Babur, the first Moghul emperor
Courtesy The Economist – Dec 16th 2010 ON A bright winter’s morning lines of plane trees and immaculately tended rose bushes fall away down terraces where men crash out on carpets and sheepish young couples sit as close together as they dare. The plants are fed by a central water channel, the signature feature of a Moghul garden. Below is the brown smog of Kabul; beyond, snowy mountains. The tomb of Babur, … Read entire article »
Was Jinnah A Democrat?
A continuation from “Was Jinnah secular?” and “Did Jinnah want Pakistan?”. By Yasser Latif Hamdani There are many people who criticize Jinnah – quite incorrectly in my opinion- of having laid the foundations for subsequent periods of authoritarian military rule. They allege that Jinnah’s decision to become the Governor General was the first blow to parliamentary democracy in Pakistan. Unable to distinguish the argument of constitutional purists pleading the ceremonial and executive roles of president and prime … Read entire article »
Did Jinnah Want Pakistan?
By Yasser Latif Hamdani This is partly a continuation of my earlier article “Was Jinnah secular?” but mainly a response to a letter posted by Moin Ansari addressed to Mr. Najam Sethi called “refuting Mr Sethi’s blasphemy” in response to a TV show the latter did on the distortion of history in Pakistan. Ahrari Fifth Columnist Moin Ansari is from a breed of self appointed Pakistani McCarthyites who abuse and attack anyone who tries to point out some facts … Read entire article »
Islamist lies about Allama Iqbal
By Yasser Latif Hamdani On 9th November this year, Pakistan was off on account of the great poet and philosopher Iqbal’s birthday. I wonder why? It is time we had a discussion on whether Iqbal was legitimately a founding father of this country. In my opinion, Pakistan has only one founding father and that is Mahomed Ali Jinnah not Iqbal, without belittling Iqbal’s contribution to the idea of Pakistan. However it does not end there. The right … Read entire article »
Religious Right in Their Own Words; Apostasy Punishment, Jihad and the Role of Non Muslims in the Land of Infidels
Part 3 By Adnan Syed This series revisits one of the pivotal events of the early Pakistani history; the riots by the religious right wing parties to get Ahmadis declared as non-Muslims, and the subsequent Munir-Kiyani inquiry commission report into the causes behind the riots. The report went on to interview the religious leaders of the newly formed state of Pakistan regarding their motives and their ideas of Pakistan as a pure Islamic state. As the interviews revealed the incongruous replies of various leaders, they also showed vague but chilling ideas that the right wing parties harboured to turn the newly formed Muslim nation into a politically Islam dominated theocratic nation. The interviews reveal the role of democracy, non Muslims, Jihad and punishments like apostasy that would be practiced in an ideal … Read entire article »
Filed under: Constitution, Democracy, History, Identity, India, Islam, Jinnah, Liberal Democratic Pakistan, minorities, Pak Tea House, Pakistan, Religion
Jinnah And Jefferson : Dreams From Two Founding Fathers
Originally published by Washington Post on the independence day of the US and Jefferson’s death anniversary, we reproduce the same article on our Independence Day. By Akbar Ahmed Sunday, July 4, 2010 “You are free; you are free to go to your temples, you are free to go to your mosques or to any other place of worship. . . . We are starting in the days when there is no discrimination, no distinction between one community and another, no discrimination … Read entire article »
Filed under: History, Jinnah, secular Pakistan, secularism, USA
Daily Times: Nationalism: inclusive versus exclusive — II —
By Ishtiaq Ahmed When the Hindu members of the Pakistan Constituent Assembly expressed their worries about ‘sovereignty over the entire universe belonging to God’, Liaquat Ali Khan assured them that a Muslim state should have no problem in having a non-Muslim as prime minister. However, this was not true Jinnah wanted to establish a Muslim-majority state, but not a Muslim-majoritarian state that would privilege Muslims over non-Muslims in their status and rights as citizens; hence he spoke of Pakistani nationalism and not Muslim nationalism when on August 11, 1947 he addressed the Pakistan Constituent Assembly: “You are free; you are free to go to your temples, you are free to go to your mosques or to any other place or worship in this state of Pakistan. You may belong to any religion … Read entire article »
Filed under: Democracy, Egalitarian Pakistan, History, Identity, Islam, Islamism, Jinnah, Liberal Democratic Pakistan, minorities, Pak Tea House, Pakistan
Daily Times – Nationalism: inclusive versus exclusive — I
At PTH, we have argued for the partition as a nuanced set of events that were characterized by extreme mistrust between the two major political forces of that time. These major parties harboured deep distrust against each other. The Muslim League politics increasingly focused on the idea of Pakistan as a bargaining chip to win the rights for the sizeable Muslim majority within the United India. The British hurry to leave the United India, emergence of Muslim League as the sole spokesman for the Muslims, and Congress unwillingness to recognize the Muslim nation demands within the United India resulted in a bloody and messy partition. We still live with the scars of the partition that resulted in one of the largest uprooting and human migration of modern times. … Read entire article »
Filed under: culture, Democracy, Egalitarian Pakistan, History, Identity, Islam, Islamabad, Islamism, Jinnah, minorities, Pak Tea House, Pakistan, Religion, secular Pakistan
The national narrative
Salman Tarik Kureshi Daily Times, June 12, 2010 What happened through the 1950s was the piecemeal articulation of a national narrative for the new state. Jinnah’s liberal, inclusive vision was converted into a faux Islamic exclusivism. Conformity was imposed on political pluralism and a unitary state, belying the Quaid’s crusades for provincial autonomy, was created Pakistan, we learn, is rated among the five most unstable countries in the Global Peace Index. Scarcely surprising, given the ongoing civil … Read entire article »
Filed under: Army, Civil Service, Colonialism, Constitution, Democracy, History, Judiciary, Media, Pakistan, state
Eulogy of “Pak Tea House”
Dr. Irfan Zafar Am I really dead? No, still trying to breathe but the lights seem to be fading away as I hear voices, not the familiar one’s, strangers walking in and leaving behind nothing but painful reminders of what my past used to be. Broken tea cups, sticky tables, cracking chairs, flies and dust all around is all what is left; staring at me crying for help but as I lay dying, my mind continue to go back bringing in visions of the past ferociously. I remember the Sikh brothers looking at me for the last time with vacant eyes as they walked away in tears leaving behind the “India Tea House”; my original name which was changed to Pak Tea House by the new owner Siraj-Ud-Din Ahmad to avoid any … Read entire article »
Filed under: History, Pak Tea House, Pakistan
From the Frying Pan into the Fire
They say in Africa that when elephants fight, it is the grass that suffers. To this Julius Nyerere had once added that when elephants make love, the grass still suffers. Nyerere had made this witty remark at a summit of the Non-Aligned Movement in the 1970′s. The organisation had been formed to extricate as much of the world from suffering the same fate as the grass in this African proverb, during the Cold War. Yet, it failed Afghanistan … Read entire article »
Filed under: Afghanistan, Books, Citizens, History, Images, Photos, war
From A Rooftop Restaurant In Lahore
A View ‘Across Another Century’ The GT Road Blog By Steve Inskeep NPR correspondents are on the Grand Trunk Road. The team has undertaken this project to hear from “young people along one of the world’s historic highways.” Today, we get to go along with the team to a restaurant in Lahore that offers much more than just food. From Coo Coo’s Cafe, you can look back across time. (John Poole/NPR) There’s no need to get into what we talked about. … Read entire article »
NPR: CIA Fight Against Communism Bolsters Radical Islam
by NPR Staff http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=127500908&ft=1&f=1004#127500197 The CIA’s determination to roll back communism during the Cold War inadvertently allowed radical Islamists to gain a foothold in Europe, according to a new book by Pulitzer Prize-winning author Ian Johnson. A Mosque in Munich: Nazis, the CIA and the Rise of the Muslim Brotherhood in the West details the Nazis’ attempts to create a fifth column within the Soviet empire by becoming allies with Muslim minorities living in the Soviet Union. “The Soviet Union had oppressed Islam, closed many mosques and mistreated many minorities in the Soviet Union, including Muslims,” Johnson tells host Guy Raz. “After the Germans ended up with literally millions of Red Army POWs in the war, they began to realize that many of these were potential soldiers to fight the Soviet Union.” … Read entire article »
Filed under: Great game, History, Islam, Religion, Terrorism, USA
India’s Young and Poor Rally to Another Gandhi
Reproduced from The New York Times By JIM YARDLEY Published: June 4, 2010 AHRAURA, India — Rahul Gandhi’s helicopter descends out of the boiling afternoon sky and a restless, sweat-soaked crowd of 100,000 people suddenly surges to life. Men rush forward in the staggering heat. Teenage boys wave a white bedsheet bearing a faintly cheeky request: We Want to Meet the Prince of India. … Read entire article »
Blowback in Lahore
We have posted Omar Ali`s previous post titled “The Dead Parrot” a few weeks back. Below we reproduce his comment on the Lahore massacre. Dr. Ali discusses compelling reasons why we are here and where we are heading towards from here. We did not get into this mess overnight and we will not get out of it soon enough. Too many innocent Pakistanis are losing their lives as Pakistan struggles to overcome its previous policy errors. PTH may not necessarily agree with all points raised in the following post (AZW) Blowback In Lahore By Omar Ali http://www.outlookindia.com/article.aspx?265617 Terrorists (Punjabi Taliban) simultaneously attacked two Ahmedi sect mosques in Lahore during Friday prayers and killed over 80 people. First thoughts on this evil attack: The choice of target is easy to understand. Ahmedis are a persecuted and vilified minority in Pakistan … Read entire article »
Filed under: Al Qaeda, Army, FATA, History, Identity, India, Islam, Islamabad, Islamism, minorities, Pakistan, Religion, Rights, state, strategy, Taliban, USA, violence, war
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