Japanese embassy gears up for cultural extravaganza

By Schezee Zaidi

The Japanese embassy has geared up for a thrilling and exciting cultural extravaganza in Islamabad to mark the 60 years celebration of diplomatic ties between Japan and Pakistan. From music recitals to book launching, film show to photograph exhibition and calendar display, the power of martial arts performance to elusive Ikebana demonstration, the list of cultural events starting on November 6 would carry on till March 2013, introducing vibrant Japanese cultural ensembles in Pakistan.

Talking about the Japanese cultural extravaganza to the media at an informal dinner meeting at his residence, Toshikazu Isomura, counsellor of the Public Affairs Department, Embassy of Japan, said the cultural arena always proves to be a stronger bond between the two countries, and the planned events aim to introduce Japanese culture to Pakistani friends in a vibrant way to bring the two peoples closer.

 

The Japanese cultural potpourri opens on November 6 with a joint musical recital by Japanese Ambassador Hiroshi Oi and four Japanese musicians to be held at the Turkish embassy. The next is ‘The Spirit of Budo,’ an exhibition elaborating the history of martial arts in Japan, organised in collaboration with the Japan Foundation at the National Art Gallery on November 12.

The screening of Japanese films, ‘Kurosawa Movies,’ will open on November 9 and continue till November 14 at the National Art Gallery. Named after the great Japanese moviemaker, the Kurosawa film fest is a tribute to Akira Kurosawa, known as the most influential and important filmmaker in the history of cinema. Kurosawa directed 30 films in a dynamic career spanning 57 years.

The selected Kurosawa movies for screening include ‘The Hidden Fortress,’ ‘Seven Samurai,’ ‘Yojimbo,’ ‘Red Beard,’ ‘Sanshiro Sugata,’ ‘Sanjuro’ and ‘One Wonderful Sunday’.

The Japanese cultural fiesta also brings a unique book launching. The book titled ‘Surkh Phulon ki Sabj Khushboo’ is a compilation of literary works by Pakistani and Japanese literati. Compiled and edited by Khurram Sohail, the book also presents Urdu literary works of Japanese writers and also the translated works of Japanese literati, also done by Khurram Sohail. The book presents unique vision and views of Pakistani and Japanese literati as they look towards Japan through their literary eyes, touching the linguistic service of Japanese literati in upholding Urdu language and literature in Japan.

BASHIR HUSSAIN NAZIM: END OF AN ERA

WHEN A LIBRARY IS DESTROYED .......!

MAHTAB BASHIR

mahtabbashir@gmail.com
03335363248

"JAB SE MADDA-HE-HAZRAT (pbuh) HY WAZEEFA APNA

TAB SE IFLAAS MERAY GHAR SY PRESHAN NIKLA"!

 

Bashir Hussain Nazim with Majeed Nizami

With the Eid-ul-Adha on the edge, I am penning down my emotions and gut-feelings shared with my great father Bashir Hussain Nazim- immersed with love, dignity, honour and pride. I will miss my dad on Eid day, because of contrasting views on slaughtering of Bakra. I distinctly remember, last year on the Eid day when I planned to hire the services of a Butcher and after some time a Butcher stood at doorstep, father asked him whether he knows about Takbeer? A shake of his head in negative not only put that Butcher in deep trouble but gathered sheer mortification to me as well (not to mention what happened once the Butcher left :-). Later, father himself slaughtered the goat while we managed to handle the legs of that Bakra.

On a very serous note, I will miss my father more than words will ever allow me to express. He was my hero, the wise one I listened to and sought advice from, he was my medicine man when I was ill. My dad was the first man I fell in love with as a little boy and no man will ever fill his shoes nor will walk closely behind. I find comfort in his quick and painless passing but the sorrow will always be deep. He was a simple man- a Shalwar-Kameez type of grace.



My father, Allama Bashir Hussain Nazim was a self-taught person. A linguist personified, a naat khawan and naat composer at par, a staunch lover of Holy Prophet (pbuh), a passionate admirer of Iqbal and a true man of letters. 

Abbu with Ashfaq Ahmed, Bano Qudsia and Mansha Yad

I am blessed to have had such a wonderful man like he was. I was also blessed to be with him as he disappeared to meet his creator. As he entered home on the night of June 16 at 1130 hours, we found him in agonizing pain. I thought this pain was business as usual as he often asked me pointing towards his legs “ay phar yar merian lattan, daba zara, kafi dard ho riya ay”. As we started rubbing and massaging his legs, he felt suffocation along severe sweating. Without wasting time, we called a nearby physician, who had a quick examination and referred us to move him to hospital. And within few minutes, we were on our way towards CMH, Rawalpindi (of which Abbu wished to go, because of his son Brig. Dr Mukarram Bashir , who is working there). We reached there within 20 minutes. As we were covering the distance, I found father reciting holy verses and Darood-e-Pak (as he always found). During this drive, I was not panicked sensing it would be a normal check up. May be father is having food poisoning, may be its because of weakness, or a drip or two will definitely help him stand back on his feet, I thought (because father never told pain in his chest). As he was put on hospital’s bed and Mukarram Bhai along with two other doctors on duty engaged in the remedial process, I took a sigh of relief, left that spot and came outside in the car parking with the prayers on my lips. After 10-15 minutes I thought to go inside to know the updates- I found one duty doctor whispering with Mukarram Bhai, “we are doing the hospital’s procedural work and after that its upto you either you take the body along right now or at morning time.” This brief sentence was the most shocking I have ever heard throughout my life. I found a spot slipping away beneath my feet, literally. I yelled… “what are you talking about. I will see my father myself. I will treat him myself.” …and as I entered the ward, throw the curtain away… I found my beloved father wrapped in a white sheet. I hurriedly slipped the piece of cloth to see his face. He was smiling, and reciting Darood-e-Pak but his lips were not moving ……….!!! I hugged him tightly to confirm whether he is gone and in response he never produced a whisper, even. I only wished I would have hugged him longer and tighter a bit earlier on that blessed night of “Meiraaj Shareef”, and with the dawn of “Fathers’ Day”, had I known it was the last time his strong arms would hold me.

"SILSILA NAAT KA KIA KHOOB CHALA MERE BAAD
QABR PERHTI HY MERI- SALLE ALA MERY BAAD

NOOR-E-HAZRAT SE MERI QABR FAROZAN HO GI
US PE BARSY GI SADA NOOR GHATAA- MERY BAAD

TA ABAD SAYYED-E-ALAM KI SANA MEIN NAZIM
HO GI MATTI BHI MERI, NAAT SARA- MERY BAAD"! 



SACRIFICIAL ANIMAL- A THRILL FOR KIDS WHILE IT LASTS

MAHTAB BASHIR

ISLAMABAD

mahtabbashir@gmail.com

A sacrificial animal, for a grown up faithful, may be just a sombre offering from a man to his Creator but for children it is a welcome guest and a thrill while it lasts. With Eidul Azha just round the corner, groups of children can be seen everywhere in the city, showing off their sacrificial animals.

Children are very excited these days and they are having a great fun in walking with their animals, patting and caressing them, feeding them and adorning them with colourful leashes, reins, strings, ribbons, henna, and other little ornaments. Unaware of the exorbitant prices of sacrificial animals and their parent’s ordeal of buying them, children are just thrilled to have them around.

This scribe learnt on Thursday after a visit to the cattle market in H-11 that the prices of animals this year are three times higher than the previous year’s. Hence Eidul Azha, like Eidul Fitre can be called an event for the children since they are the ones who have the maximum fun on these holy days. Kids’ demand for sacrificial animals started as soon as August did. These days, they can be seen boasting about prices, colours and physical features of their animals. These children are just not contented to have their sacrificial animals; they do everything to make them look ‘beautiful’ too.

“I have purchased a few ornaments to decorate my goat that my father purchased spending Rs 30,000. Now, I have adorned my animal with reins of bright colours and silver ornaments for its neck and legs,” said Hamza, a youngster. These enthusiastic children dedicatedly perform all the chores related to their animals, which include arranging for their fodder, sheltering and taking them for a walk. Talha Shakil, 10, said he had to wait all year for Eidul Azha so that he could enjoy the company of his goat. “I love to take it for a walk,” he said. He said that he along with his friends would take their animals for a walk, preferably to some nearby meadow twice a day.

Another kid, Oheed Ahmed, said he preferred to go with his parents to select the animal of his choice, suggesting it should be beautiful enough to show off. “We friends have a sort of competition among us as to whose animal is more beautiful and healthy than others’,” he said. He said it was not easy to look on when one’s animal was being slaughtered. “It’s really hard to sacrifice them but it has to be like that,” he said. Although kids usually fail to collect much Eid allowances on this Eid but they feel compensated with the company of sacrificial animals.

Eidul Azha is celebrated annually on the 10th of the last Islamic month, Zilhajj, of the lunar Islamic calendar. The celebrations begin after the Hajj on the 9th, the annual pilgrimage to Mecca in Saudi Arabia by Muslims worldwide. On Eidul Azha faithful sacrifice their animals to seek Allah’s blessing. Many people have yet to buy animals because they are hoping that the prices might come down in the next couple of days.

TALIBAN’S THREAT TO MEDIA

According to a BBC Urdu service report, Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) chief Hakeemullah Mehsud has issued ‘special directions’ to his subordinates in different cities of Pakistan to target Pakistani and international media groups. This is the TTP’s response in anger at the critical coverage the media across the board has given to the assassination attempt on Malala Yousafzai. On the government’s part, the threat is being taken seriously. The Federal Interior Ministry says intelligence agencies have intercepted a telephone conversation between Hakeemullah Mehsud and a subordinate, Nadeem Abbas alias Intiqami, in which the TTP chief directed Abbas to attack media organisations that denounced the TTP after the Malala incident. The cities specified to be targeted are Karachi, Lahore, Rawalpindi, Islamabad and others. Clearly, this is as wide as media targeting can get. The Interior Ministry in response has issued orders to beef up security at the offices of media organisations by deploying additional police. If needed, the government will deploy the Frontier Constabulary as reinforcements. The ministry has also cautioned religious scholars who had publicly denounced the Taliban following the attack.

The countrywide revulsion against the targeting by the TTP of a 14-year-old girl whose only ‘crime’ was standing up defiantly against the Taliban’s campaign to bring a halt to education in general, and girls education in particular, in areas under their influence was also reflected in media coverage of the event. Our lively media rarely converges on such a consensus on anything. When it does, things cannot remain the same and the pressure of public opinion generated as a result of this media consensus tends to force the authorities’ hand to respond to the issue. To their credit, the authorities, from the government to the armed forces, have unanimously come to the conclusion that enough is enough.

Now what remains to be seen is how this convergence translates into action. The reports about finally firmly grasping the nettle that is North Waziristan, the hotbed and safe haven of the Taliban, are a hopeful sign, despite the military’s reiteration of the need for a political decision before an offensive can be launched. The apprehension all along about military action in North Waziristan has been the adverse asymmetrical effect in the form of a terrorist blowback throughout the country. By its very nature, the protagonists of such warfare retreat before overwhelming force deployed against them and strike elsewhere so as to distract and stretch out the security forces, which inevitably produces gaps in the security network. It is imperative therefore that unlike previous military campaigns, including the ones in Swat and South Waziristan, any campaign against the terrorists holed up in North Waziristan must take into account and pre-empt the militants’ ability to melt away into other areas in the face of a military offensive, to live and fight another day. Any offensive in North Waziristan therefore must treat the requirements of the theatre as a whole, cut off retreat routes, and at the same time brace for terrorist attacks elsewhere in Pakistan. Bitter as the harvest of a North Waziristan offensive has the potential to reap, there is now no escape from taking out these fanatics and cleansing the soil of Pakistan from such inimical forces that threaten the best values of our state and society.

Courtesy: Daily Times

GHULAMI-E-RASOOL MEIN MAOT BHI KABOOL HY!

The government, under pressure from the growing and increasingly violent protests against the film insulting the Prophet (PBUH) has decided that today will be a national holiday and declared it Yaum-e-Ishq-e-Rasool (Day of Love for the Prophet (PBUH)). The federal cabinet also decided to hold Shan-e-Rasool (Dignity and Respect of the Prophet (PBUH)) conferences at the federal and provincial levels. Federal Information Minister Qamar Zaman Kaira told the media that the cabinet had suggested to the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) that it should sign an agreement with YouTube for blocking sacrilegious material. It may be recalled that when the furore over the film broke, the government requested YouTube to take the offending footage off its server and help bloc access to the film through all other Internet conduits. 


However, despite the fact that YouTube has blocked the film in a number of Muslim countries, and is adding countries to that list every day, it told the Pakistan government that it could not comply with the request since it had no such agreement with Pakistan. As a consequence, the government shut down YouTube in Pakistan altogether, much to the chagrin of its users. But that was apparently not the end of the story, as the Lahore High Court has issued notices to the government regarding inadequate blocking of, and therefore presumed access to, the offending film. Welcome to the age of the Internet, which makes blocking anything a highly precarious and difficult enterprise. 

The federal cabinet wants the culprits responsible for the film brought to book and to be shown no leniency. Mr Kaira argued that a holiday was the only way the government could show its seriousness about the ruction caused throughout the Muslim world because of the film. Mr Kaira appealed to the protesters to remain peaceful. He revealed a proposal to hold an emergency meeting of Pakistani ambassadors to discuss the fallout of the film and subsequent blasphemies. The cabinet also asked President Asif Ali Zardari to raise the issue in his address to the UN General Assembly and summon a summit of the OIC to tackle the provocation and forge a consensus on the response of the Muslim world.

Critics of the government’s decision to declare a holiday today express reservations that the move would encourage people to participate in the protests, which may turn violent. If the past few days’ events are anything to go by, the apprehension is not without weight. Increasingly violent attacks are being mounted against the US Embassy in Islamabad and the Consulates in Lahore and Karachi. Even the supposedly foolproof arrangements to keep protestors away from the diplomatic enclave in Islamabad failed in the face of the determined mob, and the army had to be called in to bolster a hard-pressed police force. 

The government’s intention may have been unexceptionable, i.e. to answer its critics that its response to the issue had been far too mild. However, if it has misread the mood on the streets, the decision could backfire in the form of countrywide violent protests, which would obviously stretch the already stretched law enforcement and security forces.

While Pakistan attempts to cope with the explosive situation emerging at home, the ‘freedom of expression’ champions in the west continue on their reckless and provocative path. French magazine Charlie Hebdo, which gained notoriety in 2006 by reproducing the Prophet’s (PBUH) caricatures first published in the Danish daily Jyllands-Posten, has in the middle of the growing protest in the Muslim world decided to publish more blasphemous cartoons of the Prophet (PBUH). France as a result is bracing itself for a backlash, while protests sweep Afghanistan, Indonesia, Lebanon, Sri Lanka and elsewhere. 

More than 30 people have already been killed in the protests, including 12 in an attack by a female suicide bomber in Afghanistan. Al-Azhar has condemned the publication of the cartoons, and even the Vatican has expressed its unease at the emerging crisis by describing the publication of the satirical images as throwing “fuel on the fire”.

What the proponents of unbridled freedom of expression in the west either do not realise or do not give a fig about is the dialectical relationship between freedom and responsibility. In their clinging to notions of freedom of expression (without any responsibility as to the consequences), what these modern day fundamentalists of western values fail to see is how their adventurism is bringing grist to the mill of the extremists throughout the Muslim world, and in the process dooming the liberal, democratic and progressive community in these societies to hell. 

RUET-E-HALAL, SHAHADATEIN & MOON SIGHTING

There is something surreal and vaudevillian about this whole high drama that we go through every year. As surreal as the water car episode that we went through recently. Those otherwise pathologically concerned with Pakistan’s “image” abroad as a modern state should really be on an overdrive here.

What we have, every year, in the 21st century, is a national debate over the sighting of the moon. It would take several attempts at explaining this annual national discourse to an outsider for the latter to take it seriously. And this is not to be attributed to the condescending superiority complex of those using the Gregorian calendar towards those using lunar. No, religious injunctions in other faiths, even other Abrahamic faiths, can be far more eccentric than the mere use of the lunar calendar. What will be questioned would be the reluctance to actually use the lunar calendar to get out of the messy, inexact business of sighting the moon.

Adding a layer of complexity to the whole issue is the forging of new ties across sectarian divides and the burning of old ones. One prism of understanding the issue used to be in the pro-Saudi Arabian versus pro-local terms. How, then, would that explain the functionally anti-Saudi Arabian influence government of KP, celebrating Eid a day earlier and the Saudi Arabia-fixated Punjab government celebrating it a day later?

Also evident is the irony of the central Ruet-e-Hillal committee calling the other camp obscurantists while maintaining an intransigently literalist stance on sighting the moon. But Peshawar’s Mufti Popalzai also based his declaration, not on any calculation or throwing his lot with Eid in other countries, but, yes, on reports of sightings. With this, the debate mutates from the theological into a my-word-against-yours, spawning off arguments about light pollution in cities, the visibility of the moon and whether the faith is sullied by using telescopes to begin with.

Several years ago, Mufti Muneeb (who is now in his 14th year at the committee), in his protest against Mufti Popalzai, equated the matter with the then recent Swat crisis. He explained the necessity of an “operation” the way one was started in Swat to restore the “writ of state.” Heavy words, these. The loss of the state’s monopoly on violence to militant extremists is to be put in the same slot as the trivial issue of gazetted holidays?

To segue that into an appeal: it would do us all a lot of good to drop the hyperbole. The heavens won’t fall if we have two Eids. And national unity wouldn’t have been cemented even if we did. There are other, bigger monsters to slay for that.

TIME TO INTROSPECT

On this Independence Day, as Pakistan turned 65, we find as many views on democracy, secularism and Islam as there are people living in the country. Confusion is one word the youth that comprises 65 percent of this country uses often to describe their understanding of the situation in Pakistan. There is complete disorientation as to the purpose of creating Pakistan in the first place, and then the direction it should have, and still needs to take. If the idea was to create a nation with multiple cultural dimensions, with human values at its core, then the way we have dealt with our citizens by depriving them of a decent living goes against that grain. There is a need to reinterpret, redefine and shed the dust covering the original concept of Pakistan envisioned by Jinnah and Iqbal. They certainly did not talk of a Pakistan enslaved by the current dominant and self-defeating narrow interpretation of Islam.

So-called Islamisation, starting from Zia’s era, has reduced the state and society to being entrapped by religious intolerance and lack of direction. The phenomenon of extremism, with a handful of people hiding in the mountains of northern Pakistan demanding Shariah to be the leitmotif of state and society is an indicator of things getting out of hand. The country is fast moving toward a debacle woven into a pattern of hatred, religious intolerance and crude understanding of Islam. Did Muhammad Ali Jinnah dream of this kind of Pakistan? The oft-repeated speech of Jinnah that he delivered at the first session of the Constituent Assembly of Pakistan on August 11, 1947, clearly suggests the role of religion in the state that he envisaged. He delineated the position of minorities in Pakistan by granting them complete freedom of religion so that they could practice their faith in whatever manner they thought fit. This was the spirit that became the cause for the creation of Pakistan.

Today it is a different country we are living in, where minorities are harassed and are forced to either convert to Islam or leave the country for safer havens in India or elsewhere. The domination of right wing groups and opinion in the political, social and economic spheres has affected our relations with the world. We are not at peace with our neighbours. An air of hostility swirls across Pakistan, India and Afghanistan. The India-Pakistan animosity paradigm that saw trillions of dollars lining the pockets of political elites and arms dealers from the western countries in the name of defence and security, brought nothing but economic deprivation for our general public. The case of US enmity sown in the hearts of Islamists played out as an expedient way to exploit public sentiment rather than establishing Pakistan as a country free of political, military and economic dependence. Pakistan is surviving on the periphery of the world’s mainstream, where the purpose, cause and reason for Pakistan’s creation is lost in a welter of noisy and contradictory voices, adding more heat and fury rather than reason and wisdom to the country’s striving for direction, stability and prosperity. We are unfortunately directionless even today after 65 years and the freedom that we so lovingly guard in the name of sovereignty has itself become a redundant formula of false claims of national success and pride. We are in need of deep introspection. And what could be a better time for this than Independence Day?