Last week Dawn ran two stories on the dismal state of a leopard at the Karachi Zoo. The writer stated how the beast was being regularly pelted with stones and disturbed with sticks by the visitors. How awful! No, not the fate of the leopard, but the audacity of the writer to actually ask the [...]
Daddy? Yes, son. Are we going to have a war with India? Perhaps. Oh, goody. We will thrash them, right? Like we did in 1857! It wasn’t in 1857, son. Oh, okay. But whom did we thrash in 1857? The British, son… And the Hindus too, right? Well… Did Quaid-i-Azam fight in that war along [...]
It was a startling experience following the antics of the Indian electronic media in the wake of the recent terrorist attacks in Mumbai. As one Indian news channel after the other babbled across the most thrilling and sensational expressions of paranoid, anti-Pakistan clichés, I switched back to watching our own channels when a sudden realisation [...]
“Fashion industry.” Really, what on earth is this “fashion industry” in Pakistan? Some newspapers have gone on and on about the ins and outs, the trials and tribulations, the glory and the triumphs of “Pakistan’s fashion industry.” I’ve seen many young journalists passionately discussing and then scribbling page after page about the “politics” (read gossip), [...]
Everyone knows how Jews, Hindus and, of course, the Freemasons have been the most compelling reasons behind the many political, economic and social problems that are eating up Pakistan. I just don’t understand why there is even a debate about this. I humbly suggest that anyone attempting to debate this irrefutable fact should be taken [...]
lt is an insult, especially to the memory of those who die so tragically in terrorist attacks, when certain members of society and the media start diluting the whole event with the ever-present help of outlandish conspiracy theories. Instead of collectively condemning the ever-growing monster of extremism that is getting fatter by the day, one [...]
Shahzad Roy’s latest video and song, Laga Reh, has created a prominent little ripple in the local pop scene. An irreverent take on the various socio-political forces of agitation in the country, the song has also managed to disturb the sterile homogeneity of today’s music scene. In spite of the fact that Roy began his [...]
A few days ago my day was made when I stumbled across a DVD of a 2007 documentary called The Power of Nightmares. Made by the BBC, the narrator and director of the documentary, Adam Curtis, lays down a rather convincing thesis that suggests that the current ‘war on terror’ and ‘Islamic terrorism’ are two [...]
If Inzimam-ul-Haq were a music critic… First of all, thanks to Almighty God, boys in many bands prayed well, and so the Islamic Republic music scene is recovering from pulled hamstrings because praying comes first and then playing but we tell girls not play, only pray, because girls belong in the kitchen making lunch for [...]
Much has been discussed about the political reasons behind “Pakistan’s decent into religious extremism.” Unfortunately, very little has appeared regarding the more social and cultural reasons behind the dreaded phenomenon. One way to go about this is to analyse certain Pakistani films that may answer the question about the general society’s role in the matter. [...]
