Taseer will live as an icon for a sane, just Pakistan

Salmaan Taseer, businessman, publisher and Governor of Pakistan’s largest Province, was killed by his bodyguard a zealot who like his supporters thought that Taseer had…

An icon for a sane, just Pakistan

Salmaan Taseer’s defiance of convention and collective cowardice is one of the watersheds of Pakistan’s contemporary history. His defence of a poor Christian woman…

Mumtaz Qadri – Salmaan Taseer – Blasphemy it was not

Pakistan’s Supreme Court has upheld the death penalty for Mumtaz Qadri “the policeman who murdered former Punjab governor Salmaan Taseer in January 2011 for…

In Pakistan, ‘Blasphemers’ Like Me Receive Militant Justice

Like so many others, I was recently targeted in a cold-blooded assassination for speaking out against extremism. Pakistan has acquired a strong reputation of…

Farewell, Dear SM

 TFT “Death, a necessary end, will come when it will come…” Salma Mahmud, or SM as we called her at TFT, quietly left us…

2011- A year that will haunt us

From Paper Magazine 2011- a year in review A journalist recently remarked that 2011 was the year that no one will remember. Alas, this…

Death Sentence in Slaying of Pakistani Governor

From the New York Times: “Today’s judgment is a positive development whereby norms of justice have prevailed. Pakistan cannot be allowed to become a…

An existential crisis

On 4 January, Punjab province Governor Salman Taseer was killed by a member of his security detail, Malik Mumtaz Hussain Qadri. But as disturbing…

RIP Salmaan Taseer: this country did not deserve you

Salmaan Taseer’s brutal murder at the hands of a policeman is a cruel reminder of where we have landed ourselves: in a dark morass…