Photo released by QEHB on Oct 19, 2012. Malala, the world is praying for you.
For official updates on Malala Yousufzai’s condition, see this website set up by Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Birmingham, where she is being treated. An additional update posted on Friday 19 October 2012, at 13:50 hours (reproduced below), lists details of her injuries and what’s being done to treat them. The latest update is that she is stable, comfortable and responding well. She is communicating through writing notes, and thanks all well-wishers for their support and the doctors and nurses who are treating her. She will need a significant period of rest and recuperation before undergoing reconstructive surgery. Continue reading →
Adapted from the post I sent to my Yahoogroup a little while ago:
No point repeating what happened a week ago in Swat, when Taliban shot Malala Yusufzai, the 14-year old school girl who has been speaking out courageously for the right of girls to be educated, supported by her equally brave father, Ziauddin Yusufzai, principal of the school she was studying at.
Malala was already a hero to many. Now she has become a worldwide symbol of the right of girls to education, as well as of resistance to the Taliban. In this, she represents millions of Pakistanis – and world citizens. Her friend Kainat who was also injured, told CNN from her hospital bed that she hoped to continue her education and that Malala would come back and join her schoolmates soon. “I want to tell all the girls to continue their mission to get an education,” she said.Continue reading →
“Families in Charlestown are gathering on Bunker Hill monument on Sunday October 14 at 5:30 pm to hold a vigil for Malala Yousafzai. Please try to attend and spread the word, all welcome,”read the email circulated by the Pakistani Association of Greater Boston on behalf of Joanne Samuelson, a Boston resident who works at M.I.T.
The drizzly weather cleared away allowing the sun to come out in time to endorse the gathering at this historic spot in Charlestown, Boston, the site of a major battle between the revolutionaries and the British colonists.Continue reading →
This blog post is not about the violence and mayhem let loose in Pakistan to protest the anti-Islam film made by some fanatics. The destruction caused by the protestors in the name of love for the Prophet Mohammad (PBUH) last Friday was televised for the world to see. This post is about what some people, mostly youth, are doing to counter such madness.
Horrified at the destruction and violence, some youngsters decided to actually DO something beyond sitting around and complaining about the protestors and their criminal activities: “The idea is simple, just get out on the streets and roads, use whatever resources you can to clean up the mess created by these riots. This is a national thing, and it would be great if people in every city of Pakistan join in!” Continue reading →
Largest exhibition of Pakistani contemporary art on display Sept. 24 at National Art Gallery, Islamabad at 5 p.m. to celebrate 30 years of Rohtas Gallery. Sixty five artists will exhibit more than 165 works in a testimony to Pakistan’s contemporary artists and an amazing journey through their growth and contribution to art over three decades. Rohtas Gallery opened in 1981 when a repressive military dictator ruled Pakistan. Rohtas Gallery defied constraints and offered space and inspiration to Pakistan’s artists who wanted to challenge contemporary thought and encourage others to do the same through their work. This exhibition on Sept. 24 celebrates Rohtas Gallery and Pakistan’s artists and their amazing journey together.
1993 – May 11: Salamat Masih, a 14-year-old Christian boy, was named as the main accused in a case lodged by the imam of the mosque at Ratta Dhotran, district Gujranwala, Punjab, Pakistan. It was alleged that Salamat had written derogatory remarks about the Prophet Muhammad (SW) on the mosque walls and thrown slips of paper with similar language written on them into the mosque. Salamat’s father Rehmat Masih and uncle Manzoor Masih were co-accused. Manzoor Masih and Salamat Masih were illiterate. A sessions court sentenced them to death but the high court later acquitted them. Manzoor Masih was shot dead during the hearings, and the High Court Judge, Arif Iqbal Bhatti, who acquitted them, was also later shot dead. Salamat Masih and Rehmat Masih had to flee the country.
The people of Pakistan and India, people of Indian and Pakistani origin around the world, and friends of India and Pakistan, are fed up of the visa restrictions that prevent them from visiting families in the other country. There isn’t even a tourist visa protocol between these two biggest neighbours of South Asia. People in the region want the right to travel and to trade, to walk along coastlines and roads that represent their collective past, to seek and spread harmony across a subcontinent not divided by politics and propaganda. In this modern age of interdependence, it is a tragedy that the citizens of India and Pakistan are left peering over a border made indomitable and intimidating. There is little space for the hand of friendship to be extended across this border. This must change. Sign the Aman ki Asha Milne Do petition at Change.org . Let’s get a thousand signatures in time to present to the Foreign Ministers when they meet in Islamabad on September 8 2012.
Article sent for this blog by Justice Markandey Katju, retired Justice of the Supreme Court of India.
The Emperor has no Clothes
Now the Chief Justice had to be given oath by the President of Wonderland, but before that could be done the Chief Justice grabbed a golden crown from somewhere and crowned himself… then declared himself the Emperor of Wonderland, a post above the President or Prime Minister…
By Justice Markandey Katju
Once upon a time a little girl called Alice was dozing one summer afternoon on a meadow when she saw a strange sight. A white rabbit dressed in a coat and wearing a wristwatch was running while saying, ‘I am late’.Continue reading →
The late great poet Ahmed Faraz’s son Sarmad Faraz pays tribute to his father, by releasing a music video titled “Shayar”, which features the poet reciting his verses in his inimitable manner.
Sarmad is a musician and is best-known for being in the band Corduroy. He chose this particular poem of his late father because it espouses resilience, individuality and change.
The poem “Shayar” is part of Ahmed Faraz’s first-ever published book Tanha Tanha (1954). (Read more below).
Journeys to democracy 