Movies to watch out for: Rahm (Mercy) and Forbidden Steps

Posted on March 15, 2017 by beenasarwar

Sharing details of two very relevant films by Pakistanis whose work I’ve seen and liked:  Rahm (Mercy), the movie, in London and Glasgow this Friday…

Rahm

…And upcoming, seeking support: Forbidden Steps – a feature film that aims to humanize a faith and a people that have long been misrepresented; writer/director Iram Parveen Bilal’s earlier work includes Josh based on Karachi’s Khana Ghar, and The PHD Movie.

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A Battle for the Soul of Pakistan

Posted on February 18, 2017 by beenasarwar
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Sehwan: Women and children in the courtyard. Photo: Beena Sarwar

Wrote this in one go about the suicide attack at Sehwan Sharif that claimed over 80 lives. Sick at heart but not giving up. Thanks to friends around the world, especially in India for their messages of solidarity, to the Wire for publishing it so fast and editor Siddharth Varadarajan for the photos used with the Wire piece. We had gone to Sehwan together, along with Nandini Sundar and Aslam Khwaja. Extracts from my article:

I wonder if the bangle sellers outside the shrine are alive. I still have some chunky glass bangles I bought, bargaining more for the sake of it than to save money.

Did the woman bouncing a little girl on her shoulders, chanting and dancing to an inner beat before the drums sounded, go back last Thursday? Did they survive the blast?  Continue reading →

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Online course developed by late Dr Ruqaiya Hasan kicks off in Pakistan

Posted on February 11, 2017 by beenasarwar
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Ruqaiya Hasan, Hong Kong, Feb 2015. Photo by Lexie Don

Thrilled and excited to share this news from my mother, Zakia Sarwar, founder member of the Society of Pakistan English Language Teachers (SPELT), about the online course for teachers’ professional deveopment that was her sister, my khala ammi Dr Ruqaiya Hasan’s dream

PRESS RELEASE: 11 February 2017

Professional development online course for teachers in Pakistan kicks off

Project posthumously takes forward globally renowned linguist Dr Ruqaiya Hasan’s dream and intellectual legacy

KARACHI: The posthumous launch of an online course for Pakistani teachers designed by the internationally renowned linguist Dr Ruqaiya Hasan kicks off February 11, 2017, taught by Dr. Carmel Cloran, Dr. Hasan’s colleague and co-researcher from Macquarie University, Sydney Australia. Continue reading →

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Women’s Action Forum letter to the Chief Justice, Supreme Court of Pakistan

Posted on January 27, 2017 by beenasarwar

recover-activistsReproducing below the letter sent by the Women’s Action Forum letter to the Chief Justice, Supreme Court of Pakistan about the “disappeared” activists and the deliberate and sustained campaign against them in the media and on social media. This campaign, with its accusations of blasphemy and treason being leveled against the missing activists and those campaigning for their safe recovery poses a danger to those missing, their families and the human rights campaigners.

WAF urges that the state, its institutions and agencies be held responsible for the recovery of the missing bloggers/activists and inform what the investigation has yielded, and that the federation be held answerable for non-compliance of SC orders on the issue of enforced disappearances.

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Filed under: Blasphemy Laws, Freedom of expression, Human rights, Media, Violence in the name of religion | Tagged: , , , , , , | 1 Comment »

Recover Disappeared Activists

Posted on January 24, 2017 by beenasarwar

It is now more than three weeks since the professor, poet and activist Salman Haider was ‘disappeared’ from Islamabad. Shortly afterwards, more social media activists were picked up. By whom and why? Questions beg answers. Please sign the statement urging their safe return.

Action for a Progressive Pakistan's avatar

***PLEASE SIGN THIS STATEMENT HERE.***

recover-activists

Famed Pakistani Poet, Academic, and Left Activist Disappeared

Critical Activists Disappeared

#RecoverSalmanHaider | #RecoverAllActivists

Famed Pakistani poet, academic, and Left activist Salman Haider has gone missing since last Friday. As of now, we have little credible information but we believe that Salman was abducted due to his political views and writings. Salman has been a staunch champion of the oppressed and working class peoples of Pakistan, and uses his witty prose and incisive verses to challenge and mock all forms of oppression in Pakistan.

He is not alone. Within hours of his abduction, news of other activists disappearing has emerged–Waqas Goraya, Aasim Saeed, and Ahmed Raza Naseer have gone missing.

We demand that the Pakistani state apparatus–its military, intelligence agencies, and civilian institutions–act promptly to ensure the safe recovery of all activists.

We call on scholars, playwrights, poets, writers, activists, artists from around…

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Ongoing worldwide protests against “missing” bloggers

Posted on January 15, 2017 by beenasarwar
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Lahore protest. Photo: Khalid Mahmood

January 15, 2017 marks just over two weeks since the professor, poet and activist Salman Haider was abducted from Islamabad, followed soon after by more such “disappearances”. Human rights activists around the world are demanding that Pakistan produce the missing bloggers and end the climate of fear being created. Disappearing activists is not a new tactic, as Pervez Hoodbhoy reminds us – been happening with alarming regularity in Balochistan. But these abductions happened in Punjab. Meanwhile, the propaganda machinery of the dirty tricks brigade (#DTBPk) is out in full force painting as ‘blasphemers’ and ‘traitors’ the missing bloggers and those supporting them – which in the context of Pakistan is a clear incitement to violence and vigilante action. Below: photographs from some of the protests – Peshawar, Toba Tek Singh, Islamabad, Lahore, Karachi, Dallas TX and London, England.  Continue reading →

Filed under: Blasphemy Laws, Human rights, Violence in the name of religion | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Salute to a stellar actor and courageous humanist: Farewell Om Puri (October 18, 1950 – Jan. 6, 2017)

Posted on January 7, 2017 by beenasarwar

I’m not a great film follower but this is something I felt compelled to write yesterday. Published in the Aman ki Asha website and crossposted here.

om-puri-ians

The legendary Indian actor leaves a legacy of humanistic and compassionate values and peace aspirations

Legendary actor Om Puri’s untimely death has saddened film and peace lovers not only in India but in Pakistan and around the world. Like his long-time friends and colleagues Naseeruddin Shah and Mahesh Bhatt, and younger colleague Nandita Das, he had a special relationship with Pakistan due to his desire for better relations between the two largest countries of South Asia. Continue reading →

Filed under: Art and activism, Culture, Pakistan-India | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments »

Binge-watching desi films

Posted on January 3, 2017 by beenasarwar

My article in The News on Sunday, Jan 1, 2017, on two film festivals in New York recently showcasing work from Pakistan and India. I wanted to write more about some of them but didn’t have space. Below, with additional links and pix.

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Mah-e-Mir director Anjum Shehzad and producers Badar Ikram, Khurram Rana with Ambassador Maleeha Lodhi. Photo: Beena Sarwar

Desi audiences thronged to two recent film festivals in New York showcasing films from Pakistan and India

Many of the films in what is being heralded as a revival of Pakistan cinema feature the sprawling megapolis of Karachi. The multifaceted city’s historic sandstone buildings, sandy beach, traditional tiles, boundless energy emerge in these films… dreamily romantic under a perpetual full moon (Mah-e-Mir), wildly eclectic (Mailay), effervescent, multi-cultural (Actor In Law), violently revengeful (Gardaab), creative, musical (Ho Mann Jahan), a playground for street dancing (Dance Kahani), a tangle of underworld sewers and space-age factories (Teen Bahadur, animation). Continue reading →

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Lessons for journalists from a Pulitzer Prize-winning composer

Posted on December 28, 2016 by beenasarwar

Beena Sarwar

Notes from the Nieman Pulitzer 100 event in Cambridge MA, “POWER: Accountability and Abuse,” presented by the Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Sanders Theatre, Harvard University 

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Sep. 9, 2016

Cambridge, MA: The thousand-seater Sanders Theatre filled up fast in anticipation of the Wynton Marsalis concert that was kicking off the Nieman Pulitzer 100 event, a few days before my first journalism class at Princeton University. No photography or videos of the performance were allowed but I figured the rule didn’t apply before they started playing so I sneaked a quick photo. Continue reading →

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As tensions rise between India and Pakistan, we remember a friend who called for peace

Posted on November 8, 2016 by beenasarwar

Sharing a piece I wrote with Dr. Partha Banerjee about our friend Haider “jigar”Rizvi, published by PRI on October 28, 2016, a year after he died in Lahore. Reproduced here with photos that we weren’t able to get to PRI in time.

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Haider Rizvi celebrating life and love at Ghizar District, Gilgit, 2015. Photo by Qamar Abbas.

Last year around this time, we were saddened by the death of our poet and journalist friend Haider Rizvi in Lahore, Pakistan, on Oct 29, 2015. Haider had lived in New York, and was for many years a correspondent for the Inter Press Service (IPS), based at the United Nations.

With Haider’s untimely passing, we lost someone who loved to make friends irrespective of religion, color or caste — someone who believed firmly in peace.
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