Carnage in Karachi

dear veeresh sahib -- i couldnt be bothered how fed up or not fed up you are, whether till your nostrils, below them or slightly above them -- if you had closely read the article ITS ABOUT POLICY CHANGES AT PTV, NOT ABOUT WHAT HAPPENS ON THE STREET ON DELHI -- jesus , you dont seem to get that do you -- i couldnt be also bothered on your beliefs or otherwise on what costs in the pakistani newspapers should be -- i have been a full time journalists for almost a decade IN PAKISTAN and i think that means, in my opinion, that I have some kind of informed opinion, definitely more than you who sits in Delhi and seems to base his views of Pakistan on his recent foray to watch a match or some Pakistanis he meets -- the old Dawn office could be anything, veeresh sahib, it isnt the Dawn office or is it, which is what you said it was till I pointed out your inaccuracy -- people like you will believe what they want to believe (and by the way Romair, this isnt necessarily an Indian affliction, i see it happens to many non-Indians who interact too) -- veeresh sahib please get this -- i am not in disagreementw ith the fact that pakistani newspapers or magazines are much more expensive than their indian counterparts -- what i am against is you foisting your views on me, esp. since i work in the media IN PAKISTAN and think would know better than you (at least on this one) -- and trust me veeresh many pakistanis like me and others who i know, know that all indian streets are not what they see in the movies -- that, veeresh sahib, is yet more proof of the thoroughly patronizing attitude you have towards pakistan and it comes across in your arguments/posts here -- perhaps the pakistanis you met had this view
veeresh sahib `till you are satisfied` -- u sound like a dictatorial pita there veeresh sahib -- and what does `go back and be something` mean exactly` -- hahahha



-- romair -- by the way to add further in response to what you wrote i think an response needs to be responded to, esp. if its a thinly-veiled personal attack --

Romair:

``I read a good ten newspapers a day (four Pakistani, three Indian and three American), on a regular basis, so I have a good idea of what I am talking about. ``

Jeez!! What kinda job do u have?

My Dear Shri Omar ji . . . Dawn`s old Delhi office in Daryaganj is now the ``Times School of Marketing``, and the archives there wrt Dawn and its owners are very very illuminating.

Like a politician or entertainment person, an editor or a journalist. . . the moment you put your name to something, you stand in the public domain, answerable by position. Be glad you are not in the West, where the rest of your family as well as personal history is placed there too. So, your article, my questions, your answers, my rejoinders . . . till I am satisfied. Otherwise please go back and be something else.

Newspapers in Pakistan and their costings have nothing to do with advertising. I can prove it to you that even if you have `nil` advertising, your newspaper should not cost more than 6 Pakistan rupees on the pavement. Hawker commissions notwithstanding. Likewise your magazines, they need not cost more than 12-15 Pakistan rupees on pavement.

The complete web-war between you and me started because I am fed up till here, a spot just below my nostrils, with all this Bollywood based reportage by Pakistani media on matters Indian (when they aren`t talking about freedom fighters and grenade attacks in kashmir, ofcourse). When I have been through a lifetime of meeting Pakistanis and explaining to them that Indian streets are not what you see in movies, and get disbelieving looks in return, then you will understand why I take umbrage on your reportage about U M and glycerine at the Wagah/Attari border.

And since you mention my trip report on Pakistan, currently up and running at chowk as well as outlook and soon in a variety of vernacular media in India . . . can you show me ONE realistic trip report on India by a Pakistani mediaperson or otherwise? Oh yeah, visa wails, but what prevented any of you from getting on a bus or a train?

When we talk about truth in journalism, that is where it starts, and that is my objection to your portrayal in the PTV based U Matondkar article/editorial.

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sadna, what you said about the intelligence agencies was never in doubt

feroz, your right -- im not interested -- but trust me im not smarting -- this for me a professional hazard -- talking to people who violently disagree with me -- we do it at work quite a lot trying to tell people why their articles or letters cant be printed -- of course we give them cogent reasons but they sometimes dont understand -- and by the way even you misunderstood my accountable remark -- i did not say that the govt should hold the people or anyone accountable -- I SAID THE EDITORIAL WAS IN FACT HOLDING THE GOVT. ACCOUNTABLE -- there, hope that is clear and unambiguous enough ... phew-- and again feroz need i tell you how many minds our editorials/articles have influenced -- dont worry im not going to ask you to list before us how many young minds at aitchison you have influenced -- you again misquuote me forez, as a journalist i do not attend rallies by political parties (in fact should not, though might have covered them) -- i was talking about ones for press freedom, when journalists or the media was under threat or generally speaking -- feroz plz could you give up this habit of presuming too much

bongdongs -- last stories in dawn came on the okara military farms issue -- this year several came on the textbooks revision issue -- and a month or so ago there was one about how pia had gone ahead and bought its new planes defying the wishes of the finance ministry --

ralph -- the media was initially allowed to cover the trial but then it was shifted to the jail premises after which the media was disallowed --

bongdongs your right about self censorship, and there is a degree of self censorship everywhere, no better example than in the US -- post 71 tries to tell the arm chair philosophers on this website that being a journalist can be quite a hazardous job in a country like pakistan --

pmishra2 -- ``freedom struggle in karachi`` hahah thats a good one -- if you are referring to the MQM then pmishra ji the MQM is now in power in sindh - i doubt it very much that they would do this and even if they did it wouldnt be for a `freedom struggle` -- what hindu heriage have i dragged in ??? hahha by calling you shri ? isnt that mister in hindi ? so if you call me omar sahib you are dragging in my `muslim` heritage

veeresh ji -- if a journalist writes a piece on doordarshan and says that a recent programme on doordarshan might represent a change in state policy then would you assume that the journalist agrees with the propaganda that doordarshan dishes out -- yes my article (not editorial on urmila`s trip) did have this show on ptv in mind but how in the world does that mean that i condone the crap ptv dishes out -- if you had read the article more closely, you would have seen that it doesnt -- and by the way, what aspersions have i cast on this living outside pakistan -- if anyone who does that with his patronizing attitude it is probably you -- in any case veeresh ji, this whole interaction with you was started by you making all kinds of insinuations about others -- and when the other person began to respond in kind you couldnt handle it

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and plz stop these semantic somersaults of qualitative and quantitative on pakistani newspapers costs -- apart from quoting some friend of yours at dawn`s ``delhi office` (which you still quote despite being told that Dawn moved from Delhi iin 1947), what other quantitative proofs have you given -- i told you it is partly because of advertising that indian papers cost so less and because in pakistan the hawker takes a 30 per cent commission -- and you call these `qualitative` assertions-- aahh the personal bit -- so the truth has come out -- as you seem to admit yourself -- dear veeresh sahib did you put your byline on the outlook india article because you wrote the article and expected and wanted reasoned and constructive feedback or because you wanted personal attacks -- my or anyone else`s byline being there doesnt mean that i should be attacked personally -- reasoned logical (or even emotional) argument is fine as long as it is on the content -- so now you tell me that i should expect interactors to get personal with a writer because that writer`s byline happens to be on the article posted ?
plz tell this to your editor at outlook india and see what he tells you

romair -- why thank you-- since support or approval is so rare on this site it does feel heartening -- i nbever said that dawn is a brilliant paper but its certainly not as bad as some make it out to be -- and why just analyze dawn, why not analyze the indian express, the times of india and while at it pass slanderous remarks against their editors and writers --
btw dont worry romair sahib i dont mind the interaction -- its quite laughable at times and is another way for me to interact

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an editorial writer`s job can be quite solitary sometimes as opposed to a reporters -- i know most people here will go on and on -- besides , im sure sooner or later i will switch off interacting here --

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arjun:


you ( #101) just confirmed something i had suspicions about;)

have a good day, sir!

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omar_r_quraishi #75
If you take even a subset of recent events - suicide bombing to sabotage a 3-hr concert by an Indian singer, in one place officialdom being tolerant of absconding armed militants taking their sweet time to `register`, while in another place officialdom arresting people because a provincial politician is returning, sectarian terrorists continuing to come out of the woodwork -- imho, it looks a lot like a paranoid intelligence agency (or two) is in charge, which is desperately trying to prevent erosion of ideological frontiers and/or institutional interests.

#95 by ferozk

“what does that make your opinion? I would like to think that it makes your opinion an elitist”

Here is the problem that I was alluding to in my previous post. I guess, I didn’t do a good job.
Pakistan just does not have two opinions -elitist and the middleclass- there is a third opinion and that is the opinion of the majority of Pakistan.

If I take cudgels with the middleclass ideologies, I am not automatically an elitist. When you confine the debate to the Middleclass and the elitist, you are showing your ignorance and disdain for the people, the real people. In my post, I tried to point out that one needs to make a connection with the common person and once you make that connection you will have the ability to have an objective view of the situation in Pakistan.

You don’t have to be a communist or a leftist to make that connection. ZAB in Pakistan did that and now BB is doing it. NS is doing it and to a certain extent some rightwing parties are doing that.

About history:
History in Pakistan is the most distorted subject and there is not much space between our opinions about it. Agreed, it is being distorted-but you don’t have to accept the distorted version. May be you need to sanitize it based on your knowledge and understanding.

“it seems that you have an expectation about Pakistan also”

Yes. I do! And message was to lower your expectations and match that with the expectation common folks’ have. When I referred to Islamic vision what I meant was that there is no need for some lofty ideals in pursuit of Jannat but some down to earth expectations would be a whole lot easier to reconcile with.

“Please do not compare Pakistan with Germany or any other nation.”
The comparison was to illustrate a point and let me further elaborate it. Countries go thru turmoil but people also make come backs. The illustrations were to just point out that Pakistan has not gone thru the kind of turmoil that some in the world have seen. In fact, the current strife in Pakistan is nowhere near that. Now I am not belittling any thing. I have full sympathy with victims but I wanna keep my perspective too.

“Pakistan`s problems are to be solved within a Pakistani experience”

This again is a myopic view. What is the Pakistani experience may I ask? Pakistan is part of this world and if people ask for democracy they are not asking for some Pakistani experience. They are asking for some thing that has been tested elsewhere. A “Pakistani Experience” is an army solution. The Pak Army never forgets to repeat Pakistani type of democracy and words to that nature.
If people are asking for secular Pakistan or a Pakistan with a human face, people are asking for things that have universal experience. It is important to separate the reality from the make believe world that is made popular by the Pak Army and its propaganda machine.

#90
I seem to have put my foot in my mouth. The ``Herald`` magazine is published by the Dawn group.

thank you Sir veeru!....will check here of comparative pak prices.

comments welcome re: freedom of press on the followinf news item

from the nation today:

ARY forced to cancel Shahbaz interview

From Our Special Correspondent
LONDON—The PML (N) President Mian Shahbaz Sharif’s interview was cancelled Sunday due to govt pressure minutes before it was to be broadcast by the ARY Digital television channel, its management said. The interview was to be conducted by Dr Shahid Masud.
According to the ARY Digital Channel’s management, they were threatened by the personnel of various agencies that their Karachi office would be closed down and their staff would also be picked up and shifted to unknown place if they did not cancel the interview.
“There will be no guarantee of the safety of the staff”, the management of the television quoted officials of the agencies as having told them.

Mian Shahbaz Sharif, while commenting on the situation, said that he will come to Pakistan according to his schedule. “The government cannot stop me from coming back”, he said, adding that the rulers “had lost their senses.”

He said the interview was cancelled at the behest of President Pervez Musharraf and the ban on government advertisements to certain newspapers speaks volumes for the freedom of the Press in Pakistan.

While talking to his spokesman Farrukh Shah on telephone, Mian Shahbaz Sharif said that he will come back on May 11. “Pakistan is my country and place of birth. I will live or die for my homeland”, Mian Shahbaz Sharif said, adding that the service to the country was his motto.

“My heart beats for the Pakistanis and no one can deprive me of my basic right of returning to my beloved country”, Mian Shahbaz Sharif said.

The spokesman, quoting Mian Shahbaz Sharif, said that the armed personnel of various agencies stormed into the Karachi residence of Haji Salman Iqbal — the owner of the ARY Digital television channel — and threatened him of dire consequences if the interview was broadcast.

“The business (of television channel) will be no more there and his life (of Haji Salman Iqbal) will be under threat”, the agencies personnel told the ARY Digital Channel, according to Shahbaz Sharif as quoted by the spokesman.

re: HP # 62

Interesting comments.

To answer a few points, which you have made. Respect for a people`s history depends on whether they have a history. In Pakistan`s case, history is a very abused term and it can mean anything. Pakistan`s real history is never taught to its pupils and the one, which is taught in schools, is a politically twisted web of lies and hatred. Consequently, which history of Pakistan, am I supposed to respect?

Regardless of your social class complexes, nations need a direction and they are expectations associated with nations and without any expectations to be aspired, nations remain bogged down in the mire. When Pakistan was created, there was an expection and from the burning nature of your response, it seems that you have an expectation about Pakistan also, otherwise my words would have not caused you such a bitter distaste. If that is the case, are you not also suffering from the ``lower middle class mentality``, which you hold responsible for Pakistan`s ills?

Please do not compare Pakistan with Germany or any other nation. Pakistan`s problems are to be solved within a Pakistani experience and not with an Algerian experience and Pakistan does not need to experience a Pol Pot to appreciate the depravity of its situation. Granted those nations suffered, but does their sufferings make a difference to the Pakistani suffering? A dying person does not care that others have died, because he only cares that he is dying.

One last thought. If you have such a lowly opinion on the lower middle class mentality, what does that make your opinion? I would like to think that it makes your opinion an elitist opinion.

Ciao