A Tragedy Born of Military Despotism and Anarchy looking at it from across the border, i feel pakistan is in throes of a change to popular democracy. but then this can happen,if the army and the usa lays its hands off and the civil society in pakistan emerges as a political power.

the challenge remains as to how, the army can be kept away, when it has vested political and economic interests? can an army that is used to pampering, take a cut in its status?

the other is ,by not acting in accordance to american will, can have serious consequences to pakistan economically and militarily, can the nation survive that?

well 2008 seems to be exciting...

Courage in a Time of Chaos the losses from the chaos amount 400bn rupees, thats 5bnusd if imnot wrong, exactly the money mushhy baba, got from the us of a to counter terror!
in my village in south india, there is a saying " the money got gambling ,got spent in the brothel"

Of Rites and Rights: An Interview with Asma Jahangir kashmir should be united like baluchistan, like pakthoonistan and like sindh after throwing out illegally settled retired punjabi military officers from their place.
gwadar should be given to marri or a mengal. is it okay for all punjabi mundas!? pakistan has made fun of us, saying we mishandled kashmir, what about the mohajirs, sindhis, baluchis and pashtun`s, do they not have greviances against the federation? apart from,some political sympathies we never tried to make an issue of allof it.today at a time when pakistan grieves, we keep quiet, bb`s speeches, aggravating kashmiri secession, is not forgotten by us, but we knew she was helpless. we gave autonomy tokashmir, tillthis day no indian can buy land in kashmir,this despite the fact that 350,000 pundits were thrown out of the valley, can the same be said of your side of kashmir? the ethnicity of pakistani kashmir has been altered in the past 50 yrs by massive migration from punjabi plains. in short all ihave to say is people who live in glass houses cannot throw stones at each other.

Benazir’s Murder: Who Killed Her? well all said and done, we can only speculate, the truth will never come out because the truth will destroy pakistans only institution, the army and its intellegence services and thats in nobodys interest,be it the political parties or usa. nobody wants to stir up the hornets nests, everyone wants the status quo, to be maintained, and so everything will be swept away, and benazir will remain, a glorified portrait. zardari is not an angel, neither is nawaz sharief, they all will need the power of the army and the american green buck to survive and they are simple politicians running behind power, they are rich and influential fuedal lords, why would they care about people?
people of pakistan, remain, slaves of the unholy trinity that created it, the rich land lords, the mullahs and the army .

Whither Pakistan? pakistan should understand the taste of its own medicine, . you gave us that same medicine with the help of dawood ibrahim in 91 , by burning mumbai. violence will pay back in violence and more violence. wasn`t it hamid gul who said we will bleed india with a thousand cuts? and there was a wry smile in every pakistani face. now the poison cult people like gul, spread has infiltrated the very house it was born!

Benazir Bhutto Killed in an Attack my heartfelt condolances, we in india have certain misgivings but im certain that raw didnot kill the woman.
the nation will have other leaders but my heart goes out to her children, who cant have another mother.

Fall of Dacca jinnah once said, muslims in india are a separate culture in comparison with hindus! i donot have jinnahs brains, im just a kid whos curious, but what is the connection between a kerala mappilla muslim and a punjabi muslim, other than faith?
one is dravidian, dark & short, eats rice & fish, the other is caucasian, fair & tall and eats chapathis & mutton.
one lives in a matriachal system, the other is patriachal.
one speaks malayalam and the other urdu?
faith alone cannot unite, biggest example is east pakistan.

Where is Ibn-Sina of the 21st Century? i think muslims should start reading, iqbals, reconstruction of modern islamic thought. that will change their attitude. wahabism aflight on petro dollars is the major cause of trouble for islam. kill the saudi royal family and there will be peace.

Kashmir: Everyone has lost in their own way if pakistan beleives that india will allow remarking of boundaries in kashmir, then they are living in a dream land.
if the region becomes peaceful then the borders can be opened, and issues settled. but pakistan is becoming volatile by the day , so how do we beleive them?

Political Quandary in Pakistan lets understand that pakistan was created by a unholy trinity, the landlords who didnt want to lose its privilages, supported by religionists and the army,poor mr.jinnah, the secular, was only an afterthought, a caricature. over sixty years all three have grown big. so therevis no chance forward cause the civil society is so small in comparison. so lets the religionists rule for a while, mess it up so that the army becomes aligned with the civil society and then there would be peace.

Thorn Tree Gossip in our subcontinent there is saying,that you are tooworried about the neighbours orchard than your own. nice.

Re-thinking Kashmir well i happened to meet a kashmiri in chennai, runs a handicraft store, i was seling him some flooring material, and he happened to be in need of that. as a south indian, im oblivious to kashmir, its not an emotional thing to me, so i was unbiased, but then interacting and knowing hin for three days, i felt, one thing, the kashmiri indifference to join mainstreamindia, is not about religion alone, it is also about a so-called-racial-superiority , of their being fair and light eyed and the rest of us being black and short.i felt pity for this man, while the rest of india, is racing to be the third largest economy in the world after the us and china, this man is denying that freedom to his children. i talked tohim, about his thoughts of joining pakistan, and he flatly refused that is the right solution. how can he agree , seeing the very mess pakistan is? most kashmiris i beleive want to stand up as an independent state. something that both coutries will not agree to. sad state.

Assessing the Socio-Economic Decline of Pakistan as an indian i feel you guys are irreverently critical about your own state. why donot you open up trade with india. in three years it will climb to 6 bn usd. u import wheat from usa when its available right across the border. i recently heard,pakistani`s complainig about nokia phones made in india, this is the heights, this is overdoing things, its this fear or anger against india, thats really killing the economyof pakistan, its this fear that gives ammunition to the defence forces . bottom line make peace with india, open up trade and everything will be smooth. if not this vicious hate will eat from inside.

From Kerala to Islamabad (A Journey of Nine Decades) tariq, a real nice article. im from kerala, im from cochin, and i have friends who live near the periyar river. im a hindu, who fasts, during ramzan, because most of my friends are muslims. in fact muslims in kerala are far better off than muslims anuwhere in india. maybe northindians should learn from us. i have 2 muslim rakhi sisters, who tie rakhi on rakshabhandan, a north indian festival(it means im their brother and its my obligation to protect them- im at times naughty thatsperhaps the reason). we respect each others, religion, and we have peace. shared culture , language and racial stock, are also required to fasten identity, not religion alone. maybe the makers of pakistan forgot that thing. i have muslim friends who come back from the middle east and say harsh things about arab culture, and acknowledge the fact that arabs are at times lacking in brains, compared to us indians. i then fail tounderstand why most pakistani`s feel they require a pan-arabic identity. if i recollect iqbal, he wanted to create pakistan, as a muslim state devoid of arab influence, because he felt that islams true nature and intentwas revealed not in arabia but in the subcontinent. my friends mother is the most devoted muslim i have ever met, clad in a white muslin sari, with holykoran in front, she prays for evryone who is ill or has a problem irrespective of their faith, there is a glow in her eyes having led a life full of godliness, we call her umma, mother in malayalam. umma is my image of islam. peace, compassion and godliness its true pilliars of faith. we are examples of a culture where both religions can survive with mutual respect- afterall secularism means morality has no religion, its about being humane. welcome to kerala, gods own country.

India Through Pakistani Eyes pervez article is an eye opener, being smug about what we have achieved and not thinking about our negatives is wrong.
this helps get a balnced view of our country.
on the hind sight, had india and pakistan, not been partitioned, muslims would have 30% or more share in population, do you really think hindus would play around then? with that kind of majority? how big would we have been as a nation, even china would have looked puny? reading about pakistan and partition, i feel jinnah took a rather hasty decision, and pakistan became an artificial state. its this artificial nature of pakistan thats leading to trouble be it in politics or religion.