Ethical Marketing …..

Today while driving from my home to office in Karachi, I managed to take the route of NIPA to Hassan Square. On that track, there was a billboard to which my sight came across. I stopped my car on the side of the road and stood still in front of the billboard & kept looking at it for 5 minutes. The only thing my brain anticipated during these 5 minutes was “A BIT FOR CHANGE . . . “.

That billboard was delivering a very important message relating to a forgotten lesson which the religion Islam taught to the “MUSLIM” nation of the “ISLAMIC REPUBLIC OF PAKISTAN”, a lesson relating to the respect of women. That billboard was saying “Stop Promoting Nudity for Selling Your Fabric”. Then I managed to take a picture of that billboard.

As the summer season has just arrived, the female lawn designers have placed the advertisement on the billboards promoting their products through female and that too without considering the Islamic limits of ethics. The question arises that why does the marketing is portraying a woman as an object? Is there no other way of promoting the fabric without a female model? Will their sales revenue decrease if they only promote the designs without a woman on the billboards?

Most of the people would appreciate this piece of work but some will be labeling it with the conservative mindset. It seems that we have not only snatched the HIJAB of the Muslim female of our society but has also placed them on the enormous billboards. I would like to mention the Quran versus, in which the Almighty Allah, the Creator of mankind and the universe says in Surah Al-Ahzaab, Verse #59:

‘O Prophet! Tell your wives and your daughters and the women of the believers to draw their cloaks (“Jalabib”) veils all over their bodies (screen themselves completely except the eyes or one eye to see the way that is most convenient that they should be known (as such) and not molested: and Allah is Oft-Forgiving Most Merciful.”:

It is the time that we must do the assessment of our society that are we following the orders Allah Almighty. This is the time to examine that are we in the limits of the ethics assigned to us by Allah Almighty or we have crossed them all. Islam is the only religion which talks about the female respect and honor They are like the clove of the unopened flowers as they are not pricked by anyone unless they blossom there hidden beauty our of them. In Abu Dawood, Book 32, Hadith # 4091 Ummul Muminin Hazrat Ayesha (Radhiallaahu Anhu) narrated

“May Allah have mercy on the early immigrant women. When the verse “That they should draw their veils over their bosoms” was revealed, they tore their thick outer garments and made veils from them.

The time has arrived that we should move towards a complete Islam rather then following the only versus which are favorable to us. We have to stop this evil or else may be our own next coming generation will be on these billboards. According to the book “Kenz Al-Omal, v. 13, p. 91 & 93” The Prophet (s) said,

“A caller will call out on the Day of Judgment, ‘lower your gaze until Fatima (Radhiallaahu Anhu) has passed.”

Keeping in mind the Islamic teaching & taking the Prophet Muhammad Sallalahu Alaih Wasalam, his Ahl e Bayt & Sahabah Ikraam Rizwaanullahe Ajmaeen, we have to explore marketing techniques free from unethical means. Let us secure our Muslim society so that our females may breath again free from embarrassments. The time has come to represent the true image of Muslim not only by words but by conduct. Let us all join our hands to promote this Nobel cause and take another step to free our society from evil.

 

The Album of Life

There was once a world without you. Someone was celebrating your expected and awaited arrival and someone bore hardships and pains to bring you into this world. With the first click you land into this place which is a beautiful masterpiece of the creator. You are an adorable baby, a joy to your parents who bear those sleepless nights and support your helplessness with unconditional smiles on their faces. Just with a few more flicks, you are a daring toddler of your proud parents who cherish the first steps of your independence and confident walk. Your mind tells you that you can do it but your body disagrees. This still developing co-ordination between your brain and body makes you stumble. But there is always a pair of gentle hands to pick you and tell you, ‘You can do it’. Those hands and reassuring hugs make you fearless and failures do not scare you. Falls and bumps don’t stop you from experimenting new challenges.

You talk silly and they kiss you. You do not make sense and they hug you. You trip and they lift you high. You scribble lines and they appreciate you with raised eyebrows and dropped jaws. You do most silly things to catch their attention and make your presence felt. You go cross if ignored and they try to please you with hugs and kisses, hide and seek, ‘horse-rides’ on their backs etc. You can’t share them with any other child as you are too possessive about them.

With a few more flicks you are a confident school going child. Exams are the most difficult days in one’s life, you think. But, they support you and celebrate when you get down the stage after a performance or winning a race. Their world revolves round you. Their sleeps, social life, work and holidays; you are one factor that affects all of these.

Life is changing for you. You feel you are big and smart enough to know everything; a teenager filled with energy. Something in you tells you that you can conquer the world. Your ideals begin to change. ‘No’ is the word you don’t like to listen but would use often. You see colours in your life and with a few more flicks you have another beautiful person to fit in frame with you and soon the cycle repeats. You have a little one of your own and you are overjoyed with this little cry and chuckle in the house.

This album of life is strange; an overlapping connected series of circles where we all are in different stages of the track.

The lovely hands which cuddled you are now wrinkly and those bright faces are now sagging. The legs, which ran with you on the shoulders, are now weak. They trip and topple. Despite their physical weakness, their support makes your life and career successful. They are entering into the last phase of their lives. They have started talking silly. They sometimes make no sense at all. Laugh, cry or shout for no logical reason. Sometimes their ‘childish’ and attention seeking behaviour disturbs you. They need someone to talk to, sit with them and hold their disjointed wrinkly hands without even asking for a word, or sometimes just a word of love and a gentle smile exactly like you did when were young and silly but adorable to them, remember?

‘And whomsoever We bring to an old age, We reverse him in creation (making him go back to weakness after strength); so do they not understand?’ [Al-Qur’an 36:68]

Life goes on and a day comes when they reach their finish line in the circular track of life. (The circle doesn’t stop for anyone). The beautiful hands, the shady trees under which you felt safe, the warm hugs that gave you confidence are no more.

If you had any sleepless nights because of them, and you got a chance to feed and clean them like they did when you were young, consider yourself as an extremely lucky person, although no one can return the debts of parents’ love and hardship; not even a single scream of the mother when she cried and tried to bring you to this world and smiled immediately after you came in her arms.

Another flick! You’re a weak elderly with your children running for a ‘successful’ life and you are sitting in an armchair, reading newspaper with those glasses on and a walking stick by your side. Your mind is still young and keeps reminding you the highly energetic life you spent which involved struggle, joy, grief, and celebration, disappointment and hopes. But your body doesn’t agree. You know everything that the world holds, with people around you who think you know nothing, but they don’t realise they are just a few steps behind in the big circle of life.

The circle of life never stops. We don’t have a special eye to look at the future but our parents are a mirror of where life could take us. Our boasting energetic bodies and minds do not allow us to see that we’ll be in exactly the same state of feebleness, frailty and dependence if we live up to that age. Life is too fast and unpredictable and we are all running after ‘God-Knows-What’ with too little time to love each other. It’s the love and the loved ones who make life worth living. Let’s give our parents their rights, our love and respect. We can try to return at least 1% of what they’ve given us; sit with them, listen to them, obey them in Allah’s limits, smile at them, hug them often and feel the contentment and blessings of Allah that come our way. If we have this treasure and guaranteed entry to paradise and God’s pleasure, we shouldn’t waste our chance.

‘And your Lord has decreed that you worship none but Him. And that you be dutiful to your parents. If one of them or both of them attain old age in your life, say not to them a word of disrespect, nor shout at them but address them in terms of honour. And lower unto them the wing of submission and humility through mercy, and say: “My Lord! Bestow on them Your Mercy as they did bring me up when I was young.” (Al- Qur’an 17:22-24)

Aafia Revisited

The issue of Aafia Siddiqui is very delicate and complex. We all have questions but very few of us manage to get reasonable answers. Some questions are not questions; they are merely hallucinations of our limited “unlimited” grey matter. And some of them are not ours, rather are shoved into our grey matter following sophisticated brainwashing techniques and therefore ‘our’ quest doesn’t bring any good results whereas others deal with petty issues, again induced within us using the same techniques, so that we ignore the bigger picture.

We all have critics either because we did something extraordinarily good or we did something extraordinarily bad. But, Aafia’s critics don’t fall into either although the questions raised against her fall into all three categories that I mentioned above as well as many others. The complexity of the questions raised truly reflects the complexity of her case. I’d like to reiterate few important facts in her story beginning from her abduction and eventually her judicial rape.

  • 18/03/03 | FBI issues an alert regarding Aafia’s potentiality being a terrorist
  • 29/03/03 | Aafia declared an al Qaeda ‘fixer’*
  • 30/03/03 | Aafia disappears while on her way to Rawalpindi (from Karachi); and according to      my research, she was abducted from Karachi by our LEAs (Law Enforcement Agencies) following post-9/11 pressure coming from US end
  • 04/04/03 | FBI denies any hand in her disappearance
  • 26/05/03 | FBI officially declares her an al Qaeda operative
  • 28/05/04 | Pakistan’s Interior Ministry accepts they handed Aafia
  • ??/??/05 | Centre for Human Rights and Global Justice (CHR&GJ, New York University School of Law) published a report titled: “Fate and Whereabouts Unknown: Detainees in the “War on Terror.” It presented “factual summaries of (28) individuals who may be in secret (US) detention sites” and included known information about Aafia at the time
  • ??/??/06 | Amnesty International declares Aafia one of the ‘disappeared’ persons in the ‘war on terror’
  • 28/02/07 | Ghost Prisoner by Human Rights Watch says Aafia “may have once been held” in secret CIA detention
  • ??/02/08 | Aafia was brought back to Karachi and tortured, according to Asian Human Rights commission
  • 11/07/08 | No women held in Bagram, according to a US Army Colonel
  • 31/07/08 | Aafia’s brother is informed by FBI that she’s in US custody
  • 04/08/08 | A press release shows that Aafia has been arrested in Ghazni (Afghanistan)
  • 06/08/08 | A US magistrate rules to hold her without bail
  • 12/08/08 | Pakistani Embassy in Washington issues a repatriation request
  • 13/08/08 | Never held Aafia, US military (in Afghanistan)

Now let’s pause here and connect the dots. Aafia disappeared in March of one year and our Interior Ministry’s acknowledgment (which came after FBI declaring her an al Qaeda operative) is coming in May of the next year and coupled with FBI’s denial of any hand in abduction leads us to the conclusion that b/w March of 2003 and May/April of 2005 she was either in the custody of our LEAs or the CIA. Also, have you ever asked yourself what ‘alerted’ FBI, what was she up to? More importantly, what kind of lifestyle she was living that alerted the FBI? By the way, she wasn’t alone when she was abducted, she had three kids with her at that time, why we always ignore them while pointing fingers at her? What took Amnesty International so long to acknowledge her disappearance? Who is responsible for that slack, the free media of Pakistan or its dead-soul inhabitants? Were any legal procedures followed while handing her to FBI? Why was she brought back and more importantly why was she tortured? If no women was ever held in Bagram then who was the female detainee that her co detainees always relate to? More importantly, why the US simply not tell who she was if she wasn’t Aafia? If Pakistan handed her over to US and if she wasn’t been held in Bagram then where was she in all those years; in the US? OK, let’s assume she was in the US but then why US let her go back to Pakistan and how she managed to end up in Afghanistan? And in all this mayhem, where were her kids?! Most importantly, why we always skip this question? If she went into US custody in 2008 then whose custody was she in during all those years? Let’s move on!

  • 02/10/2008 | Aafia sent to a Federal Medical Centre for psychiatric evaluation
  • 06/10/2008 | Pakistani senators meet her, she tells them how she was “abducted in 2003, given an injection, found herself in a cell, and was forced to sign papers and confess to things she didn’t do; her children’s lives were threatened and she was abused grievously”
  • 17/11/2008 | Aafia declared “not competent to proceed as a result of her mental disease, which renders her unable to understand the nature and consequences of the proceedings against her;” by Judge Richard Berman
  • 09/03/2009 | The tentative date for Aafia’s trial to begin

Few more points straight from my end:

  • What caused her to end in such a destructive psychological state?
  • One of her kids is back but what about the other two? Probably, her youngest kid has died, yes, it’s unofficial but true. · Above all why she was abducted from Pakistan for a crime committed in Afghanistan to be tried in the US?
  • What Aafia had to go through during illegal detention in Bagram is in grave breach of US War Crimes Act (1996) as well as Geneva Conventions (1949).
  • The very act of her enforced disappearance is a clear breach of UN’s Declaration on the Protection of all Persons from Enforced Disappearance.
  • Let us assume Aafia did shoot at US military personnel and FBI agents but why DOJ (Dept. of Justice) while indicting her ignored more than 5 years of torture altogether?  Why they ignored the common sense element altogether that how on earth can a woman so thin and pain stricken cause damage to army personnel so well trained.
  • As her attorney put it: “Picture this woman who is very tiny (and extremely frail and weakened from her ordeal), and ask yourself how she engaged in armed conflict….with six (armed and well-trained) military men, how did this happen? And how did she get shot? I think you can answer that, can’t you (and question the absurdity of DOJ’s charges against her)?
  • What happened to FBI’s alert, by the way, and their declaration as well, not to mention none of them showed up in the court proceedings? All seven counts had to do with her staged clash at Ghazni where she fired at armed military personnel with bullets that left no marks on the walls, didn’t injure anybody (although it was close range encounter) and the only injured party was none other than herself.
  • The rape and victimisation that she had to go through isn’t an unexpected one. If an army, who’s on a mission of moral policing of the world, belonging to world’s most civilised country, can rape and mutilate men then it can definitely rape and victimise women but what she went through inside the US (not in a secret detention) is utterly disgusting! In Bagram, she only had to face unofficial degradation (rape) but in the US she had to face official degradation (strip-search) as well.
  • 86 years imprisonment for firing a gun that she couldn’t hold, for firing bullets that left no trace, for firing from a close range causing nil injury or for getting injured herself?

So, next time some miserable apologists try to confuse you regarding Aafia being innocent or not, please remind them:

She stayed in illegal detention for more than five years for no good reason. The charges that were levied against her by FBI had no factual stand whatsoever and that’s the only reason they never made it to court proceedings but HEY she lost her kids, she lost her chastity (she was raped in Bagram as well as in the US), she lost her psychological balance, she lost her honour, she lost her dignity, she lost everything, for what? For the stupid reasons made by a force known to the world for their crimes, lies and atrocities? And yes, her 86 years imprisonment is based on no forensic evidence whatsoever.

Oh, really sorry, even I forgot to mention about the real Aafia. She was a neuro-scientist, the only one in the world to have an honorary degree from Harvard University; she was Hafiz-e-Quran and had 144 honorary degrees & certificates. She went to MIT and Brandeis, raised money for charities, did voluntary social work, hosted play groups in her apartment, loved her religion, and distributed Qur’ans to inmates in area prisons. She was living a normal American life until the FBI called her a terrorist, a high-profile Al Qaeda operative. Aafia was indeed a woman guilty only of being Muslim at the wrong time in America.  (Boston Magazine’s Katherine Oxment asked: Who’s afraid of Aafia Siddiqui?)

The divine way

It has been years since Pakistan has emerged on the map of the world. Muslims of India became Muslims of Pakistan after a great struggle and a big loss of human lives. The question arises that what made them struggle for the separate homeland and putting life at stake. Today, after accomplishing approximately 64 years of independence, we have got distributed into two different schools of thought. One of the schools of thought says that Pakistan is a Muslim state (as the Muslims are in the majority) but according to them, it doesn’t imply that the Islamic law should be followed as a mandatory requirement. The other group seems completely disagreeing with this perception and focuses on the approach of the people who struggled for the independence as the only thing in their mind was a land where they can practice their religion Islam without any restrictions.

Our homeland was named Islamic Republic of Pakistan by the founders. But unfortunately, the Islamic laws were not implemented for running this Islamic society. It can easily be interpreted that the people with power at that time, got distracted from the way they should have walked upon. The biggest flaw in our country’s system is that rather than implementing the Islamic laws, we have started thinking Islam is only a religion, and not a code of life.

After analysing the thoughts of the specific group whose thinking is to separate Islam as a religion from the governing of the state, when I open the Book of Allah, the Qur’an when I read Hadith, I feel completely confused that what has made that specific group of people think that way. May be it is due to the reason that we never implemented Islamic laws and now we are trying to satisfy ourselves by saying that Islam has nothing to do with the state governance. Islam is not as the way we have represented it as so-called Muslim. The remaining work of defaming this religion was done by the media, both (electronic and print) as it has played a key role is placing a misconception in the people minds.

If we had implemented the Islamic laws, the present situation would have completely changed. It is not any NGO but Islam which talks about rights of minorities, rights of women, education, equal distribution of wealth, a society free from inflation and governing the overall state. This was the same Islam which was implemented by the Caliphs in their times after the the Holy Prophet (Peace be upon him) by following the Quran & Sunnah as the constitution.

We still have time in our hands to implement the real Islamic laws in our homeland Pakistan which was made an independent state in the name of Islam. It is high time we made practical implementation of the real good governance and a welfare state, and overcome the worst state of time we are in. Why not try the divine way with full faith and conviction for once?

Ethnic hooliganism on Pakistan Day

Sometimes I just wonder whether the state we will in is even a state anymore. If by the state we mean the government, then what is the government even doing? Very frankly, I feel no security seeing the police around. Far from that, I often avoid encountering or approaching them for help. Experience tells us that often the police is just another of the many exploiters that surround us. What about courts? Who likes to go to court? Frankly, nobody! After all, who likes to go through more injustice to get justice? Then there is open violence; everywhere there is violence; it seems as though, tolerance and respect have seen their days.

But I guess, we are all used to it.

So what if the state isn’t playing its role. So what if it’s not respecting you as it should? Does that give you the right to disrespect others? To simply raid into a city of your own country in large numbers and taking full advantage of that city’s hospitality to infect it with your hooliganism. Just because you come in large numbers, and ‘political correctness’ has learned to make room for your ethnic “grievances”, and therefore doesn’t interfere when you decide to hold your rallies in different cities, does not mean that you can loot and plunder, humiliate and kill people, and desecrate sites that are held sacred, either culturally, religiously, or historically.

On this 23rd of March, the day we celebrate as the Pakistan Resolution day, a national holiday, I was with a few of my friends, from universities that included IBA, SZABIST, CBM (IoBM), FAST among others, from the platform of Youth Intelligentsia, at the Mazar-e-Quaid to offer our respect and prayers for the cherished founder of our country.

What we saw there was shocking and heart breaking too. People were entering the great leader’s last resting place with ethnic flags and wearing shoes, both of which are not allowed. They raided in with dirty abuses for our leader and even Pakistan.  They openly chanted anti-Pakistan slogans and had sticks in their hands. Many displayed very disrespectful and degrading gestures to the founder of the nation.

Surrounding the premises of the Mazar was a rally organized by an ethnic separatist movement.

While we saw these horrifying scenes and so did the many women and children that came in families to mark this national event, many of us wanted to do something about it. We asked the guards and they simply added that they needed orders to counter them. It was also understandable that any scene at the Mazar would have negative consequences. But we did decide to do what we came here to do, and in the process break the silence of fear that had occupied the atmosphere.

We had with us Pakistan’s ex-national Golf coach, Jamal Badshah Khan, who raised out loud the “Pakistan Zindabad” slogan right next to Jinnah’s grave just after we performed the Fateha. The people, who were till then silent, chanted alongside us even louder.  Then the Guards performed a parade in what was one of the most patriotic moments of my life.

The anti-Pakistan rally was not far away, and as soon as they heard us they rushed inside chanting the slogan “Pakistan kay chahnay walon… Hum Tumhari maut hen” (Those who love/desire Pakistan… we have come as your death).

By the grace of God, however, no violent confrontation took place. Maybe, because these hooligans feared that we were more in number or as to how the ordinary people would respond if so were to happen.  We then left the Mazar when we had accomplished our task. On our way back we saw members of this ethnic group with guns and axes in their hands, only wondering on the cowardice of such people coming to a public site visited by families.

We learned later that this ethnic hooliganism had taken hostage much of the city, except in manners more violent if not shameful.

Many questions are raised regarding the whole incident.

Where was the so-called writ of the government that allowed such terrorists to do whatever they want for a whole day, and that too on Pakistan Day? Was it because such groups are largely perceived as the asset of ruling party; the members of whom have publicly talked of a ‘Sindh Card’?

What has happened to our society that violence and thuggery have gained widespread acceptance? Difference of opinion is an acceptable element, but where did such disrespect come from?

Would the perpetuators of these crimes be brought to justice, or is it true as is observed that Pakistan is becoming a more stateless society with every passing day?

 

 

Rachel Never Died

Rachel Corrie, beautiful soul, born in Olympia, Washington was no ordinary child, no ordinary 23 year old student and no ordinary human being. And people, who are extraordinary, never die. They live for ever in the hearts and minds of their followers. They give direction to many and because of them, hope never dies. Because of such crazy and courageous, the ugliness of injustices is exposed.

Her 5th grade speech ‘I am here because I care’ revealed no small dreams. At such a tender age, she talked of the oppressed, the poor and hungry and resolved to eradicate the ugly realities by the year 2000. As a student, she was different and wanted to explore the world especially after 9/11, year 2001. Ditching a beautiful and colourful American dream which she could have lived like many of her age, she travelled thousands of miles to Gaza to act as a human shield, where mercy and humanity is butchered every day and night, where men, women and children are murdered as a part of ethnic cleansing program, where houses are bulldozed, olive trees are cut, help including food and medicines from the rest of the world is denied and flotillas travelling to help humanity are attacked.

‘’Anyway, I’m rambling. Just want to write to my Mom and tell her that I’m witnessing this chronic, insidious genocide and I’m really scared, and questioning my fundamental belief in the goodness of human nature. This has to stop. I think it is a good idea for us all to drop everything and devote our lives to making this stop. I don’t think it’s an extremist thing to do anymore. I still really want to dance around to Pat Benatar and have boyfriends and make comics for my co-workers. But I also want this to stop. Disbelief and horror is what I feel. Disappointment! I am disappointed that this is the base reality of our world and that we, in fact, participate in it. This is not at all what I asked for when I came into this world. This is not at all what the people here asked for when they came into this world. This is not the world you and Dad wanted me to come into when you decided to have me.’’  (28.02.2003)

On the day she died (16.03.2003), she was 23, dressed in a fluorescent orange vest and with a megaphone in her hand she was trying to stop the demolition of a Palestinian home where she lived with the children who were considered family by her and vice versa. She was mercilessly crushed under a military Caterpillar bulldozer which came towards her, knocked her down, crushed her with its blade, backed up, and ran her over again and she died shortly afterwards. ’My back is broken’ were her last words.

What did she have in common with the Palestinian; faith, ethnicity, skin colour, language, social background? Absolutely nothing! What was common was humanity. She had eyes that could appreciate the truth, mind that wasn’t closed because of any bias, heart that would cry on injustice and brutality and a soul that would feel the pain of Nazi-style genocide.

Her emails to her family are a must read in which she accounts Israeli atrocities towards innocent Palestinians.

”I think, although I’m not entirely sure, that even the smallest of these children understand that life is not like this everywhere. An eight-year-old was shot and killed by an Israeli tank two days before I got here, and many of the children murmur his name to me, “Ali”–or point at the posters of him on the walls. The children also love to get me to practice my limited Arabic by asking me “Kaif Sharon?” “Kaif Bush?” and they laugh when I say “Bush Majnoon” “Sharon Majnoon” back in my limited Arabic. (How is Sharon? How is Bush? Bush is crazy. Sharon is crazy.)”

In 2003, Rachel’s news opened a new aspect of Palestinian cause to me. I learnt humanity existed above the boundaries of faith, ethnic origins and languages. I came to learn there are people on this earth who would risk their lives and everything for some other people despite absolutely no worldly strings attached between them. And it’s to date that I have explored a world that is cruel, unjust and merciless, but such people are a reason to live and resist. They give you direction, motivation and energy to challenge the ugly forces of the world.

For me Rachel Corrie is not the name of a person. It’s a phenomenon which embodies humanity, resistance, courage and craziness. Yes, she was as crazy as it needs to be to shake the world and stir the plans of the handful of unjust men ruling this world. And it’s this craziness and madness which is the ultimate requirement to challenge falsehood and malice. Human beings live and die, but phenomena, missions and ideas never die. They’re like beacons of light for generations to come. Rachel Corrie, an American, a peace activist and a trailblazer, will always be my hero.

“Love you. Really miss you. I have bad nightmares about tanks and bulldozers outside our house and you and me inside. Sometimes the adrenaline acts as an anaesthetic for weeks and then in the evening or at night it just hits me again – a little bit of the reality of the situation. I am really scared for the people here’..“When I come back from Palestine, I probably will have nightmares and constantly feel guilty for not being here, but I can channel that into more work. Coming here is one of the better things I’ve ever done. So when I sound crazy, or if the Israeli military should break with their racist tendency not to injure white people, please pin the reason squarely on the fact that I am in the midst of a genocide which I am also indirectly supporting, and for which my government is largely responsible. “I love you and Dad…”  Email to parents ~ 27.02.2003

A dream to climb

In my brain people divide not into men and women, villagers and urban, but into those who go to the mountains and those who don’t. The latter will never understand that urge.
(Freedom Climbers)

Several days ago all mountain lovers in Poland celebrated success of Adam Bielecki and Janusz Gołąb, Polish climbers who for the first time in history climbed Gasherbrum I (one of the eighthousanders located in Pakistan) in winters and without the oxygen gear.

Now the whole expedition is stuck in the base-camp because of bad weather and the only contact with them is via satellite phones. Another international group, an Austrian Gerfried Goeschl (leader), Swiss Cedric Hahlen and Pakistani Nisar Hussain attacked the summit also on March 9th. At the moment there is no contact with them and their fate remains unknown.

Why people choose such a fate? Why do they spend their last financial resources to go and sweat, struggle with wind, freezing cold, high altitude and oxygen deprivation? I hike myself and my dad used to climb when he was young. It is impossible to explain. In my brain people divide not into men and women, villagers and urban, but into those who go to the mountains and those who don’t. The latter will never understand that urge.

But if I try to explain to myself why I do that? Somehow in struggle and pain, when I know my limits, I know the Divine. When I look at the pure and simple beauty of harsh walls and peaks and I know I had to really work hard to see it, that I am chosen to watch it, I feel the Creator of the world much closer. Climbers and hikers may die one day because of what they do. But I am sure if they had a choice to go again, they would.

Winter Himalaism is Polish specialty by now. 9 of peaks above 8000 m of height were climbed for the first time in winter by Polish teams. Remaining 3 are Nanga Parbat, K2, and Broad Peak, all in Pakistan. I remember my Indian friend telling me his memoirs of the autumn trek to Goecha La – a 4950m pass over the Talung glacier in Sikkim facing the Eastern face of Kanchenjunga. During this considerably low trek he had taste of changing altitude and oxygen deprivation due to lower atmospheric pressure. When he described what Polish do in climbing he said: Its the kind of plans that most people would call insane but they push boundaries of human endurance. Nanga Parbat has a route called Polish line … and its probably the most difficult route to the top.

Bernadette MacDonald who wrote Freedom Climbers tried to analyze what is the secret behind this special trait that makes Polish do that among so many other nations. During the presentation of the book last Monday in Warsaw she said that it was the love of freedom that makes it, competitiveness, and this special thought that nothing is impossible. There is a goal, a plan, and action to achieve it. With no limitations of typical human brain that would tell them Man you will never succeed, nobody before you did.

****

Two brave Pakistani porters-climbers went to search for the lost international team.

Polish wait till the weather improves to get help.

They dream to come home.

And they probably dream of K2.

I hope they will have that chance.

 

 

 

3/11 – Afghans will never forget

Here comes the defining moment in Afghanistan’s infamous war; 11 deadly years of violence that has jeopardized the entire region seems closer to a reverse tide as US faces a deadly situation post recent ‘massacre’ by its rogue staff sergeant at the pre-dawn of  11th March. Sixteen Afghan civilians including 9 children and women along with elderly men were killed being shot in the face at point-blank range. Corpses were later burnt allegedly by some highly inflammable chemical. This crater for US forms very close to an already dark abyss where US policies fell last month after the burning of Holy Qur’an, resulting in deadly reprisals and anti-American sentiment  taking strong hold in every nook and corner of Afghanistan.

The ‘terrorist’ belonged to Lewis Mc-Chord which is considered as one of the largest American military installation in US with a horrendous reputation of violence, “The most troubled US base ever” as a military site “stars and stripes” calls it. Some of the soldiers deputed by this facility were involved in civilian killings in Afghanistan back in 2010. Four to five soldiers were convicted of one of the most brutal charges where one of the convicted staff sergeant acknowledged cutting out fingers and tooth of the victim to keep them as war trophies. Suicide rates due to post-traumatic stress disorder are also high at this base which has largely been involved in violence both domestic and in war-theatres outside US.  Recently 3rd Brigade, 2nd Infantry division of this base sent about 2,500 soldiers to Afghanistan in December for a yearlong deployment. The brigade had deployed to Iraq three times since 2003; this is its first deployment to Afghanistan.

The alleged assassin was deputed with special-forces in Kandahar along Navy-Seals or Green Beret units for village stability missions for first time after his three ventures in Iraq. His precision in firing on the fore-heads of children flattens the assertions of ‘being drunk’ or having ‘mental ailments’ as no soldier is recruited after routine medical check-ups. As reported he later returned to the base and is being held by fellow authorities.

This brutality was carried out at the Alokozai village, in the Zangawat area of Panjwayi district near 3:00 a.m. when an alleged group of US Special force was out for the bloodiest of murders ever in the history of Afghanistan. According to live accounts and eye witnesses multiple weapon sounds were heard, including pistols and machine gun bursts simultaneously. The houses attacked are at least 2 miles apart and it becomes literally impossible for a single gunman to kill and burn people in one house and then run few kilometres to do the same thing again. Eleven dead belonged to a same family and nine of the victims were children, including infants found soaked in blood close to the bodies of their mothers. Afghan sources in Pajwayi claim to have photographs of half-burnt bodies of women and children as blood-spattered walls and floors have already been aired in the media.

Some local villagers have reported seeing two groups of soldiers. The Afghan defence ministry also believes in its initial assessment that there is a possibility of one or more soldiers being involved.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai also believes in the possibilities of more than one soldier as he quotes in his statement a 15-year old survivor ‘Rafiullah’ as telling him in a phone call that ‘soldiers’ raided the house and woke up his family members before shooting at them.

‘This is an assassination, an intentional killing of innocent civilians and cannot be forgiven’, Karzai said despite calls of condolences and shock from Obama, Pannetta and Jhon Allen.

Everything seems to be falling apart for US strategists as they claimed to have made significant progress in negotiations for a strategic Partnership Agreement allowing US Special Forces and advisers to stay in Afghanistan for an indefinite period in order to protect the region from falling into chaos once the combat foreign forces leave in 2014. The agreement has apparently been delayed after this attack which saw a detention centre being handed over to Afghan authorities as its first phase or achievement.

“This could delay the signing of the Strategic Partnership Agreement,” an Afghan government official told Reuters.

The purposeless and unending war has turned the ‘pampered soldiers’ into humiliated zombies fighting for a respectable exit in a lost war which becomes impossible to achieve after this single incident. Each day of Afghan war theatre  draws near  a dramatic and unimaginable end for US and her allies that ransacked an already war-torn country, in fact a nation deliberately left in chaos post-soviet war in 80’s by the same ‘Super-power’ that once claimed to be friends of Afghans.

Afghans have rendered enough sacrifices during the past decades, especially this last one. Their land was occupied, bombed by B-52’s; their men were brutally killed and taken to prisons around the world. Millions of Afghans have already lost their lives and loved ones at the hands of invaders who not only killed them, but disrespected their culture, heritage and values and above all their religion by desecrating the Holy Qur’an.  As if death was not satisfying for the ego of the aggressors, there have been incidents where bodies were mutilated, urinated and devil-danced upon by ‘exceptional forces’ as Obama calls them.

Latest, was an episode of unmatched abhorrence and disregard to poor Afghans who have always stood strong at the helm of tyranny. No word in dictionary can define and no word can repent this bloody night imposed on innocent Afghans sleeping peacefully only to be disturbed for few minutes of bloody nightmare; back to eternal sleep. One wonders what’s coming next for US and its forces as the hatred and vengeance has not only infused in ordinary Afghans, but apparently their own stooges in the government and trained army are uttering words of fire, blood and vendetta.

Heart wrenching stories continue to flow out of Kandahar explaining accounts of this gruesome and unforeseen bloody rampage, shaking the core foundations of humanity and leaving no doubts in the mind of world about the psychological condition as a result of legitimate Afghan resistance against occupation forces in Afghanistan.

Presidential statement from Karzai’s office has termed this incident as “unforgivable”, Taliban as expected have vowed for decisive response and termed the US forces as, “Sick Savages” liable to be killed wherever found and the already boiling blood of ordinary Afghan’s on the issue of burning Qur’an has now turned into a volcano whose ashes are easy visible from the balconies of white-house.

A republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich said in an interview to the “Fox News” that it was time for U.S. troops to leave Afghanistan. He considered the mission in Afghanistan as “undoable”.
“It’s very likely that we have lost — tragically lost the lives and suffered injuries to a considerable number of young Americans on a mission that we’re going to discover is not doable,” he said, adding in an interview on CBS’ “Face the Nation” that the U.S. doesn’t have the “willpower” or the “capacity” to “fundamentally change the region.

Tragedy of Kandahar will always be remembered as the most brutal face of oppression. US forces have long taken motivation from their ‘9/11 we will never forget’ phrase; and 3/11, Afghans will never forget!

 

What’s your priority?

How different this world would be if leaders, followers and individuals could prioritize on something other than ulterior motives. Somehow or the other I feel we are all to an extent being governed by the ‘what’s in it for me ideology?’. It has become so hard to live selflessly in this dog eat dog existence where long gone are the days of altruism. I don’t consider myself any different from everyone else but lately I have begun to envision things that impinge on my conscience.

This planet is host to 6.8 billion people out of which 925million people are malnourished, in other words 13.6% of the world population is living with hunger. The very notion that it sounds just like a number, and perhaps nothing more than mere statistic is disquieting. Most of us are too besotted with our lives to shed even a momentary thought on how the current state of affairs will affect and is affecting the sordid lives of the many who live under a dollar a day.

It is infuriating that the destitute have to bear the brunt of thriving economies who are actually flourishing at their expense. I don’t think anyone can challenge the fact that most Multi National Companies are akin to colonialists who use, abuse and exploit resources in the poor host countries. Fact is developed countries, the US of A a case in point, are only capable of displaying ‘realpolitik’ and there show of compassion is a downright farce. The past, present and future depicts their blatant human rights breach and yet they claim to idolize humanity and world peace.

Nonetheless I do not consider the role and interference of any foreign element as the sole contributor of the social, economic and political upheaval of our country. The acute shortage of energy, inflation and high unemployment prevails because we as a people have no gumption to take to the streets and envision a revolution that liberated parts of the Middle East. It is unnerving that nobody cares if the taxpayers money is being spent on setting up ostentatious monuments or to bail out inefficient public sectors. It is unnerving that nobody spares a thought on the 32.6% of Pakistani people who are living with poverty day in and day out struggling to make enough for a few morsels of food.It is unnerving that we take pride in the beauty of the capital city of Islamabad and ignore the existence of 35+ slums home to thousands of people who believe it or not are also residents of the capital city. Since Zia’s regime in 1985 the CDA was given the sole responsibility of upgrading and rehabilitating the inhabitants of katchi abadis and how far have they come since 1985 in accomplishing this feat?  In these past 27 years they managed to legalize ten squatter settlements and provided them with electricity, water and gas connections. A survey would reveal how little their lives have change since 1985 because realistically speaking they are still inhabitants of SLUMS. For heaven’s sake Japan rose from ashes after being nuked in less than 27 years and the best we could do is provide basic civic amenities?

Development has never been Pakistan’s agenda. It is a country endowed with rich natural resources which unfortunately it cannot even excavate on its own. It has a coastal line of 1050km which if fully utilized by setting up wind mills can make a huge difference in the lives of people living in surrounding villages but the only thing standing in the way of such an investment is priority, good leadership and sheer will power. It is about time some kind of initiative is taken to make everyone’s life better and not just that of a specific segment of society. Like Mark Twain says:

‘ The secret of making progress is to get started. The secret to starting is to divide your complex, overwhelming task into small, manageable tasks, and then start the first.’

Nothing you do today to change things for a better tomorrow will have any kind of detrimental or drastic consequence on your life. What stands between the development of Pakistan is not just the inept leadership but also the complacent Pakistanis.

 

 

Did you say ‘Secular Extremism’?

The phrase-“Give unto God what was God’s and to Caesar what were Caesar’s”- is such a charming phrase, full of all that is naïve, and based on wishful thinking.

Let me elaborate on secular grounds, using reason alone against the dogmatic principles associated with revelation, that there exists a very obvious contradiction in the statement, which is to say ‘what if God and Caesar disagree? Who to ‘give unto’ then?’

But let’s not concern the logical fallacies, or rather, intellectual dishonesties, secularists entail in their arguments. For now, we’ll bring to discussion the attitude they adopt in their desperate attempts to pin down all-things-religious.

And here comes the dilemma of our ‘pseudo-liberals’. You’ll never find them taking part in any real intellectual argument. They’ll never take your words as a basis of your argument but would rather first declare you “Mullahs”, “Ignorant”, “Religious Extremists” and so on. Then, they will simply take the stereotypes based on these words and try to throw false accusations on you.

It’s the easiest job to put your opponent in any given debate in his weakest position i.e. extremist and put words in the mouth of your opponent, based on awkward stereotypes and flawed assumptions. And by taking such childish measures they are in fact running away from any fruitful dialogue based on sound principles such as reason, empathy, honesty and maturity. Without these principles you are a child who, inattentive of what other people in the room are saying, is too busy talking to his imaginary friend. When told that there are secular extremists too, they simply deny any such thing. They simply say that only religious extremism exists as extremism belongs to the narrow minded which of course seculars can never be.

But I tend to differ.

After all, what would such liberals have to say on the secular fascism taking place on the streets of Karachi? All three political parties accused of violence in Karachi, namely the PPP, MQM, and ANP are secular parties working on purely secular motives. Alternative accounts would say that ethnic rivalries are the motives behind the everyday killings of ordinary citizens that we all have become accustomed to. But aren’t ethnic rivalries essentially secular in nature.  So can we really back away now from admitting that ‘Secular Fascism and Terrorism’ does exist in our very metropolitan?

Secular fascism doesn’t only exist; it’s all over the place. It’s the rule, not the exception. For instance, look at the word fascism itself. Its roots are in a purely secular ideology that has nothing to do with religion. Those who upheld this ideology believed themselves superior to other nations on purely secular grounds. Certainly the killing of six million Jews had no religious motivation whatsoever.

Social Darwinism is another ideology that took refuge in what it considered “positive science”. It preoccupied the mind-set of the European colonizers and gave them moral justification for all their vicious acts. Of course, since they could “scientifically” say that they are a more advanced and evolved race, it was their duty to propagate their own race throughout the globe while colonizing, and in the process, plundering, looting, raping, subjugating and exterminating, whole civilizations. After all it was “a survival of the fittest” as Herbert Spencer would like it to be. But all was justified, secularly, as the “White Man’s Burden”, which made it so easy to forget the genocide of whole civilizations in America and Australia, and enslavement of millions of Africans.

But religion is always brought to the limelight on the accusation that so many bad acts are carried in the “name of religion”. But what about the horrifying acts carried out on the basis on secular things, like ‘democracy’, ‘liberation’, ‘civilisation’ and ‘justice’.

What about the most devastating wars the world has ever seen, the world wars? Were they not fought in the name of secularism? What about the cold war that frightened humanity with the unprecedented accumulation of weapons of mass destruction, scientific espionage, false polarization, and organized violence, even wars, in the third world.

What about the making of the nuclear bomb. Would any religion sanctify of the making of a weapon that could kill millions in an instant and ruin generations to come. And what about the bombarding of Hiroshima and Nagasaki; did they have religious motives, or secular ones?

The world is full of secular people and regimes involved in horrendous crimes against humanity.Unfortunately, in our own country we see an emerging secular “liberal” class that has some very strange tendencies.

For first, it excludes anyone with a different lifestyle and view-point, from being part of that class. If you do not detest and dislike everything associated with religion, if you do not think everything wrong with our country is because of religion; and most importantly if you do not make fun of religion and religious people then no matter how open-minded you are, you sir, cannot be a ‘liberal’.

Second, it’s the greatest supporter of US imperialism. If it’s the Raymond Davis issue, they’ll say ‘Well, he has ‘diplomatic immunity (whatever that is)’; if it’s Aafia Siddiqui, they’ll say ‘she is a terrorist and deserves every piece of brutality thrown at her’. If it is a drone attack on innocent civilians, they’ll say ‘we do not have the technology so we have no other option because, after all, our lifestyle is ‘threatened’.

And third, it side-lines all human right calls when it comes to religious people; the state murder of the female students of Jamia Hafsa was justified, with no room for sympathy whatsoever, because they were used as a ‘human shield’. (So the next time a person uses your daughter as a human shield to save him from the gun in your hand, you should kill both).

Such liberals are not liberals at all. They’re extremists. Full stop!!