Help lifesaving supplies get DIRECTLY to CHILDREN of Pakistan. Text FLOODS to 864233 to donate $10 to UNICEF USA (<3 Alyssa Milano, Rob Riggle for taking up Pakistan relief cause & highlighting children http://bit.ly/9fhJGP. THANK YOU)
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Friends in USA: Send $10 thru your cell phones by texting the word “FLOOD” to 27722 – Set up by US State Dept Pakistan Relief Fund http://www.state.gov/pakistanrelief announced by Hillary Clinton today http://bit.ly/cVom6B
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The real deal. A lifetime, washed away. Mango farmer, author Daniyal Mueenuddin in NYT http://nyti.ms/c4qVqu
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Pakistani people value India’s $5m aid offer. Indian govt shd send thru fastest channel, even if Pakistan govt under pressure hesitates to accept. No time for games. There’s no problem at people level. Indo Pak peace march (Amn ke Badhte Qadam) 20 Indian marchers donated INR 30K for flood relief in Lahore Aug 15; Indian artists, doctors are volunteering help.
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Published in The News on Sunday Political Economy section, Aman ki Asha page, June 13, 2010
June 10 2010
Dear Beena,
I can live with “Indian Administered Kashmir” and “Pakistan Administered Kashmir”. I’ll have to think about “militant” for “terrorist”, partly because then that might let off the hook homegrown Indians responsible for terrorism. And I will likely have to disagree about India’s interference in 1971 being nothing but a hostile act. I mean, it was hostile, necessarily so. But I believe it had to happen. I think peoples have aspirations, naturally so, and (West) Pakistan was actively and brutally suppressing the East’s aspirations in 1971. Continue reading
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tagged: 1971, Dr Mubashir Hasan, Ishrat Firdousi, J&K | Leave a comment »
Panicked schoolgirls being evacuated after a bomb blast outside their school that killed one boy, Apr 19. AP photo
My monthly column Personal Political in Hardnews India
April 26, 2010
Beena Sarwar
On April 19, there were two bomb blasts in the heart of Peshawar – a low intensity one outside a police-run school as parents were picking up children that killed a small boy, followed hours later by a second detonated by a suicide bomber, in the famed Kissa Khwani Bazaar (story tellers’ market), killing over 20 people including one of Peshawar’s senior-most police officials.
There was a haunting Associated Press photograph in newspapers the next day: four schoolgirls in their school uniforms in the back of a van being taken to safety. One clutches a water bottle. Wide-eyed with fear and bewilderment, they can’t be more than six years old. Continue reading
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Fifth installment of Dilip and my weekly email exchange, published in The News on Sunday (still the best weekly English language paper in Pakistan) Political Economy section, Aman ki Asha page, March 21, 2010.
CONVERSATIONS: Dream on
March 18 2010
Dear Beena,
To begin with, my salaams to the memory and spirit of Aziz Siddiqui, whom you mentioned in your last letter. He’s right, of course: is giving up the fight for your beliefs even an option?
The interesting thing about this exercise is that we agree about a lot of things. Which might raise the question, are we the right people to be doing this exercise at all? But that raises another question: why not? Why should voices that tend to agree on some things not be raised and heard? Continue reading
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tagged: Asiapeace, Association for Communal Harmony in Asia (ACHA)., Aziz Siddiqui, BITS Pilani, Dr Ishtiaq Ahmed, joint memorial, Kanta Luthra, kargil, partition violence, Rahul Bose, virtual memorial, wagah peace memorial | 1 Comment »
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tagged: charity, democracy, flour distribution, food insecurity, karachi stampede, Pakistan, Politics, women dead | 2 Comments »
Dr Farrukh Gulzar, the progressive minded medical practitioner from Lahore who was the driving force behind the Reference for Dr M. Sarwar and the 1950s student movement on Aug 8, has now thrown his energies into helping organise a remembrance for the late poet Zaheer Kashmiri. Friends in Lahore, please do attend. Here is the invitation he sent:
Zaheer Kashmiri
AHL-E-DIL MILTAY NAHEENH, AHL-E-NAZAR MILTAY NAHEENH
ZULMAT-E-DAURANH MAI, KHURSHEED-E-SEHR MILTAY NAHEENH
–ZAHEER KASHMIRI
(Translation:
Gone are the sensitive hearts or insightful visionaries
In this oppressive darkness, no morning sun arises)
Remembering the life and works of the legendary Marxist, progressive poet and activist, a literary critic, and a strong influence of and upon
Progressive Writers Movement (Anjuman-e-Taraqi Pasand Musanafeen)
ZAHEER KASHMIRI
Hailing from Amritsar, Zaheer Kashmiri spent his life in Lahore, and was a very popular and respected figure in the liberal, progressive youth and seniors alike. When Faiz Ahmed Faiz headed the editorial board of ‘Sawera’ PWA’s monthly magazine devoted to socialist and progressive thought, the other board members included Ahmed Nadeem Qasmi and Zaheer Kashmiri. Please join his friends, family and followers to pay tribute to him at this occasion. His poetry and articles compiled in his book “Ishq-o-Inqilab” will be available for sale at discounted rates.
SEPTEMBER 9, 2009
ALHAMRA HALL NO 3, THE MALL, LAHORE
4-8 PM
SPEAKERS: HAMEED AKHTAR, ABID HASSAN MINTO, I. A. REHMAN, HUSSAIN MAJRUH, ASLAM GURDASPURI, SHOUKAT PEERZADA (BROTHER), MERAJ MUHAMMAD KHAN, RASHEED MISBAH, NASREEN ANJUM BHATTI, ARSHAD BUTT
POETRY: DR TAHIR SHABBIR
MUSICAL RENDERINGS: NASIR KHAN, MUHAMMAD JAWAD
MODERATORS: ABID HUSSAIN ABID, RASHEED MISBAH
ORGANISED BY:
PROGRESSIVE WRITERS ASSOCIATION (ANJUMAN-E-TARAQI PASAND MUSANAFEEN) PUNJAB
YOUTH VISION
HAMAINH KHABER HAI KAY HAM HAINH
CHIRAGH-E-AAKHIR-E-SHAB
HAMARAY BAAD ANDHERA NAHEENH
UJAAALA HAI!
— ZAHEER KASHMIRI
(translation:
We are acutely aware that
We are like flickering candles in the dying night
There is no gloomy dark after us
Only bright light will prevail)
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tagged: Abid Hasan Minto, Abid Hussain Abid, Ahmed Nadeem Qasmi, Arshad Butt, Aslam Gurdaspuri, Dr Tahir Shabbir, Faiz, Hameed Akhtar, Hussain Majruh, I.A. Rehman, Meraj Mohammad Khan, Muhammad Jawad, Nasir Khan, Nasreen Anjum Bhatti, PWA, Rasheed Misbah, Sawera, Shoukat Peerzada, Zaheer Kashmiri | 1 Comment »
![Free flour was being distributed in a busy neighbourhood when the stampede happened [AFP]](https://beenasarwar.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/2009914124811580_5.jpg?w=300&h=200 "2009914124811580_5")
Journeys to democracy 