Benazir's influence - Part 1

Dost ki nani and other ideas...

I attended funeral rites of my friend's nani yesterday at around 10:20pm near Airport and following happened:

1) Not even half of the men attending the funeral wore their caps. That's strange and new for me.

2) Most of the closest relatives of Nani wore trousers and shirts rather than the traditional shalwar kameez. Many wore T-shirts and it gave an impression that many were there to show people that they were there and not for any religious purpose, whatsoever.

3) During funeral, many people were just either talking with each other or attending to their mobile phones. No one cared for the rites and no one really asked them to shut off the mobile. Such are the Muslims of our times!

4) When finally, after much hankering, time came to lower the body into the grave not even one person knew exactly how to do it. No one really was sure where should the cloth be placed below the dead body. I was appalled at my own lack of knowledge.

5) Atleast Atif bhai, cousin of Uzair, knew that one should not wear any sandals or shoes while inside the grave.

6) Every second person was either standing on someone else's grave or jumping over them, citing lack of space available. I have always found this in bad taste. For instance, how would you feel about the person standing on your mother's grave? Ask this question and wait for a tight slap.

7) No one really bothered to give any azan after the rites and the prayers have been said.

8) No one, save one person, knew that while reciting the first Sura of Al-Bakra, one must point his finger towards the head of the deceased.

And then we say we are good Muslims!

Bloggers' conference and our worthy Government

It is not at all surprising that Govt. of Sindh is holding a Blogger's conference at a local hotel this weekend. Not surprising in a sense that government, any government that is, knows well that Blogging is perhaps not accountable nor stoppable. It runs across computers, across borders, and without much hassle. And blogging has, since its birth, embarrassed quite a few famous men and women.

But my question is (as a politically inclined blogger) that, 'can we expect any semblance of support from a government which continues to hunt down honest men and women, and which considers freedom loving journalists as enemy combatants'?

I personally think that this conference has been arranged to see the real number of bloggers present in Karachi. Our ministry of information would like to meet some friendly bloggers along the way.

I also imagine myself - and other bloggers - sitting next to ISI and MI agents during the conference.

Good Lord!

Murdering Baluchistan

Baluchistan, since its emergence as a Pakistani state, has been in the think of things. It has been bombed, its people have been tortured and killed; and its chiefs have dis-allowed any semblance of civilization to its people. Baluchistan remains Pakistan's backyard with all the dirt and the garbage of Punjab and its other elite classes, the Military and the civil bureaucracy (most of which happens to be from Punjab as well).

No wonder then whenever something happens in Baluchistan Punjab gets the finger. So it should be. Except for Bhutto's indiscriminate killing of Baluchis during 1970's, most of the happenings in Baluchistan have come via Punjab.

For one, the strange reasons about not building any number of small dams in Baluchistan are too well unknown. So is the habit of federal government of not promoting any sort of tourism inside the province. And when it comes to share distribution, once again Punjab takes the major cake. The cake which should preferably go to Baluchistan considering its vast mineral and petroleum wealth.

Such grievances gets an air when leaders of this province are kidnapped and murdered in cold blood. I don't know the names of the Baloch leaders murdered nor do I know their importance to the province except that one of them was following the case of missing persons belonging to Baluchistan. He was due to appear in the court soon, I am told. If that is the case, then one must point fingers at our own Military Intelligence, IB and ISI rather than go for Indian RAW or Afghani agencies. After all, kidnapping and reselling of primarily Baloch and Pathan men have been the work of our agencies and not someone else. This killing could have been the work of someone else, just to malign our agencies, but the possibilities are dim. CJ is already looking into the matter hard.

I will, meanwhile, keep my fingers crossed until I know the hard facts. But if the killers are not found, Baluchistan will burn badly. It is already burning and I am really not sure where are my Pathan and Baloch friends at the moment.

Zardari M'athar Ch'od

I found this really interesting comment in the bathroom of the masjid where I usually pray my Zuhar (afternoon) and Asar (evening) prayers. Someone had pointed out really nasty things about President of Islamic Republic of Pakistan. I thought this would make an interesting photograph. And an even more interesting blog entry!

By the way, the red marker on top says, 'Zardari mother fucker'. And the bottom line says, 'Benazir's killer is Zardari'.

Public Flogging and Private State of Pakistan

Today, I am once again appalled at what Zardari-led govt. (government?) has allowed to happen in Swat. Repeatedly the shocking video (still above) of a 17-year old Swati girl being flogged by men is nothing new. It happens in Afghanistan and it happens in Pakistan. Just that some daring man (now we know he is Shaukat and that he made this video in January) made it. He did not much care for his own life. More daring was his idea of sending it to Geo TV. Now that the video is out Pakistanis are once again under the spotlight. World is watching this video again and again and claiming that Pakistanis really don't deserve their own state. Savages roaming around with lashes, hitting at men and women at will; government failing substantially. All this must be a clue that Pakistan have had enough of its territorial life. Now it deserves to be broken down into chunks. And things like that.

The good thing about this clip and this event is that suddenly Pakistanis of all shades and sizes have realized that Taliban are no good. Even mullahs, who have traditionally been shaky about moral affairs, are behind govt.. They feel that something must be done about this Afghani / Saudi brand of fanatical Islam. But the hardliners (wahabis and such) are still not sure what they want. So they continue to support such horrible so-called Muslims.

Too bad, once again Pakistan's International image has gotten into serious trouble.