarabad can take no more, and she has decided to make a stand. 

Mai Jori Jamali’s stand  is all the more inspiring because she hails from Ghulam Mohammed village in Baba Kot in Balochistan. Baba Kot is an area that made infamous for the burying alive three innocent Balochi women for alleged fornication. This dishonourable act was  defended as a tribal custom  by a sitting Cabinet Minister and the current Deputy Chairman of the Senate no less. The women of Baba Kot degraded and buried alive, did not die that day, rather they live on, in Mai Jori Jamali.

Mai Jori Jamali represents a new Pakistan that was born after 9 March 2007, a date which transformed Pakistan for the better three years ago today. It is a new Pakistan which seeks to rebel against the status quo and the elites who fear change and the loss of their privileges. The Mai Jori Jamali  story is all the more inspiring because she is a Balochi woman from Balochistan. 

Mai Jori Jamali is already a heroine for the poor Balochi masses and showcases a true Balochi narrative, hidden under the sad truth that Balochistan has been neglected and usurped by the powerful feudals and sardars for too long who reside in Islamabad and Quetta acting as king-makers and as the sole champions of Balochistan.  Mai Jori Jamali and ordinary Balochis like her have proved that the reality is somewhat different in Balochistan and that people seek empowerment and their ‘huqooq’ from leaders within Balochistan and without.  

Mai Jori Jamali has campaigned on providing empowerment and has led a ‘Huqooq March’ in recent days lambasting Balochistan’s feudal lords for robbing the poor of their rights. Her struggle is a noble one and merits our full support, a video clip of the the march is shared below:

 

Credit goes to Awab Alvi at Teeth Maestro for leading from the front on the Mai Jori Jamali story as shown here and to Adil Najam at ATP as shown here for painting the big picture on this inspiring story. Huma Yusuf covers the story in detail and writes in Dawn an excellent article which is shared below: 

Issue-based Politics by Huma Yusuf

PAKISTAN is a nation desperately in need of heroes. Our politicians dissimulate, our cricketers disappoint, and our celebrities self-destruct. It is reassuring, then, when a hero — or in this case, heroine — emerges from unlikely circumstances, giving this jaded polity something to believe in.

Largely neglected by the mainstream media, Mai Jori Jamali has been the darling of the Pakistani blogosphere this past week. She is the illiterate wife of a farmer and a mother of nine who has filed papers to contest the by-election for a vacant Balochistan Assembly seat, PB-25 Jaffarabad.

In the election, Mai Jori is up against Mir Attaullah Bulledi — an independent candidate with the support of the PML-N as well as prominent sardars and a former federal minister — and Nasir Khan Jamali, the PPP candidate (Baloch nationalist parties have boycotted the polls). Unlike her competitors, Mai Jori boasts no land-holdings, financial resources, political patrons or influence. Her campaign is supported by the Awami Party, and has been funded by contributions from her constituency. At a series of meetings with civil society activists and members of her community at the end of January, Mai Jori raised a little over Rs11,000, which she used to travel to the district headquarters, process her nomination papers and settle election fees.

Chances are, Mai Jori will lose the election. But Pakistani politicians can learn a lesson or two from her campaign, which focuses on empowering Baloch women. Rather than play up ethno-nationalist sentiment or engage in the power plays of established political parties, she has articulated a platform that forms the basis of her campaign.Mai Jori hails from Ghulam Muhammad Jamali village, which is in the same district as Baba Kot, a remote village that gained notoriety in 2008 when three women and two teenaged girls were allegedly buried alive after being shot in a series of honour killings. At the time, Senator Sardar Israrullah Zehri had defended the barbaric incident by describing it as a ‘tribal custom’.

The Asian Human Rights Commission also reported that the provincial government had tried to keep the killings out of the media. Given this background, and the continuing prevalence of violence against women, Mai Jori’s candidacy is being seen as a stand against ‘customs’ that permit the routine abuse of women’s rights in the area. By framing her campaign as a rejection of violence against women, Mai Jori has earned the attention of blogs such as Teeth Maestro and All Things Pakistan, and, far more importantly, voters in her constituency. Lately, Mai Jori and her female supporters embarked on a ‘Huqooq March’ (march for rights), which entails door-to-door campaigning through a number of villages. At each stop, she has reportedly been greeted by hundreds of peasant women eager to push back against the repression that defines their lives.

The grassroots appeal of Mai Jori’s campaign is the latest in a string of telltale signs that Pakistan is readying for issue-based politics. As voters become more informed owing to higher literacy levels and pervasive media coverage, they are more interested in campaigns that seek to address specific issues and injustices. No doubt, ethno-nationalist, dynastic, faith and image-based politics (which deploy media strategies for political gain) continue to dominate the Pakistani political landscape. But the following examples suggest that a new trend is imminent. Last year, rightwing parties, including the PML-N, the Jamaat-i-Islami, and the Tehrik-i-Insaf (PTI), established themselves as a decisive force in the political arena by rallying around the issue of the restoration of an independent judiciary. Their ongoing popular appeal and ability at the time to join hands with unlikely partners — such as the legal community and journalists — stemmed from their focus on one concrete problem, the plight of the judiciary.

Since then, the rightwing parties have enhanced their political cache by uniting people with different political viewpoints (many of whom have open reservations about the PML-N or PTI’s ideological underpinnings) on the basis of one issue after another, from the NRO (National Reconciliation Ordinance) to Blackwater. In this political strategy, the parties are no doubt taking a page from the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal, which won elections in 2002 by riding the wave of anti-Americanism that resulted from US-led attacks in Afghanistan in October 2001.

Interestingly, to counter widespread anti-American sentiment, the Obama administration too is focusing on specific issues, rather than lofty rhetoric about freedom, democracy and historic alliances. Since Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s trip to Pakistan in October last year, US officials have been emphasising Washington’s support for our energy, rather than security, needs. Ms Clinton announced a ‘signature’ $125m grant to improve energy output and efficiency, and in January, the Ministry of Water and Power was allocated $16.5m to boost the capacity of hydroelectric plants.

Separately, the Muttahida Qaumi Movement has embraced issue-based politics in recent months to broaden its appeal from urban Sindh to the middle classes in Punjab and even Gilgit-Baltistan. The party has taken an unambiguous stand on issues that affect the everyday lives of Pakistanis — local government and creeping Talibanisation — and has enjoyed national prominence as a result.

The true power of issue-based politics could become apparent as political parties seek constituencies in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata). This week, Prime Minister Yousuf Gilani reiterated that the Political Parties Act would be extended to Fata as soon as military operations in the area conclude.

There will be little currency in the tribal belt for the ethno-nationalist and dynastic politics that define Pakistan’s major political parties. To function in a region with a unique tribal and linguistic culture, political parties will have to focus on the issues that matter at the grassroots — economic development, education, health and infrastructure. If such a strategy succeeds in Fata, Pakistan may just see a shift towards issue-based politics across Pakistan. Perhaps then a woman like Mai Jori could win an election on the strength of her message.

Win or lose, Mai Jori Jamali is  the real winner for she has given hope to the poor of Pakistan.

Goodbye Brother Gai Eaton 

Filed under: Blog on Tuesday, March 2nd, 2010 by Wasim | No Comments

The great Hasan Charles Le Gai Eaton is no more. The man mountain who inspired millions of Muslims to find God in their lives has departed to his eternal abode in heaven. Brother Gai Eaton as I fondly called him, is, was and will remain forever an inspiration to me personally as it was his book Islam and the Destiny of Man which inspired my interest in Islam and changed my life forever.

Brother Gai Eatons’ books will forever remain masterpieces that nourish the soul by planting the seed of submission to a greater being in God for people of all faiths even none.  The books were works of pure genius for Muslims like me who sought a meaning for their being and more widely their faith beyond  the pathetic, often cursory and cosmetic exercise of blind rituals alone. For true meaning of our purpose in life, contrast Brother Gai Eaton’s views on the transit state of man, happy in life and happier in death as it heralds a return of man to a great Creator.  

Regular readers will know of the unwritten Other Pakistan rule of writing and publishing posts only on Pakistani issues. This rule has been overruled today and I make no apology for that. The loss of Brother Hasan Charles Le Gai Eaton to me personally and to the Muslim world at large  is so vast that he leaves a void no-one is ever likely to fill.

Brother Gai Eaton has inspired me to live a life in service to ALLAH.  In his death, I selfishly mourn the loss of his towering intellect and genius which has no parallels. Where giants once walked, midgets can only now pose for Hasan Charles Le Gai Eaton’s are not born often.