Postcard from Agra

Published in The Friday Times As Indian TV channels broadcast stories on Pakistan’s domestic infighting, and rumours of a new coup d’ etat, my…

Contemporary Pakistani literature in the age of terror

I am posting the synopsis of my paper entitled Silhouetted Silences – contemporary Pakistani literature in the age of terror, that I presented at…

Build The Peace Consensus

By Sadia Dehlvi The trail of terror continues with cricketers as the latest target. The Mumbai and Lahore attacks, public executions and the murder…

Desecration of Rahman Baba’s tomb is desecration of humanity

The SCN press release echoes my sentiments at the disgusting act of vandalism in Peshawar. It is a befitting metaphor for the barbaric bigotry…

Nightingale of Peshawar falls silent

My piece published in The Friday Times The bombing of Rehman Baba’s shrine is more proof that we are slipping, inch by inch, into…

Sad times in Lahore

What a sad day it was – a city that usually glows with spring colours and crisp air was a death-zone. Everyone was afraid…

Say no to war

Little did we know that the imminence of war between India and Pakistan would once again become a possibility, howsoever faint or misguided? The…

‘There are none so deaf as those who don’t want to hear’

Liked this excellent editorial from The News: Yet more curiously, there appears to be a positive dearth of arrests of those who publicly carry…

Who will win the game?

I have been amazed at the reaction that my little piece, “Policy shifts not war” published on these pages on Dec 4 has generated…

Policy shifts not war

First published in The NEWS The dastardly attacks in Mumbai have irritated the old wounds and replayed the familiar, jingoistic tunes across the Indo-Pak…

In City of Tolerance…

I was quoted in this NYT article on Lahore Still, Raza Rumi, a writer and blogger who takes great pride in his city, insisted…

Lahore blasts fail to terrorise Lahoris

Having lived two days in Lahore as a ‘resident’, the three low intensity blasts are a rude reminder that there is a war all…

Delhi and Islamabad blasts: Deadly tale of two cities

A reader directed me to this lovely post. 13/09/08: A series of bomb blasts ripped through the crowded market places of Delhi claiming a…

The dilemma of an educated [Indian] Muslim youth

Saif Khalid, a patriotic Indian writes on the predicament of those who want to stay away from the missions, the purges and typecasting of Indian…

Islamabad is burning – down with terrorism

What jihad, what Islam and what kind of Muslims these butchers are – they kill innocent people, the underclass outside a posh hotel in…

Utopia for me- Pieces of my heart

My piece published in the News on Sunday yesterday – Karta hun jama phir jigare lakht lakht ko (I seek to gather the scattered…

A ‘counter-view’ of suicide-bombing

The victims are not exclusively Americans and Jews but in countries like Iraq and Pakistan, Muslims themselves. What is even more traumatising "which arouses…

Pakistan Suicide Bombings: The narratives of terror

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…

Lahore blasts and the Jihad industry

My city Lahore was attacked yet again by the pusillanimous attackers pretending to be brave and honourable. There is no justification and no excuse…

Economist estimates cost of Iraq war to exceed $3 trillion

This is an astounding figure. Not to mention the loss of over 1 million civilians, the sectarian blood-baths, the destruction of a civilisation and…