Sunday, December 30, 2007

No end to dynasty worship

There seems to be no end to dynasty worship in Pakistan - even the most liberal and popular political party is not immune from it. Quite disappointing to see this news:

Benazir Bhutto's 19-year-old son Bilawal has been chosen to take over her Pakistan People's Party, after her assassination on Thursday.

It is thought he will take the role in a ceremonial capacity while he finishes his studies at Oxford University.

Bilawal told journalists at the Bhutto family home: "My mother always said democracy is the best revenge."

Ms Bhutto's widower, Asif Ali Zardari, who is expected to run the party, said it would contest January elections.

Friday, December 28, 2007

Rejectionists

Just came across this article. It is insightful to know that extremists despise neardby moderates much more than they do faraway rivals.

In 1947, when the sharp East-West polarisation that came to be known as the Cold War was just beginning to take shape, Stalin came forward with an apparently strange theory. He identified the Soviet Union's main enemy not as the United States, but as the British Labour Party and its leader, Britain's then prime minister, Clement Attlee. The underlying logic of Stalin's theory was the same as the one that had led Lenin, just before the Bolshevic Revolution, to focus the main thrust of his attacks not against the Tsar but against the Cadet Party, the party of the Russian Liberal bourgeoisie. The logic in both cases was that these apparently less offensive parties, the Cadets in 1917 and the British Labour Party, a typical representative Social-Democracy, in 1947, were better equipped than any other anti- communist forces to attract the masses. As such, they represented the main obstacle in the way of a communist victory, and only by removing that obstacle would the communists succeed in isolating the capitalist enemy and paving the way for its downfall.
From Dynasty to Democracy - At the end of the tunnel

Let's hope this chaos may turn out to be a precursor of constructive change. I agree with Tariq Ali that it is a high time for its rank and file to transform Pakistan Peoples Party from a dynastic to a democratic party. Someone suggested on another forum that Aizaz Ahsan be asked to lead PP now and I fully concur with this proposal. Perhaps there exists some light at the end of the tunnel ! Or may be I am just being over-optimistic!


Benazir's horrific death should give her colleagues pause for reflection. To be dependent on a person or a family may be necessary at certain times, but it is a structural weakness, not a strength for a political organisation. The People's party needs to be refounded as a modern and democratic organisation, open to honest debate and discussion, defending social and human rights, uniting the many disparate groups and individuals in Pakistan desperate for any halfway decent alternative, and coming forward with concrete proposals to stabilise occupied and war-torn Afghanistan. This can and should be done. The Bhutto family should not be asked for any more sacrifices.

Thursday, December 27, 2007

Assassination of BB

Benazir Bhutto is killed in a suicide blast in Rawalpindi today, along with 20 other people. Another unfortunate event in the land of crisis. Bhutto was far from impeccable politician but removing her from scene will do no good to already messy situation in Pakistan. More chaos ahead!

Sunday, December 16, 2007

Pevez Hoodbhoy's 10 Commandments

Pevez Hoodbhoy, world renowned MIT-trained physicist and arguably among the best minds ever produced by Pakistan, reveals an upodated version of 10 commandents, 5 of them for USA and 5 for Muslims. I have nothing to disagree with him on this matter.

1. Muslims must STOP blaming the West (or the “infidels”) for everything that is wrong with them. Out of the 48 Muslim countries of the world, not one can be called a democracy in the pure sense of the word. Sadly, there has been NO significant scientific achievement in the last 700 years or so, whereas between the 9th and the 13th centuries, during the golden period of Islam, it was only the Muslims who kept the light of knowledge burning. The causes of Muslim decline have all been internal, and NOT the result of conspiracies. If Islam is to become a positive, constructive force in the 21st century, it must change from within, and worldwide opinion will follow.

2. Whenever and wherever there is an act of terrorism, condemn it LOUDLY and fully. The West has taken the majority of the Muslim communities’ lack of anger at 9/11 as tacit approval of militant Islam. Unfortunately Islam has become synonymous with violence and terror, and many moderate, peaceful Muslims have now become victims as well. The moderate Muslim community must fight against the hijacking of Islam.

3. Stop dreaming of theocracies and the reinstating of the Shariah law. Such ideas belong to the past, and are not compatible with the continuously evolving society and environment to which we belong. Insistence on such ideas can only drag the Muslims further into a medieval abyss.

4. Accept the fact that others do not see morality the way you do. Muslims have been brought up to believe that the only morality worth upholding is sexual morality. Other religions and cultures may not place so much emphasis on sexual morality, but that does not necessarily make them inferior human beings.

5. The last Commandment is for Muslims who have chosen to live in countries other than their homeland. Integrate. Do NOT try and stand out. Do NOT try and be different. And yes, it is possible to do all this AND maintain one’s individual identity, and without compromising principles and values we have grown up with. We must take more of an interest in our surroundings, in politics, and not just national politics but starting at the grassroots level.

Myths of Neocons About Pakistan

A beautiful dissection of "realism" of neocon pundits about Pakistani politics!
Back to Stone Ages


Shamshad Ahmed's article in The Nation:

A country without constitution or the rule of law and where there is no independent judiciary and no fundamental freedoms and rights is no better than the 'stone age' cultures, and has no place in the contemporary comity of civilised nations. Government and politics, as the world knows them, are alien to Pakistan. Our scene pathetically bears resemblance to Thomas Hobbes's concept of primitive anarchy marked by a 'war of one against all' and to Rousseau's idealisation of the 'noble savage'. Perhaps, Hegel spoke for us when he said that man can never learn anything from history.
Akbar's eclecticism

Khalid Ahmed reviews Stietencron's book on Mughal Emperor Akbar's syncretic approach to religion.

Akbar’s rule was a patch of effulgence in a general darkness on earth. Poets and artists gravitated to it; faiths rejected in other lands escaped to India to find tolerance. Today, Akbar is irrelevant to what is happening in the Islamic world
Aitzaz Ahsan - a break from past

Arguabley one of the finest political minds in Pakistan.. I have always admired Aitzaz's intelligence, in spite of his often defences of his corrupt leader. He has made a tough choice and I wish his very well.

Thursday, December 13, 2007

Intellectual Bankruptcy in Pakistan

Bit old but still spot on! The article has a leftist slant but still, it is an interesting commentary on the sorry state of intellectual bankruptcy in "Mamlikat-e-Khudadad".



There are, I discovered, less than half a dozen good bookshops in the whole of Lahore, once considered to be the intellectual capital of India, that stock books in English. The vast majority of these books are, curiously enough, published in India, a few in the West and the rest, a very small proportion, are local Pakistani publications. Books on Pakistani society, based on empirical realities, are almost impossible to find, although the number of titles on the so-called 'two-nation theory' and the history of the Muslim League, as well as on elite politics in Pakistan, run into the hundreds. So do books on Jinnah and Iqbal, the two major ideological heroes of Pakistan, after whom a vast number of public institutions throughout the country are named. As a Lahori friend of mine quipped, 'The intellectual scene in Pakistan is so bad that our rulers think we have almost no one else to name our institutions after'.

Even on Islam and Kashmir, two issues that are central to the way in which the Pakistani state has sought to construct the notion of Pakistani national identity, I discovered hardly any decent literature in English in the numerous bookshops that I visited. Many of the few English books on Islam I came across were actually published in India. A few others were by Western writers, while the rest, not more than three dozen titles, many of these being were poorly-researched and ideologically-driven propaganda tracts of the Pakistani Jamaat i Islami and its associated publishing houses. Likewise, on Kashmir. In Lahore's biggest bookshop that also stocks English books I came across an entire shelf of books on Kashmir, but almost all of them were written by Indian scholars, published in India and probably represented the Indian position on the disputed territory.

Wednesday, December 12, 2007

Pay it Forward

I came across this website while going through Christian Science Monitor. Fun, learning and charity - all in one. Do give it a shot!
Daughter of the West

To date, Pakistan People's Party remains the only mass-based political party whose support runs across all ethnic and sectarian divides in Pakistan and has a cadre of dedicated and sincere workers. However, the integrity of its leadership leaves much to be desired. Tariq Ali's take on Pakistan's lady kleptocrat Benazir Bhutto.
Restless Few, Silent Many

Six soldiers are killed in a militant ambush in North Waziristan. A suicide bomber strikes a school bus near Kamra air force complex. Four CD and video shops bombed down in Peshawar. Meanwhile, "Great Leader" is busy establishing "writ of state" on judges, lawyers, and media and civil society. And "the people of Pakistan", while being rightly outraged against the dictator-in-chief keep mum about the increasing influence of wanna-be dictators.


In addition to sympathising with the Islamists’ anti-US stance and justifying their anger against western clout that has spawned economic inequality and despotic regimes, there is a tendency to endorse the ‘moral order’ that the militants want to impose on society. Thus, all kinds of atrocities are tolerated. Not a murmur is heard when women, accused of indulging in wayward acts, are beheaded, or when public executions (bypassing state justice) are conducted in the name of purging society of undesirable elements. Little concern is enunciated by the educational authorities when girls’ schools are bombed. If at all there is any protest at the way young boys are brainwashed in seminaries and then dispatched on suicide and other missions, it is muted.

The liberals lack the courage, possibly even the numbers, to come forward and forcefully explain why moral policing and extreme religiosity have no place in a society which would be better off concentrating on how to improve the lives of its people. Taking advantage of their silence, dogmatic elements propound views that fuddle clear thinking. This is the phenomenon that is described as Talibanisation. The latter does not merely pertain to actual deeds of violence in the name of religion. It is also a state of mind.
Balochistan’s prisoners of conscience

Balochistan is no doubt the most wronged province of Pakistan. Qazi Faez Isa gives an insight into the grievances of Balochistan's civil society against "the essence of democracy" introduced by Mush.

Time magazine’s (Dec 10, 2007) evaluation is, “Pakistan’s leader leaves the army, but his war on the Constitution continues. But regardless of what outfit he wears, Musharraf has left Pakistan with a tattered constitution patched with amendments and filled now with so many loopholes justifying his rule that it resembles a crocheted doily, ready to be thrown over whatever ugliness the next ruler creates in pursuit of power.”

The article concludes with the swipe: “When Musharraf took power in his 1999 coup, he quoted Abraham Lincoln, saying sometimes you need to amputate a limb to save a life. On the day he imposed emergency rule, he repeated the reference to justify his actions. The only problem is, amputated limbs don’t grow back.”

Friday, December 07, 2007

What is Free Society all about?

Timothy Gorton Ash makes valid points about the essence of free society and how it needs to accomodate religious believers (and vice versa).

Among the essentials is freedom of expression, which has been eroded to an alarming degree, both by death threats from extremists and by misconceived pre-emptive appeasement on the part of the state and private bodies. Freedom of expression necessarily includes the right to offend; not the duty, but the right. We must, in particular, be free to say what we like about historical figures, be they Moses, Jesus, Muhammad, Churchill, Hitler or Gandhi (and then let our claims be tested against the evidence). We may not agree with what controversialists say about these figures but we must defend to the death their right to say it. There should, for obvious reasons, be limits to what we are free to say about living people, but these limits must be very tightly drawn.

Among the liberal essentials is equality before the law, including equal rights for men and women. Among the essentials is also freedom of religion. Since a core liberal notion is that we must be free not just to pursue our own version of the good life but also to question and revise it, it follows that we must be free to propagate, question, change or abandon our religion. In a free society, proselytisation, heresy and apostasy are not crimes. This - and apostasy in particular - is not accepted in many versions of Islam, but it is a liberal essential on which there can be no compromise.



Ed Husain's piece in The Observer slashes the clauses of medieval Sharia that are at odds with free society and advoctes a "liberal" version of Islam. It's interesting to see how he mentions Shatibi and Locke in the same sentence.

What remain valid are the eternal truths that Shatibi, Locke and others enunciated. Our humanity must transcend adherence to scriptural literalism, especially if it leads to mayhem and loss of innocent lives. The whole purpose of religion is to bring order and harmony to our existence.

Thursday, December 06, 2007

Entertainment Offense

Music, dance and entertainment have always been an anathema for this bunch of spoilsports and killjoys - known as Islamists. Nothing offends them more than the sight of anyone being happy and jubilant. A report from Islamist heavens of our "Wild Wild North-West".

The girls who turned to music concerts and stage shows, often held in Peshawar, the capital of NWFP, were thrown out of business when the cultural shows were banned.

Some of them benefited temporarily when the aficionados and businessmen on NWFP's dance and music scene diversified into the video CD business, producing and distributing long plays and dance sessions on VCDs and DVDs.

But a violent campaign by militant Taleban has caused this business to decline across large parts of NWFP. Hundreds of video outlets have been blown up. Others have voluntarily closed down or switched to other businesses.

Wednesday, December 05, 2007

Collective Self-destructiveness

Yasmin Alibhai-Brown laments the self-destructive behavior of "saviors" of Ummah! With "friends" like these, who needs enemies!

Today, creative, imaginative, dissenting and innovative Muslims have to wear virtual body armor, hunker down, just in case someone decides to get offended (and someone always does), inciting an uproar on the web, on the media, on the streets bringing out the mobs in Pakistan, Egypt, Syria, South Africa, Somalia and on and on. Inevitably some die for a cause they never really understood and the restless army of discontents shuffles off until the next noisy and bloody march.

I know of talented painters and poets in Pakistan who have just given up or fled. Arab artists, activists and thinkers unafraid of the truth are in actual prisons or enclosed behind limitations built by their fearful societies.

Explosive episodes are always gathering round the corner. We witnessed the organized outrage over the Channel 4 programs exposing some of the vile imams still controlling some mosques. The film of Khaled Hosseini's novel The Kite Runner, about a young boy in Afghanistan, is causing much anger. One of the pivotal scenes involves a homosexual rape of a Shiite boy. They won't have that, it is a slur, an insult. Muslims don't do such things. The same protests met Monica Ali's novel Brick Lane, in which a young Bangladeshi wife in Tower Hamlets has an affair. Muslims don't do such things etc, etc. Of course there is no rape and adultery in our countries, those are bad "Western" behaviors. The controversy will be reheated when the film of Brick Lane is released in a few weeks.

Transcultural dialogues

A lampoon on current political mess in Pakistan.