I was interviewed in Karachi last month; here is the intro and the link-

Recently, the journalist Saleem Shahzad has been killed in Pakistan after he had been reporting on the connections between the Pakistani intelligence agency and al Qaeda. Admiral Mike Mullen, who is the top officer in the US military, has said that the Pakistani government has sanctioned Shahzad’s killing. Even before this Pakistan has been the most dangerous place for journalists.

hear my interview at the following link:

http://futurechallenges.org/news/the-most-dangerous-place-for-journalists/#.ThsGJL0J55o.twitter

Published today in The News

Much has been said about media accountability and the dire need of a regulation framework for Pakistan’s new power centre. Pakistani media has earned its freedom and independence after a long, often bloody, struggle against military dictators and civilian autocrats. Countless journalists were imprisoned, harassed, even killed in this decade’s long fight for free speech, otherwise a much-touted fundamental right in every Pakistani constitution. There is no question that a viable democracy and a culture of accountability cannot exist without a robust and independent media.

Globalisation and the rise of electronic media in Pakistan, ironically under General Musharraf, is a relatively new phenomenon and has changed the contours of power matrix in the country. If anything, electronic media and its older cousin, the print media, with a plethora of columnists, are now an established group with considerable influence and nuisance value. Actualisation of the newly acquired powers was best demonstrated during the anti-Musharraf movement from 2007-2008. This was a startling development and pleased most Pakistanis as they found the echo of their daily trials and tribulations in the direct and frank reporting by the numerous TV channels.
Ambiguous regulatory framework: The sudden liberalisation of private television channels took place in an environment when a regulatory framework had barely been established. The Pakistani Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (PEMRA) came into existence during an unrepresented regime and, therefore, it lacked the essential process of consultation, ownership, and national consensus. On the one hand, media oligarchies emerged despite the vague announcements that cross ownership would not be permitted. On the other hand, electronic media showed little interest in developing a common code of conduct and finding ways of self-regulation. The results and the initial phase were disasters. Human limbs and heads found ample air time thereby glorifying terrorism and violence, and impacting the collective psychology of the viewers through a gradual process of desensitisation. Furthermore, objectivity was thrown out of the window and partisan, one sided rants became the order of the day.

Lawyers and media alliance: This was a type of intense civil activism and unprecedented representation of the Pakistani middle class in mainstream politics. Seemingly, a momentous development, the foresighted mobilization, came into public domain regurgitating the ‘anti-politics’ biases of Pakistan’s conservative middle class. This automatically resulted in severe distortions of the political expression. The first rule of law was personified by a handful of judges who had been linked to Pakistan’s regressive establishment throughout their careers; and a misconception that rule of law would lead to political, economic, and social transformation became a ‘truth’. Minority voices such as this scribe, alerted to the inherent contradictions of these developments. In short, intra-bourgeoisie struggles could be disruptive but rarely led to transformative social change. The results today are clear. The lawyers are beating up every public official and media representative who attempts to question their activities. After heroic battles the conduct of judges has been called into question. (more…)

Just found out that I was quoted on The Guardian twice. Made me smile a bit in these gloomy times.

Here is the copy of the page.  Click here to see the two stories on Data darbar carnage and fake degrees of Pakistani politicians.

My piece published in The News

Pakistan has crossed a major milestone last week by achieving a historic consensus on the 18th Amendment with 105 clauses, additions and deletions to the Constitution. The distortions inserted by the military rule have been done away with. Political elites this time, however, have gone a step further and improved the state of provincial autonomy. Perhaps this is where a civilian negotiation and democratic politics of compromise has been most effective. Who would have thought a few years ago that this was achievable? There were many skeptics who thought that the amendments might not be approved. However, the ‘corrupt’ and ‘incompetent’ politicians have proved everyone wrong.

Leaving aside the discourse of corruption, the NRO, and a vociferous media campaign against the President, the achievements in the last one-year by all political parties have been tremendous. The Awami National Party, after its initial truce with the militants, has stayed the course and resisted Talibanisation by giving full support to the army operations against the militants. The PPP and PML-N, despite their rhetoric and political point-scoring, have worked together on the national finance commission award (NFC) and now on the implementation of the Charter of Democracy (CoD) that has become the basis for the amendments to become a reality. (more…)

Published in Tehelka this week

AFTER 37 YEARS OF POLITICAL UNCERTAINTY, PAKISTAN’S CONSTITUTION HAS BEEN RECAST ON ZARDARI’S WATCH. WILL IT HELP REKINDLE DEMOCRACY, WONDERS RAZA RUMI

BRANDED A ‘failed state’, Pakistan has become notorious in the global media. Political change is often a result of the notorious 111 Brigade (the Rawalpindi-based army contingent which leads any military coup) moving on the streets of Islamabad and capturing the derelict PTV (Pakistan Television) headquarters. News-worthiness is defined by the number of suicide blasts that take place in a single day within what has been termed as the “most dangerous country” in the world. Pity that such stereotypes have prevented a nuanced understanding of Pakistan, as well as the fact that it is a fast changing country with a strong yearning for the rule of law and constitutionalism.

These days, Pakistanis, when they are on a break from the next suicide bomber, are rejoicing over a major political shift brought about by the April 8 approval by parliament of the 18th Amendment to fix the truncated Constitution. Thirty seven years ago, for the first time in its existence, Pakistan’s political elite was able to reach a consensus on the scheme and shape of the Constitution. An earlier version was the 1956 Constitution, which was abrogated even before its implementation by Field Marshal Ayub Khan in 1958. There were two other military “gifts” to the nation in 1962 and 1970, which were hardly democratic and barely representative of what citizens actually wanted. (more…)

(Also published by The News) Given the average shelf life of any civilian government, it is almost miraculous that the incumbent government has survived and there are signs that its removal is not immediate. The longevity of civilian order has less to do with the inherent strengths of its style of governance or delivery of public goods that it had promised in its manifesto. The survival of this government is an outcome of the lack of options for the establishment as well as its international allies, notably the Western powers. Leaving the conspiracy theories and the excessive over-reliance of the analysts on the American factor, we can safely argue that the military establishment of Pakistan and its intelligence agencies has found themselves in a unique situation since the assumption of the presidency by Asif Ali Zardari.

The truth is that Pakistan People’s Party, an anathema to the civil-military bureaucracy, has assumed the most important and powerful offices that a civilian government can aspire for. Two years ago, when the Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gillani was (more…)

A personal favourite, Irshad Ahmad Haqqani is dead. This is a huge loss to Urdu journalism as he was the last of sane voices in the vernacular industry. I often disagreed with his centre-right views but his tone was measured and he remained a staunch supporter of democracy. May God bless his soul.

I stumbled on this post at Cafe Piyala that also talks about Haqqani but the best part of it was what Haqqani’s peers and junior collegaues had to say about him. I think some of the comments were so shameful that I could not even laugh with an easy conscience. I am quoting the last part of that post here that also is quite a treat:

Whatever they might say about him, he did invent the modern Urdu column, which is half analytical drivel, half dinner menus. Only during the last week, for example, Jang columnist Haroon-ur-Rashid (according to his column) demanded and got desi murghi from the Azad Kashmir prime minister, and Hamid Mir (according to his column) discovered new insights into judicial activism over a Kashmiri dish. I forget the name of the dish but according to Jang / Geo’s brightest star, it is made of mooli and shaljam and served with rice. The host was the Lahore High Court Chief Justice Khwaja Sharif.

“The tour’s cancellation means that terrorists have won; this is what they wanted to achieve.”

I was quoted in a piece published by Hindustan Times

Cricket is not just a game. It is also a standard to measure the tense relationship between India and Pakistan at any given moment. With India’s tour of Pakistan being called off, fans have been deprived of a rollicking good time. But not many players are complaining. The reason being the Mumbai terror attack. (more…)

A few quotes from this article in the Hindustan Times – incidentally it also includes what I rambled….

Freedom means everything. But I’m not free. All these concepts are self-imposed imprisonments.—Roshan Seth, actor

Independence has provided me with a national identity but it hasn’t meant freedom. I find myself enslaved to narrow ideas of patriotism. I’m trying to break free. And writing a book on Delhi, the capital of the ‘enemy’ nation, is my first step.
—Raza Rumi, blogger

Personal freedom is crucial to my growth as an artist. ‘Independence Day’ is a distant celebration for me. Each year, as mid-August approaches I am conscious of a sense of loss — I wonder what could have been had the subcontinent not been splintered.
— Sehba Sarwar, poet

Being a (somewhat) responsible parent, I will share with my children the notion that today we remember our national heroes. And amidst the nationalistic pop nuggets being broadcast round the clock, I hope they hear Yeh watan tumhara hai, tum ho Pasban iss kay, yeh chaman tumhara hai, tum ho naghma khwan iss kay…
— Shandana Minhas, author

More here

My article that appeared in Dawn. here.

THE enthusiasts for the long march towards Islamabad are justifiably feeling let down by the grand posturing, thundering rhetoric and the subsequent retreat from agitation outside the dreary citadels of power in Islamabad’s dark heart.

A Bastille, which was not meant to be? Interpretations abound and explanations are flowing in from the motley groups who ventured to change the contours of state-society relations. The lawyers’ movement is profoundly significant. It constitutes the finest historical ‘moment’ in our troubled history. However, many observers have hinted at its limitations and the problematic phase that the movement has now entered.

Unlike China, Pakistan’s long marches have been nefarious for their results. Orchestrated by political and non-political actors to undermine the democratic process, we are well aware of this stratagem. This time it was different, complex and refreshingly path-breaking alas with similar results: pressurise the beleaguered PPP government still trying to find the proverbial power-ground beneath its truncated legs. In that sense, the march was a roaring success. From the sloganeering against the much maligned Asif Zardari, to de-legitimising three decades of PPP’s valiant struggle against dictatorship culminating in the assassination of Benazir Bhutto.

Irony, that all is now a forgotten snippet of history. What is indeed more pressing, as we are told time and again, are the sacrifices made by the honourable judges. Indeed they have altered the parameters of the state and perhaps buried the subordination of the judiciary to the all powerful executive. Well, one may ask what about Asif Zardari and his eleven and a half years in jail without a single conviction? Therefore the vilification of Zardari by anti-Musharraf sections of the media and by the historical long march is symbolic. It is a testament to the deep-seated middle class trend of demonising politicians and party politics that are prerequisites for democracy and means to establish the ‘rule of law’.

The opportunism of individuals and groups jumping onto the lawyers’ bandwagon is also alarming. It is most convenient to have been all-powerful army chiefs, heads of the ISI and former honchos of the civilian bureaucratic monolith and once the party is over, re-christen yourself as firebrand democrats. The patriotic Hameed Guls, Aslam Begs and Faiz Ali Chishtis and the neo-constitutionalist Roedad Khans and right-wing ambassadors (who slept while Afghans were killed for strategic depth), must be questioned by the anti-Musharraf movement for it was their historical culpability that undermined civilian governance. Is it not important that circumspection be exercised while letting them be the spokespersons of the new vanguard? If Zardari has to be isolated then these dubious characters must also be questioned. (more…)

This piece of mine appeared in the Hindustan Times yesterday. An accidental piece it was, written on the request of a friend during my recent stopover in Delhi.

Delhi-Lahore hip factor

Be it Khan Market or MM Alam Road,  life for young guns in both Delhi and Lahore is a blend of cafe culture, cool music and retail nirvana

A Pakistani like me who is visiting Delhi cannot help but identify the commonalities between the Indian capital and Lahore. The climate, the predominant Punjabi influence, the urban chaos and indeed the quest for a good life are as shared as the centuries of mixed history.

In Delhi, these ingredients are packaged into a single space, loved and mourned in equal measure, the Khan Market. Its swanky cafes, retail outlets spell out a comfortable sense of the plentiful. A trip to Bahri Booksellers is essential to check on the new, profound and banal book titles. Step out of the book-zone, walk around and you see young men and women holding hands and out to buy a little dose of happiness from the upmarket retail stores. New frames for glasses, an array of pret-a-porter garments and of course cafes where one can lounge while sipping an exotic coffee brew with a fancy cake. Barista is a favourite of mine with its neo-modernity ambiance and an ample variety to select from. If Barista is crowded, one turns to Cafe Turtle. Wi-fi access is available in these places along with soft music and trendy customers, whose snazzy mobile telephones rest silently on clean little tables. Connectivity is another facet of the global search for fulfillment.

In Khan Market cafes, one reminisces about similar haunts in Lahore. The MM Alam Road there is now a bustling venue for stylish cafes and restaurants that are popular hangouts for the youth defying the silly stereotypes of Pakistan. Men and women converse in their designer jeans about the world, quite unaware of the residual violence of the war on terror on the Pak-Afghan border. The Coffee & Tea Company is hugely popular. Another joint, Massom, a pancake lounge, sells mouth-watering desserts with coffee brews and plays cool music as one plunges into leather sofas to chill. Places such as Cafe Zouk, Hobb-Nobbs, Jamin Java continue to lure the hip Lahorites.
Since globalisation’s onslaught on Pakistan, Lahore’s traditional love for eating out has transformed into a fusion culture bonanza. The Hot Spot Cafe, Little Italy, Cafe Aylanto and The Dish have emerged as havens of cross-continental culinary blending. Young women drive alone to meet up with friends at these places; and hordes of teens are seen flocking to the Pizza Huts, McDonalds and Kentucky Fried Chicken outlets.

While the affluent have these arenas, the underclass youth, both in Lahore and Delhi, finds its own recreational spaces in Carom and Snooker clubs, sleazy internet cafes with loads of porn, the weekly trips to parks; and the occasional sojourns to police lock ups. Life goes on. Globalization has something to offer to everyone.

I took this photo at a Bihari camp in Dhaka. Thousands of ‘Pakistanis’ are stranded in Bangaldesh since 1971 and both the states refuse to acknowlegde their existence. Hence, a few generations have been born in the refugee ghettos who live in sub-human conditions.

I was extremely happy to read this report in the NEWS today that is a little ray of hope:

BD court gives stranded Pakistanis citizenship right

DHAKA: Bangladesh’s High Court ruled on Sunday that some 200,000 Urdu-speaking refugees have the right to be Bangladeshi citizens, a lawyer and a news report said.

Rafiqul Islam Mian, the counsel of a group of refugees, said the court made it clear that they also have the right to cast their votes in upcoming polls, expected to be held in December. “The refugees who were minors in 1971 or born after the independence of Bangladesh are citizens of Bangladesh,” the court said in its ruling. (more…)

Found this brilliant piece by Slavoj  ek writing for the London Review of Books

The media imposes certain stories on us, and the one about Tibet goes like this. The People’s Republic of China, which, back in 1949, illegally occupied Tibet, has for decades engaged in the brutal and systematic destruction not only of the Tibetan religion, but of the Tibetans themselves. Recently, the Tibetans protests against Chinese occupation were again crushed by military force. Since China is hosting the 2008 Olympics, it is the duty of all of us who love democracy and freedom to put pressure on China to give back to the Tibetans what it stole from them. A country with such a dismal human rights record cannot be allowed to use the noble Olympic spectacle to whitewash its image. What will our governments do? Will they, as usual, cede to economic pragmatism, or will they summon the strength to put ethical and political values above short-term economic interests?

There are complications in this story of  good guys versus bad guys. It is not the case that Tibet was an independent country until 1949, when it was suddenly occupied by China. The history of relations between Tibet and China is a long and complex one, in which China has often played the role of a protective overlord: the anti-Communist Kuomintang also insisted on Chinese sovereignty over Tibet. Before 1949, Tibet was no Shangri-la, but an extremely harsh feudal society, poor (life expectancy was barely over 30), corrupt and fractured by civil wars (the most recent one, between two monastic factions, took place in 1948, when the Red Army was already knocking at the door). Fearing social unrest and disintegration, the ruling elite prohibited industrial development, so that metal, for example, had to be imported from India. (more…)

An overwhelming majority of Pakistan’s population finds itself hostage to narratives of terror that are either alien to its ethos or are constructed by its home-grown theologians and opinion-makers. This is not to say that the issue of suicide bombings is easy to define and understand. They are essentially complex and located in decades of Pakistan’s evolution into a society that is difficult yet again to label: Islamic in name, struggling to be democratic and a republic it is not, well, not yet.

If we take the viewpoint of liberals, it is our war as much as a war of others. If we were to hear the west, it is about countering terror and preserving world peace; and if we listen to Pakistan’s right it is someone else’s battle fought on our land ‘the land of the pure’ lest we forget.

Where does this leave the confused, battered citizen who now has to strive for personal security among other daily struggles of existence? There are no clear answers and if one were to probe further, the questions are as murky as their geneses.

One thing is clear though: to identify the recurrent suicide bombings in the name of theological, tribal and imperial grievances is at best a half-truth. The genie is far more complex than a response to the reductionist narrative of âwar against terror and such other imperial phraseology. At the core of this phenomena, if one were to be rather blunt, lies an exclusive, bigoted ideology of a few men of holy intentions orchestrating a script written by others. (more…)

On the flourishing ‘column’ industry despite the slow growth of readership

What is so peculiar about the Pakistani media opinion factories churning out problems and solutions products day after day? Frankly, they are self perpetuating oligarchies and boring at best. The slightly discerning mortals who browse the daily newspapers in English and vernacular languages or bother to engage with the electronic media discussions are struck by certain repetitive trends. Let me map them out before rambling any further. On a note of caution, there is no intention of making generalisations here. Exceptions, they say, prove the rule!

The curse of self-importance

Nowhere else would you find brazen references to the importance of a writers’ opinion particularly among the Urdu language newspaper columnists. Despite the slow growth of readership, the ‘kalam-navees’ industry is flourishing. A few years ago, a new Urdu newspaper with a hefty advertising budget, ensured that a few big names in the column industry were under its wings. (more…)