Month: June 2010

Inspiration Pakistan: Selflessness in Jaded Times

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Sehar Tariq Times in Pakistan are tough. Things were never great but they were never this bad either. There weren’t as many incidents of violence, so many hours of load shedding or such high  prices of food and electricity. And in our fast paced downward spiral, we have lost our sense of being one nation. Its each man and woman for himself or herself. Its the only way to survive. And in the pursuit of survival we will lie, cheat, steal, trample on others, cut corners and take the low road as often as possible to get to destination mere survival.

Guillotine and Governance

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By Awaam Does anyone remember a certain French Queen who famously said ‘well if they do not have bread to eat, why don’t they eat the cake?’. Anyone who knows this will also know what her fate was.  Marie Antoinette ended with her head on that famous French chopping block – guillotine. Neat, instant and bloody. Why am I reminded of this early in the morning?

What is Blasphemy?

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By Awaam Blasphemy, in its literal meanings, is defined as a behaviour or language expressing disrespect for God or for something sacred The issue of blasphemy, highlighted again by the recent banning of certain websites in Pakistan, has caught the attention of everyone again, through debates on media. I also read and heard different versions of thought on the issues of blasphemy. While due to the rapid transmission of the message throughout the country, and due to pressure generated by the  perceived angry reaction( read road demonstrations resulting in injuries, burning , destruction and looting) of the people, authorities were keen to ban the sites within a few hours. On the other side, it also gave birth to a serious question in my mind that ‘what the hell is blasphemy’ indeed?

Court order to ban Nine Websites in pakistan

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By Awaam Lahore High Court (LHC) has ordered Pakistan Telecom Authority to block nine websites in Pakistan, which purportedly contain the blasphemous contents. The decision was taken in response to a petition filed by a retire civil servant for the ban on the websites including Google, Yahoo, Amazon, MSN, Hotmail and YouTube. The LHC ordered an interim ban on these sites without any consultation with the information technology experts regarding the issue and alternatives to deal with it. It is a moment to take a pause and reflect on what on earth is going on. What madness has gone in all of us? How are our courts reacting and why?

Sinking further – Dawn Editorial

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Tuesday, 22 Jun, 2010 Balochistan is a province on edge. Its denizens don’t know where the next attack will occur or who will be the target. On Saturday, an attack on an army convoy killed one soldier and injured several others; the Baloch Liberation Army claimed responsibility. On the same day, two members of the Hazara community were killed on Art School Road in the heart of Quetta city. Suspicion has fallen on Jundallah, the group which claims to be fighting for the rights of the Baloch in Pakistan and Iran but that also has a sectarian hue. With such disparate sources of violence in Balochistan, easy solutions will not be had. Start with the Baloch nationalist problem. To be sure, there are extremists hiding in the hills of Balochistan and living outside Pakistan who are orchestrating the violence and whose central demand, independence, will not be met by the Pakistani state. But focusing on the most extreme demand of the radical fringe can be misleading.

Value Added Tax: Sucking Blood from Stones

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Brig. Simon Sharaf The progress of a country’s revenue generation directly depends on the growth of its economy and the fairness of its tax collectors to deliver. However, at the broadest and lowest level of this enforcement lie a mass of people with different ideas, idiosyncrasies, historical traditions and daily experiences. This diversity is intertwined at the very top with governance manifested by its politicians, establishment, enforcement and intellectuals. Consequently, the tax culture of a country will always take the colour of its top tier.

The Status Quo Cycle

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By Awaam ‘Almost all Pakistanis see their country in crises’ declares the headline news in today’s papers, about the Global Attitudes Survey that was recently conducted by the Pew Research Centre, Washington.  The further findings show, that as many as 89% of the Pakistanis think of themselves as Pakistanis first, rather than as a member of their ethnic group, which can be the better news for the future of the country.

Objectives of the Federal Budget 2010-2011

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Following are some excerpts from the federal budget speech made on 5th June 2010 by the Finance Minister. These below points are stated as the objectives of the budget in FY 2010-2011. We have chosen only seven among the objectives stated in the speech, for the follow up of their accomplishment overtime. 1. Economic recovery Waste will be eliminated, expenditures tightly controlled, and the policy mix carefully managed for a strong and stable recovery.

A critical perspective on the LSE report on the Taliban-ISI alliance

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Waldman’s one-sided and highly biased report refers to several unnamed single sources. Accusations against Pakistan are mostly based on hearsay. By Shiraz Paracha The London School of Economics’ (LSE) recent report on the alleged links between the Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) of Pakistan and the Afghan Taliban is yet another proof of an unholy alliance, in which Western secret services, the mainstream Western media and some Western academic institutions are partners.

Expeditionary Economics

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By Carl J. Schramm This article,  published in Foreign Affairs Journal, asserts that Washington’s method of reconstructing economies hit by conflicts and natural disasters is inadequate. It suggests that US military must build its competence in economics. And the object of economic reconstruction must be part of any successful  strategy of invasion, stabilization, and economic reconstruction. The writer calls this expeditionary economics. We are posting this article on our blog for our readers. The United States’ experience with rebuilding economies in the aftermath of conflicts and natural disasters has evidenced serious shortcomings. After seven years of a U.S. presence in Iraq and over nine years in Afghanistan, the economies of those countries continue to falter and underperform. Meanwhile, the damage caused by the earthquake in Haiti early this year revealed deep economic problems, ones that had confronted earlier U.S. efforts to boost Haiti’s economy, and they will plague reconstruction efforts there for a long while.

Pity the nation by Hajrah Mumtaz

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The ironies we witness every day in Pakistan would have us shaking our heads were it not for the fact that they usually provoke such deep visceral dread. Take the furore over the recent shutdown of Facebook and other websites. In Pakistan the debate framed the issue mainly in terms of either the freedom of speech or the legitimacy of government censorship. Both models, as constructed here in Pakistan, were flawed and reductionist. Let that be as it may, I wish to point out something else. The websites were shut down because many people found their content ‘blasphemous’ and hurtful to their sentiments as Muslims.