Monthly Archive:: March 2010
Allama Iqbal Town blasts in Lahore were a message to Shahbaz Sharif: The following is a most interesting yet much ignored news item in Pakistani media. Here is how I interpret the series of six low-intensity ‘cracker attacks’ in Lahore. The Taliban do not ‘waste’ their precious assets (human bombers and
Shahbaz Sharif’s Taliban entreaties — by Zafar Hilaly: We can be sure that when the Taliban do not respond positively to his entreaties, Mr Sharif will not blame the Taliban, or fate, but Musharraf, the PPP, the MQM, the Americans, the Indians, the British, the Nigerians, the
Talibangate and Sharifs’ old tricks – by Cyril Almeida: Shahbaz Sharif was saying, I get it, God, country and family is my motto, too. I feel your pain. Support me and I’ll take care of you. –Photo by AP Shahbaz Sharif’s boo-boo had everyone up in arms. Even
Shahbaz Sharif’s bargain with the Taliban – by Ayesha Siddiqa: Shahbaz Sharif appears to have his footprints all over the PML-N’s future. –File Photo Shahbaz Sharif’s faux pas Shahbaz Sharif’s comments asking the Taliban not to attack Punjab have caused a furore in many parts of the country. In
Mard-e-momin – by Ahsan Abbas Shah: President Asif Ali Zardari on Wednesday became the first president to donate all his body organs after signing a bill to enact a law to regulate transplant of human organs in the country. The president made the announcement of
Verbal diarrhoea of Shahbaz Sharif – by Fasi Zaka: Imagine a situation where you have to speak before a large crowd. Right there and then, even though you are not a cow, you discover you have foot-and-mouth disease. That is to say, you mistakenly put your foot in
Zaid Hamid and Ghuzwa-i-Hind — by Tayyab Shah: Zaid Hamid and his followers will not shy away from using religious texts of doubtful authenticity, with totally wrong and self-serving interpretations, to promote war. But the Pakistani youth is no more willing to be at the receiving end
Need for an operation clean-up against the IJT militia in Punjab University: Once again, the Islami Jamiat Talaba (IJT) is in the news for all the wrong reasons. Their list of offences is long and exhaustive, and their thug-like hold over the Punjab University (PU) has devastated this once premier institution.
Dargah-e-Jati Umrah – by Hakim Hazik: درگاہِ جاتی عمرہ ملفوظاتِ شریفِ مکہ از: حکیم حاذق تعاون بشکریہ، ذوالنّون مصری [ترجمانِ خصوصی، مسلم لیگ نون] لاہور کی خاکِ پاک عرشِ منور کے برابر ہے۔ بیسیوں بزرگانِ عالیشان اس خاک میں آسودہ ہیں۔ حضرت شریف الاشراف، گیسو
The Taliban-e-Aala rules in Punjab – by PPP UK: ایوان صدر میں سیاسی بم اور پنجاب میں طالبان اعلی اصل میں آج ایک بھی ایسا شخص دنیا میں زندہ نہیں کہ جس نے حضرت امام حسن رضی اللہ عنہ اور امام حسین رضی اللہ عنہ کو دیکھا ھو
Zardari: The first ever President to donate his whole body for the cause of organ transplantation: President Zardari signs human organs transplant bill President Asif Ali Zardari on Wednesday became the first President to donate all his body organs, after signing a landmark bill to regulate transplant of human organs in the country. The President
Double Face- By Sajid Ali: Punjab Chief Minister Mian Shahbaz Sharif in his speech at Jamia Naemia Lahore requested Taliban to spare Punjab from terrorist attacks. It shows the double face of the Chief Minister as well as the double face of his party’s
Justice Khawaja Sharif speaks once again, this time against Hindus – by Abdul Nishapuri: Chief Justice of Lahore High Court, Justice Khawaja Sharif, has spoken once again, with the hate speech and prejudice which are his usual characteristics. Justice Sharif is notorious for his unflinching support for PML-N and Taliban and for his hostility
To PML-N: ‘If you shut your door to all errors, truth will also be shut out’ – by Shafiq Awan: The Punjab chief minister’s unique idea of offering an olive branch to the Taliban and in return demanding amnesty for Punjab from their terror spree was not at all a precipitous act but a well-thought out deliberation. The CM’s
Congratulations to the British boy’s family, however, local kidnapping cases go ignored in Pakistan: Pakistani woman Shamin Akhtar Butt, mother of kidnapped Mahnoor Fatima, 6, holds a placard and a picture of Mahnoor at a police office in Jhelum on March 16, 2010. – AFP JHELUM: When six-year-old Mahnoor Fatima disappeared, her mother’s
Why did General Kayani chair a meeting of key federal secretaries at the army headquarters?: Strange things happen in the Islamic (military) Republic of Pakistan. For the first time in Pakistan’s history, a meeting of federal secretaries was presided over by a military chief in a civilian set-up. Where are we heading to? Have
Blasphemy in a human world — by Sikander Amani: Whether you like it or not, the notion of blasphemy, or of ‘defamation of religion’, creates a hierarchy of beliefs which is simply incompatible with the plurality of the world, and the very right to hold a belief The
Fighting in the dark against terrorism in Punjab — by Meher Bokhari: Last year alone, innumerable incidents made a mockery of the Punjab government and its denial. The truth is, there is no dearth of facts. The tragedy is, there is no visible action being taken to address the evil, which
Encountering fundamentalism — by Nizamuddin Nizamani: Extremist Islam is encroaching deeper into the Thar Desert and almost all district and tehsil headquarters of Sindh and Balochistan, where large numbers of seminaries, with new buildings and equipped with every kind of infrastructure, have been erected during
Punjab khappay? – by Nadeem Paracha: According to many emails that I received after posting a blog in the wake of the terrible bomb attacks in Lahore last week, I was ‘spreading politics of ethnicity.’ I don’t know exactly what made these folks think this way,
Dr Farhat Hashmi: Cultivating Al Qaeda in Muslim women: Biography Dr Farhat Hashmi, daughter of the (late) scholar Abdur Rehman Hashmi, is a mother of four, and comes from the Indo-pak subcontinent. She received her Ph.D. in Hadith Sciences from the University of Glasgow, Scotland. Al-Huda International Welfare
HE Hamid Karzai and FATA – by Zar Ali Musazai: People of FATA are grateful to His Excellency President Karzai for his statement against FCR in FATA President Hamid Karzai was right to say that Frontier Crimes Regulations commonly known as FCR is a terrible legacy of the British
From Osama to Taliban, where are the Sharifs headed? – by Saeed Minhas: Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif’s careful treading through the power corridors received a severe blow as his public appeal to the Taliban for avoiding his fiefdom raised an unprecedented hue and cry in the National Assembly. If the CM’s
By aligning itself with Taliban and Sipah-e-Sahaba, PML-N poses existential threat to Pakistan: Existentialist threat The PML-N’s right wing ideology is an open secret. Thus it is not surprising if the party has now come clear on its stance vis-à-vis the militant outfits. Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif has finally exposed the
Shikwah and Jawab-e-Shikwah between PML-N and Taliban: Acknowledgement: The title of this post has been adopted from this comment by Siddiqui. While Shahbaz Sharif pleaded to the Taliban not to attack Punjab by reminding them that PML-N (ruling party in Punjab) and Taliban are natural allies
Cornered PML-N launches bid to limit damage, forced to explain its ties with Taliban and Sipah-e-Sahaba: During the national uproar, the PML-N continues to make failed efforts to control the situation, but without much success. Cornered PML-N launches bid to limit damage Source: Dawn Correspondent, 16 Mar, 2010 ISLAMABAD: The entire counter-terrorism effort being spearheaded
Who is behind Zaid Hamid’s crush India brigade? – by Kamran Shafi: The crazy Right and rump Pakistan I was to regale you with other stories to do with our security establishment’s tortured and seemingly futile hunt for the very elusive holy grail of strategic depth in Afghanistan (I ask you)
The 1947-48 Kashmir War — by Ishtiaq Ahmed: Take up any book published in Pakistan on the division of the common assets of the Indian Royal Armed Forces and you will find Pakistan, justifiably, claiming that it was not given a fair share of the tanks, guns
A perspective on Benazir Income Support Programme — by Syed Mohammad Ali: The politics of poverty alleviation The programme seeks to provide direct assistance, specifically to women. Thus, besides empowering them economically, it encourages them to seek national identity cards as a precondition to obtain disbursals, which it considers crucial for
The civil-military struggle within — by Sher Ali Khan: Changing the pattern of the civil-military relationship is a difficult task to achieve. Thus far the Pakistanis have gained some political space through their recent stand against the last dictator. This has not necessarily translated into governmental autonomy in
Hypocrisy unlimited: FATA parliamentarians’ scanning at US airport: In the last few days, we have witnessed a pseudo-nationalist hype in Pakistani media, newspaper columns and TV talk-shows alike, in which a matter of ‘great national honour’ (ghairat) was highlighted. The matter pertained to the alleged insult of
Do we need secularism? — by Dr Khalil Ahmad: For Libertarians, religious freedom is an inseparable part of this natural personal freedom that the Constitution of 1973 so purposefully protects. Protecting religious freedom as a fundamental right is not only morally, spiritually, and intellectually of greater merit but
Judge Saeed Khurshid’s resignation: LUBP has previously posted two articles on this topic, which can be read here and here. Given the lack of attention to this issue by the lawyers as well as Pakistani media, we find it pertinent to post the
Begging Taliban for mercy: Shahbaz Sharif is loyal to Punjab at Pakistan’s expense?: Related articles: The Punjabi Taliban and the Ostrich of Punjab: Shahbaz Sharif The umbilical connection between PML-N and religious conservatism: Jaag Punjabi jaag – by Aamer Ahmed Khan Shahbaz Sharif’s bargain with the Taliban – by Ayesha Siddiqa According
Dr Shahid Masood’s letter to Shaheen Sehbai – by Qais Anwar: مارچ کب ہو گا؟ میرے پیارے شاہین صہبائی میرا یہ خط جس وقت تمہاری نظروں سے گزرنے گا مارچ کی پندرہ تاریخ ہو چکی ہوگی ، مطلب یہ کھ آدھا مارچ گزر گیا ہو گا بغیر کسی مارچ کے.
Madrassah reforms : Does PPP want to nourish sectarianism?: Here is a well written piece about Madrassah reforms by Saiful Islam Khalid. I found this piece in a weekly newspaper from Islamabad. It was in paper print, which I have composed and edited to post it for LUBP
Culture of police torture in Pakistan – by Qudrat Ullah: Although the police flogging are not an uncommon arcane in Pakistan, yet the shocking telecast of flout police torture of some hapless accused, in the presence of flabbergasted on-lookers, in a remote Punjab locality by the acerbic media, has
Pakistani media is ignoring a disaster in waiting in Hunza: Story of a lake and the sinking paradise – by Irfan Siddiqi: The LUBP has previously posted an article on this topic by Dr Shahid Siddiqui highlighting the gravity and urgency of this issue. Gojal (in uppper Hunza) needs to be be declared a calamity-hit area, extending rightful facilities to its
Societal perspectives on terrorism — by Dr Hasan-Askari Rizvi: At least one generation has been socialised into a favourable disposition towards Islamic conservatism and militancy. They have a natural sympathy towards the political discourse of the militants even if they do not support their violent methods The terrorist
Who’s the ‘middle class’ in Pakistan? – by Umair Javed: The obsession with the modern educated professional as a prototypical middle class Pakistani tends to shift focus away from those that are rarely educated in formal institutions, yet continue to control a larger share of political and economic capital