Pakistan Link - March 4, 2016

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Friday, March 4, 2016

VOL. 26/10 - 24 Jumadal-ula 1437 H

PAGE 17

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Women’s Bill in Line with Quaid’s Vision ‘Terrorist Infrastructure in Waziristan Destroyed’

US & Canada $1.00

Interfaith Group Repudiates AntiMuslim Rhetoric

Fazl to Strive for Rights of Husbands

Pak-US Strategic Dialogue in Washington

US Secretary of State John Kerry and Foreign Affairs Adviser Sartaj Aziz attend the US-Pakistan Strategic Dialogue meeting in Washington

INFRASTRUCTURE, P28

Washington, DC: The United States lauded Pakistan’s commitment to take prompt action against Pathankot air base attackers, according to a State Department statement issued on Wednesday after the PakUS strategic dialogue.

The dialogue was co-chaired by US Secretary of State John Kerry and

Pakistani-American Wins America’s Top Technology Medal

Oscar Shines Light on Efforts to Stop ‘Honor Killings’

Los

Angeles, CA: President Obama has honored Dr Mark Salman Humayun of Pakistani origin with the National Medal of Technology and Innovation at a White House ceremony recently, according to a USC Eye Institute press release.

Dr Humayun’s “bionic eye” offers a solution for those who have the inherited retinal degenerative disease retinitis pigmentosa (RP).

Dr Humayun’s “bionic eye” received approval from the FDA in the US in 2013 and since then the USC Eye Institute has been one of the centers of excellence for patients receiving this implant.

Born in Pakistan, Dr Mark Salman Humayun is the grandson of Quaid-iAzam Mohammad Ali Jinnah’s personal physician Dr Ilahi Bakhsh.

www.PakistanLink.com Nawaz, Modi Likely to Meet in Washington This Month Washington, DC: Prime Minis-

Washington: Adviser on Foreign

Affairs Sartaj Aziz said that Pakistan should not be blamed for the problems in Afghanistan and hoped direct talks between the Taliban and Afghan officials expected to be held in two weeks would help strengthen efforts for peace in that country.

Addressing members of the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington, he said that there was a misperception that Pakistan was supporting some groups and that there were people who sympathize with Taliban. “This perception needs to be corrected because the way we have carried out the process in the last two years, the starting point of that is very clear that unless peace comes to Afghanistan, Pakistan will not become peaceful,” he said.

He said that restoring peace in Afghanistan was important. “That requires that there should be a political consensus between the Afghan government and Taliban and not the other way round,” he added. He recalled that when Afghan President Ashraf Ghani visited Pakistan in November, there was a very strong

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Prime Minister’s Adviser on Foreign Affairs Sartaj Aziz.

The US stressed the need for a meaningful dialogue between Pakistan and India for the peaceful solution of all outstanding issues, including Kashmir.

The delegations underscored that all parties in the region should

continuously act with maximum restraint and work collaboratively towards reducing tensions.

Further, both sides expressed their conviction that a robust, longterm bilateral relationship remains critical to regional and international security along with prosperity.

DIALOGUE, P28

MEETING, P28

Asia Cup: Bangladesh Hold Nerve to Beat Pakistan Dhaka: Bangladesh qualified for

n By Saba Imtiaz Karachi: The latest Acad-

emy Award for a filmmaker from Pakistan is focusing attention on so-called honor killings of women in the country, with the prime minister and other senior officials vowing to strengthen laws against the practice.

On Sunday, the filmmaker, Sharmeen ObaidChinoy, won the Oscar for best documentary for her film “A Girl in the River: The Price of Forgiveness,” which depicts the survivor of an attempted honor killing who was forced to publicly forgive her family for trying to murder her.

Before traveling to the United States for the Academy Awards ceremony, Ms. Obaid-Chinoy screened

ter Nawaz Sharif may meet India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Washington later this month on the sidelines of the Nuclear Security Summit, Foreign Affairs Adviser Sartaj Aziz was quoted as saying.

“There are chances of (a) meeting between the two prime ministers,” the Press Trust of India news service quoted him as saying.

“There are possibilities, when they are here in Washington DC. They would interact with each other.

Whether there would be a structured meeting I do not know. Depends on...Chances are there for a meeting,” he said.

Sartaj was in Washington to attend the sixth US-Pakistan Strategic Dialogue which he co-chaired with US Secretary of State John Kerry.

Prime Minister Nawaz would be travelling to Washington to attend the Nuclear Security Summit at the invitation of US President Barack Obama, the adviser said.

The Indian prime minister too has been invited to the summit on March 31 and April 1. No official

Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy won the Oscar for her documentary A Girl in the River in Los Angeles on Sunday

“A Girl in the River” at the official residence of Pakistan’s prime minister, Nawaz Sharif. And, later, in congratulating her for

the award, her second, Mr Sharif announced that his government was “in the process of legislating to stop such brutal and inhu-

mane acts in the name of honor.”

Initial work on a law has already started, acOSCAR, P28

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the final of the Asia Cup after beating Pakistan by five wickets on Wednesday.

Pakistan recovered from 28-4 to post 129-7, before Bangladesh reached a winning total of 131-5 in 19.1 overs. Mahmudullah secured victory, and a place in Sunday’s final against India, with a deep midwicket boundary.

Pakistan fast bowler Mohammad Amir had figures 2-26 and kept his side’s hopes alive until Mashrafe Mortaza (12 not out) hit him for two consecutive boundaries in the 18th over.

With 18 runs needed in the last two overs, fast bowler Mohammad Sami conceded two no-balls, one of which Mahmudullah cut past point to hit a boundary. It left Bangladesh needing just three runs to win in the last over.

Earlier, Sarfraz Ahmed led Pakistan’s recovery with an unbeat

CRICKET, P28

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n By Mowahid Hussain Shah

U

nder Article 17 of the India Constitution in 1950: “’Untouchability’ is abolished and its practice in any form is forbidden.” Yet, more than 66 years later, systematic oppression still flourishes, often punctuated with caste violence directed against the Dalit (Untouchables).

Laws may have changed, but attitudes haven’t, leaving India in name only a liberal democracy.

These were the conclusions proffered in a harrowing account of present-day India by eminent Indian editor Manoj Mitta during a February presentation in Washington, DC, at the National Endowment for Democracy.

Meanwhile, caste-ignited flames loom large.

Blatant is the complicity of police and judiciary elements, who turn a blind eye. A succession of special laws from 1955 to 2015 to protect Untouchables have defined and added to punishable offenses, set up special courts, and increased penalties. Article 330 of India’s Constitution allocated them seats in Parliament. Yet, violence against the Dalit has escalated and enforcement has been ineffective as the caste aspect of a crime is often ignored, prosecution of court cases is delayed, and, according to the speaker, “most cases have resulted in acquittals of all the accused,” adding the impression that the violence can continue with impunity.

The challenge to rectify is

N

ational security issues are back in the news, with President Obama proposing a plan to close Guantanamo Bay and a showdown brewing between the FBI and Apple(and the rest of the technology sector).

While the idea between balancing national security and protecting our freedoms has always been debated, the years since 9/11 have highlighted this topic further.

Unfortunately, too often the federal government has chosen to restrict freedom in the name of security. Extrajudicial measures are now the norm. From NSA surveillance to holding detainees without trial, to rendition and drone strikes, we are slowly becoming a nation in which the security state is becoming paramount.

Extrajudicial actions are dangerous since they are done outside the scope of oversight and limitations. The Constitution is meant as a safeguard to ensure that government respects the rule of law and ensures the freedoms it upholds. If the United States government resorts to such measures, it could lead to other governments using the same measures, not only on their own citizens, but ours, too. For example, the implications could be disastrous if foreign governments deny our citizens access to a lawyer in political retribution for us denying their citizens due process.

We cannot play into the image that we are willing to give up our liberties in the name of security because it gives our enemies more recruitment material. Doing so gives our enemies a chance to further define their propaganda machine with examples of America saying one thing, and then doing another. What

Fake Democracy?

made all the more horrendous as caste is integral to orthodox Hinduism, and is so pervasive and intractable that even Muslim and Christian communities, by the speaker’s account, are “infected

In 1999, Christiane Amanpour hosted a CBS-TV “60 Minutes” program on the Dalit plight, which highlighted how the ancient setup of Hindu hierarchy endorses and enables the daily ritual of hu-

Laws may have changed, but attitudes haven’t, leaving India in name only a liberal democracy. These were the conclusions proffered in a harrowing account of presentday India by eminent Indian editor Manoj Mitta during a February presentation in Washington, DC, at the National Endowment for Democracy with this Hindu malady.” Mr Mitta stated that caste “is based on the religiously sanctioned Varna system, a four-tiered hierarchy of graded inequality, perpetrated through endogamy.”

miliations accosting the Untouchables to the extent that even their shadow can defile someone of a higher caste. This segregation is systematic, sophisticated, and cemented by religion. The social

The False Choice between Security and Freedom

Photo by Jonathan McIntosh

makes our nation great is the values we hold. The freedom of expression, religion, assembly; it is these ideas that make us America.

That is why, we must remind policy makers who aim to protect our nation what is at stake. While they may help protect lives from being lost, they must ensure a piece of America is not the cost. An extrajudicial drone strike may prevent a US citizen from harming us, but the damage to our concept of due process harms America even more.

Frequently, presidential candidates say that their number one job as president is to keep America safe. However, our Founding Fathers knew that property and blood are not the foundations of our nation.

Hence, the presidential oath of office is to “preserve, protect and de-

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OPINION imprisonment category imposed by the caste system is a virtual life sentence with no escape.

Just examine the labels associated with Untouchability: unclean, impure, contaminated, polluted.

All impose a subhuman burden.

Thanks to ferocious lobbying by India, this issue has escaped international scrutiny and evaded discussion at world forums.

There are 200 million Dalit in India, plus 100 million Adivasis (tribals). Those 300 million combined are marginalized and face stigma and strife. Because caste discrimination is central to Hindu teachings, it ensures perennial inequality.

Not enough is known on the mass killings of Dalit occurring since the last 50 years.

It is Hindu-on-Hindu violence perpetrated by the upper castes. It ensures an outcast status permanently condemned to perform menial tasks. Even education has not been able to quash primordial instincts and overcome a supercilious mindset.

A June 2003 National Geographic cover story, “Untouchable”, by Tom O’Neill, slated Mahatma Gandhi for undermining the quest of Dr Ambedkar, chief architect of India’s Constitution, to abolish the caste system. Gandhi objected “on religious principles.”

Gandhi entered a “fast until death” unless Ambedkar – a Dalit – abandoned efforts to eradicate the caste system. Ambedkar ultimately relented.

Based upon the foregoing, millions of Indians view India as a fake democracy.

The Indefatigable Raheel n By Col. Riaz Jafri (Retd) Westridge, Rawalpindi

I

t was indeed comforting and reassuring to see the indefatigable Gen. Raheel in Fort Abbas attending a briefing of the army carrying out exercises in that area the very next day of his being with the troops fighting the extremists in the forward most areas of North Waziristan. As a true defender of Pakistan if he is fighting the terrorists in FATA on the one hand, he is on the other hand not oblivious of his responsibilities also to defend other areas of Pakistan such as the soft underbelly of Pakistan - the Cholistan front, where at places India is only 8 miles away from the GT Road to Karachi. Well done, Sir, the veterans like me are proud of you as a soldier as well fend the Constitution of the United as a commander and wish you GodStates.” speed in all your undertakings. May As the President said in his Allah (swt) be with you always to proannouncement of his plan to close tect you and guide you. (Ameen).

Guantanamo, “Keeping this facility open is contrary to our values. It undermines our standing in the world.

It is viewed as a stain on our broader record of upholding the highest standards of rule of law.” And it’s interesting that keeping it open also undermines our national security, as the President stated. It is always better to stick to our values, and in the long run, that helps our national security.

We must not and cannot give into terrorists’ narratives that our values and freedoms are a falsehood.

Protecting America means protecting what we stand for, not merely protecting the homeland. - MPAC

Vi e w s and opinions expressed by authors and contributors in articles, letters, opinion pieces, reports, advertisements, etc appearing in Pakistan Link and Urdu Link are their own.

The paper neither shares nor endorses them and thus should not be held responsible for the views/opinions of the writers & advertisers.

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OPINION

P6 – PAKISTAN LINK – MARCH 4, 2016 n By Dr Ghulam Nabi Fai

I

Washington, DC

The JNU Protest: The Right to Dissent

n many respects the brouhaha over the Jawahar Lal Nehru (JNU) protest and the arrest of the student union president Kanhaiya Kumar can be counted as a good thing, in that it has brought the issue of Kashmir again into the national limelight, encouraging discussion and dialogue about self-determination.

Kashmir is one of the most beautiful countries in the world, but yet it is being treated like dirt under the rug. Responsibility for it must ultimately be faced, because, sooner or later, it will be exposed. The authorities will hope that the JNU protest and Afzal Guru can be swept under the rug of the Indian conscience too. But repression invariably brings about the very opposite.

Yet it is stunning. The absurd anachronistic qualities of it are rather well characterized

by The Hindu which posted on February 18, 2016 a political cartoon of Don Quixote charging toward a windmill, crying “Sedition.” And Double double, toil and trouble: HRD Minister Smriti Irani, thinking herself back on a Bollywood film set, came dashing onto the stage in defense of “Mother India,” while forgetting her children, who were left hanging around her boiling cauldron. Has anyone called the Child Protection Agency? And don’t forget Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh who stood at the gate, sword to the ready, waiting to seize and shackle anyone in irons who dared say anything negative about her. Don Quixote would’ve been proud.

However silly, none of this could ever masquerade as patriotism and nationalism, both of which are rooted in a love for the principles on which a country has been established, not some figment of a fairy tale imagination. One cannot kill democracy in order to save it. There is no end which justifies aban-

doning the means.

Democracy is never a static thing. Its survival depends upon change and the ability to constantly evolve as people within a society grow. A narrow mean spirit is not a worthy substitute for the very constitutional foundations of a modern democracy which were designed to be inclusive and to embrace the broadest possible representation of viewpoints. Within the very heart of democracy is the constant flow of ideas, of broad public opinion, which gives a country the strength to grow and mature through a fair evaluation and consideration of those ideas which represent wisdom by their inclusiveness rather than by exclusion. A country that celebrates itself as a secular democratic state must pay its dues to the most fundamental democratic freedom of all, the right of dissent.

As Voltaire so appropriately said, “I may not agree with what you say, but I’ll defend to the death your right to say it.”

The nation should rather express its grati-

tude to those countless students at Jawahar Lal Nehru University, New Delhi, who risked their lives to uphold the truth and the freedom of expression. Afzal Guru, who was executed in Tihar Jail in 2013, was hanged, allegedly, to satisfy the “collective conscience” of India.

Paradoxically, it was that very act which is seeping through the rug now.

Many, however, believed, as did the students at JNU, that this was a travesty of justice.

It was more like a lynch mob stirred up by a phantom enemy, conjured out of a collective fantasy; or like a young boy, angry at his mom for taking his bicycle away, going out and beating a dog. Justice didn’t matter. It was about PTSD and a need to lash out; some Freudian anguish in a crazed bull which saw red and charged a red fire hydrant in hopes of ameliorating its suffering. Meanwhile, the collective had been knocked unconscious.

Yet the overwhelming majority of the Kashmiri population, including the chief minister in waiting, Ms Mehbooba Mufti, her late

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father, Mufti Sayeed, the leader of the opposition, Mr Omar Abdullah (former chief minister of Jammu & Kashmir) and his father, Dr Farooq Abdullah (former federal minister of India) have all said that Afzal guru’s hanging was a miscarriage of justice.

Most of the slogans shouted by the students at JNU have legal, constitutional and international legitimacy. When students shout “Self-determination for Kashmir” or “Freedom for Kash-mir”, these are neither secessionist nor separatist slogans. It is a reminder to those at the helm of affairs in New Delhi that these were the very words pronounced by Pandit Nehru, then the prime minister of India and Mahatma Gandhi, the founder of India.

Does the BJP-led government also want to lodge sedition charges posthumously against Pandit Nehru and Mahatma Gandhi who are on record to have said that the people of Kashmir have the right to decide the fate of their nation?

Pandit Nehru said, on 21st November 1947, “Kashmir should decide the question of accession by plebiscite or referendum under international auspices, such as those of the United Nations.”

Mahatma Gandhi has also been known to have declared that Kashmir’s real rulers were its people and not its Maharajas. “If the people of Kashmir are in favor of opting for Pakistan, no power on earth can stop them from doing so. But they should be left free to decide for themselves.”

And one can’t just sweep that under the rug because that itself is carried in the soul of the collective conscience.

Therefore, those who raise the slogans about the freedom of Kashmir should not be called anti-national. They are simply speaking the truth. It takes courage to do that in an atmosphere that has become reminiscent of conditions that characterized Germany leading up to World War II. This affair is a permanent stain on the very fabric of Indian culture. Discussing the JNU, P24

OPINION

MARCH 4, 2016 – PAKISTAN LINK – P7

n By Karamatullah K. Ghori

O

Toronto, Canada

A Tale of Two Sharifs

ld sages had a unanimous conviction on the character of man. A man’s real worth, they argued, could only be tested in wealth or power.

My late mother, steeped in traditional values of one’s genes defining one’s character, made it a habit to warn me against trusting one of lowly birth.

A man of pedigree, she’d intone, would never betray your trust but one lacking in pedigree would never desist from stabbing you in the back.

And it was Nelson Mandela—a noble man of impeccable pedigree—came up with the last word to measure the pedigree, or lack of it, of a leader.

A politician, he argued, would only think of the next election; a statesman would always think of the next generation.

Nawaz Sharif ’s unprovoked and highly phlegmatic outburst against NAB—the National Accountability Bureau—last week betrayed his angst at the prospect of national accountability finally catching up with his family dynasty’s myriad shenanigans. The Prime Minister, not known for, or defined by, any streak of subtlety came out howling like the villain of a typical Punjabi movie against an institution charged with unearthing rampant corruption in Pakistan’s arcane corridors of power.

The outburst against NAB threatening to poke its nose into Nawaz’ sanctum—where his cronies might be self-deluding themselves that they were beyond anyone’s reach—was seen by many as a pre-emptive move. Since the man himself is incapable of any intelligent ideas, it’s a fair conclusion that those making up his cloistered kitchen cabinet deemed it wise to advise the ‘boss’ that offence was the best defense, especially when their ramparts were being threatened.

Encircling the wagons was state-of-the-art strategy in the Wild West, especially when poaching on territory that wasn’t theirs. Nawaz and cronies seem to have borrowed that idea from those wagon men who were marching westward in quest of gold.

There are gold-diggers and carpet-baggers aplenty in the Nawaz camp, too. It’s also axiomatic in the lexicon of power politics of Pakistan that a stint in power is a god-send to make as much money as possible—with no consideration of, or concern for, fair or foul means. Zardari and his henchmen turned it into an art, howsoever crude, no doubt, to milk wealth, literally, out of stones and boulders. Nawaz and his cronies have

been desperately trying to at least match the skills of their precursors, if not excel.

No wonder it got the goat of many a Nawaz detractor when the PM, in his jaundiced frenzy, repeatedly bemoaned that NAB had been breaching the privacy of “innocent” people and harassing them for no reason.

Yes, brazenly and shamelessly, the man had the gall to re-

Zardari and his henchmen turned it into an art, howsoever crude, no doubt, to milk wealth, literally, out of stones and boulders. Nawaz and his cronies have been desperately trying to at least match the skills of their precursors, if not excel peatedly shed crocodile tears at NAB’s temerity to violate the privacy of Masooms!

Beg your pardon, Sir. I know you didn’t have decent schooling. And when I bring in ‘decent schooling’ it doesn’t mean you didn’t go to a fancy or posh school. My sense of decent schooling is anchored in schooling that opens up the pu-

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pil’s mind and hons his faculties of independent and educated thinking.

So I know that your inadequate schooling didn’t equip you, viscerally, to have any sense of what a Masoom is and who qualifies to be a masoom. But, please, know it well that none of those—robber-barons, swindlers, black-mailers et al.--around you and making up your inner-circle should aspire to be declared a masoom—clean as a whistle and not tainted with any black mark of scandal.

It should surprise no one keeping his gaze on Pakistan that Nawaz is a man of little resilience. The man is not known for having much of a backbone. He wouldn’t have groveled for mercy before a power-usurper like General Musharraf if he had one and fled to the safety of his Saudi sanctuary after cutting a deal with his tormentor.

So, no doubt, that Nawaz is showing backbone to NAB, and threatening to clip its wings because he thinks his back isn’t exposed or threatened. He’s sounding presidential because he feels secure that his imperial throne isn’t imperiled.

Nawaz’ new-found sense of security comes from the source that was, once, his undoing and had not only toppled him from his bastion of power but also sent him into ignoble exile.

Nawaz doesn’t feel unhinged because of the noble character of Pakistan’s other Sharif, General Raheel Sharif, whose stint at the head of Pakistan’s military establishment has been a source of blessing as much to Pakistan as to Nawaz, too.

Raheel couldn’t have given Nawaz and the country a more welcome gift than making a pre-emptive move to let everyone know he didn’t nurture any ambition to prolong his stint as Chief of Army Staff beyond his retirement date next November.

Raheel’s decision to not leave any one in doubt about his plans was quite in fitness with his character and upbringing.

He has the impeccable pedigree of a soldier who has soldering in his blood. His father was an officer in the Pakistan army; his uncle Major Aziz Bhatti was not only a soldier but a hero who won the highest gallantry award of Nishan-e-Haider. So was his elder brother, Major Shabbir Sharif who brought laurels to the clan with his own bravery and was decorated with the same Nishan-e-Haider as his late uncle.

So gallantry and nobility are both ingrained in the character of General Raheel Sharif. His office of chief of the army is not, to him, a source or means to garner further rewards or amass wealth, which, incidentally, is the motto of the two Brothers Sharif, Nawaz and Shehbaz.

In the time since he took command of the Pakistan TALE, P28

OPINION

P8 – PAKISTAN LINK – MARCH 4, 2016 n By Dr Gary Welton

I

Center for Vision and Values US

Is It Voter Fraud Season? Let’s Hope Not

n recent years there have been far too many cases in which elections in America have been rigged. As a result of court involvement, the guilty parties have in some cases spent time in prison, in some cases been released on parole, and in some cases paid fines for their involvement.

You might assume that new safeguards have been put in place to restore public confidence in the fairness of elections in America. Unfortunately, however, many proposed safeguards have been politicized in ways that have prohibited their use.

In a recent sampling of voting fraud in America, the Heritage Foundation reported on almost 300 documented cases from 43 states. In each and every one of these cases, either the individuals were convicted of fraud, or the results of the election were overturned.

In 267 of these cases, the judicial decisions came down in the last 16 years, beginning in 2000. The types of fraud included ineligible voters, impersonation of registered voters, duplicate voting, buying votes, bribery, false registrations, and the fraudulent use of absentee ballots. The latter two charges were most frequent, with false registrations involved in 83 of these cases and the fraudulent use of absentee ballots in 69 of these cases.

I began pondering the potential for absentee ballot fraud during the 2008 presidential election cycle. My mother was in her last few months of life, living in a nursing home, and I worked to make sure she had the opportunity to vote, if she chose to do so.

During her final months, she had some clear lucid moments, but many times of foggy confusion. One day when I visited her, she told me about the newly invented food called potato chips. She had lost all memory of eat-

ing potato chips during her adult years, and had reverted to her childhood depression-era years, when she had no memory of potato chips. She was so excited about this recent invention. Opening a bag of potato chips was

about her desire to vote for her long-serving senator. She had lived for two decades in Arizona and wanted to cast her presidential ballot for Senator McCain.

My siblings and I were regulars at the

As the primary season hits full stride and with the general election less than nine months away stories may begin to pop up concerning voter fraud. Will 2016 be different than any other year? In this interesting article, Dr Gary Welton examines a recent sampling of voter fraud cases in America and argues that the solution may lie with the politician themselves so delightful for her, yet so symbolic for us, as we recognized her serious dementia.

Yet, at other times, mental clarity returned. During these times she would talk

nursing home. There was rarely a day when Mom was not visited. Getting her to complete her absentee ballot simply required waiting for a clear lucid moment, showing

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her the options, and getting her signature. It took several tries, but eventually Mom completed her absentee ballot, proud to vote for her senator.

On one of my visits to the nursing home that fall, the social worker had encouraged me to allow him to handle Mom’s absentee ballot. I guess that procedure might help seniors who have been forgotten by their families, but I saw no reason to seek such assistance, given our regular visits to Mom. We as her kids were more confident that she would be able to cast her desired vote if we handled her ballot, rather than turning it over to the social worker. Is there some way to assure that senior citizens are in fact casting their ballots for their preferred candidates?

In the United Kingdom, they have passed some legislation to reduce the ability of social workers to commandeer a pile of absentee ballots, a procedure they have called “granny farming.” The recent legislation prevents a single voter from acting as a proxy for more than two non-family members, therefore requiring more people to be involved in any fraud. It is not clear, however, that this has reduced the overall problem.

When states have tried to pass voter fraud legislation, they have often been accused of trying to disenfranchise minority voters. The failure to develop reasonable laws to protect the sanctity of voting in America, will, however, eventually disenfranchise all voters, and the entire electoral process. It is time for American politicians to protect the votes of all Americans.

Let’s hope the 2016 primary and general election is free from voter fraud.

(Dr Gary L. Welton is assistant dean for institutional assessment, professor of psychology at Grove City College, and a contributor to The Center for Vision & Values. He is a recipient of a major research grant from the Templeton Foundation to investigate positive youth development)

OPINION

MARCH 4, 2016 – PAKISTAN LINK – P9

Bonding with America ...

Akhlaq e Amrikiye: A Manual for the Survival of Muslims in America (2 of 7) n By Professor Nazeer Ahmed

T

Concord, CA

he International Context

Are there parallels between the Mongol period and the modern pe-

riod?

History does not repeat itself, only its lessons do. The solutions of the past cannot be copied for the present but they hold invaluable lessons for charting out alternate courses for the future.

What are the lessons from the Mongol invasions and Nasir Uddin al Tusi’s response to them? Specifically, what lessons can American Muslims learn from the turbulent thirteenth century?

The temptation to draw parallels between the Mongol period and the modern period is obvious. The Mongols devastated a vast swatch of Eurasia from China to Hungary. Today a vast stretch of land from Afghanistan to Libya lies in ruins. The bombardment of parts of Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Yemen and Somalia is unprecedented, creating in its wake utter devastation.

But here the analogy ends. The Mongols were driven by a belief in their manifest destiny to rule the world. It was called Tengerrinism. “There can be no two suns on the same earth” is a famous saying ascribed to Genghis Khan. The nations that wreak havoc on the Islamic world are driven by more mundane commercial interests, namely, oil and economic control. Add to it the deadly internecine warfare which feeds on political, ethnic, sectarian, tribal and national rivalries.

The recent history of Afghanistan illustrates this observation. Afghanistan, sitting astride a plateau that connects central Asia with the Indian subcontinent has always been a prize fought over by invaders and empires alike. Alexander fought his way through it.

The British Empire and Czarist Russia played “the Great Game” over its control. President Eisenhower sent then Vice President Richard Nixon to assess the prospects of drawing Afghanistan into the American orbit. Nixon advised Eisenhower to leave the Afghans to their own wits as a society that was too steeped in the past to be brought into the modern era. Khrushchev, the Soviet premier, was not so circumspect. Under his initiative, the Soviet Union embarked on a program to train Afghan military officers, indoctrinate them with communist ideology and use them to gain influence in Afghanistan. A decade long Soviet infiltration of Afghanistan followed with a communist coup in 1973. When the Afghans rebelled against the communists, the Soviet followed with a direct invasion in 1979.

The control of Afghanistan was a major geopolitical move on the part of the Soviet Union. The Carter Administration responded by inventing and training the Taliban and supporting them from bases in Pakistan and with propaganda material printed in Texas.

The asymmetrical warfare between the Soviet army and the Afghan mujahideen went on for a decade. The war destroyed the ancient tribal structure of the country. The dogged resistance of the Afghans exhausted the Soviet army forcing it to pull out in 1988. A year later, the Soviet Union itself collapsed.

The Taliban moved into the socio-political vacuum imposing their own version of a medieval state where the acceptability of a man was measured by the length of his beard and of a woman by a complete covering from head to toe. It attracted disparate and disgruntled groups such as Al Qaeda which made this hapless country the target of American ire after 9/11.

The degree of violence unleashed against Muslims is unprecedented in the post-WWII era. From the massive bombardment of the Tora Bora caves in Afghanistan (2001) to the “shock and awe” strikes on Baghdad (2003),

thousands of tons of ammunition have been dropped on Muslim countries. The overbearing violence has triggered a refugee crisis across Eurasia where millions of men, women and children move from one country to another desperately searching for security, food and shelter. Millions have perished. Feeding on the mayhem, extremist movements like ISIS have sprung up, promising to right the wrongs, but in fact unleashing more wrongs and more violence. The misery continues.

The analogy of the modern period with the Mongol period ends here. The Mongols enslaved the Muslims and forced them to compromise on their religious practices. By contrast, religion is not suppressed in America or Europe. Indeed, there is complete freedom of worship and there is a revolving door into and out of every religion. The Mongols practiced Shamanism which eventually gave way to Islam, except in China where Buddhism prevailed. By contrast, the West already has a world religion, Christianity, with a rich history of philosophy, science and culture. It draws its spirituality from its JudeoChristian heritage and its temporal drive from a dynamic and sometimes tumultuous history of reformation, renaissance, empiricism and liberalism.

The scientific achievements of this civilization gave it the power to dominate the globe for over two centuries. However, with all its technological might, the West was unable to either assimilate or vanquish Islam.

Despite the close ideational interactions between Islam, Christianity and Judaism, many in the West construed Islam as an ideational challenge to Western intellectual hegemony.

As a consequence, the Islamic and Christian worlds existed as neighbors for long periods in cooperation but occasionally in conflict.

And the dialectic continues.

Military interventions have a logic of their own. The trillions of dollars of oil in the Persian Gulf is the golden treasure at stake.

The power that controls this oil controls the jugular veins of the economies of the world.

The ancient Shia-Sunni cleavage, exacerbated by power struggles between the littoral states of the Gulf, is an invitation for continued outside interventions. The tensions generated by sectarian and ideological differences as well as a competition for wealth and political dominance have fostered civil conflicts wherein millions more have died or been dislocated. One measure of this dislocation is the arms sales to the region. The Middle East and South Asia are the largest importers of arms which are used to maintain a balance of tension and controlled conflict between antagonists so as to sustain the lucrative international arms trade and keep the region in perpetual poverty and chaos.

The Muslim community in the United

States is not insulated from these upheavals in far-away lands. The 9/11 attack on the World Trade Center was a defining moment for American Muslims. The American Muslim community was ill prepared for the avalanche of well-financed anti-Muslim propaganda that followed the attacks. A perception was driven home that Muslims could not be trusted. Islamophobia has now become a $50 million a year industry. Anti-Muslim rhetoric occupies center stage in the 2016 presidential debates. The sustained and unrelenting propaganda has found its mark.

According to a Zogby poll conducted in June 2014, only 27% of Americans have a positive view of Islam and Muslims. The tidal wave of anti-Muslim rhetoric has overwhelmed the intellectual resources of the nascent American Muslim community.

What are the modalities of an Islamic life in a pluralistic society wherein Muslims are a small minority? The issues faced

by Muslims in Europe, Canada, Australia, Russia, China and many parts of Africa are similar and the lessons learned from the development of an American ethics (Akhlaq e Amrikiye) can be useful in other parts of the world

Third, there were exhausting discussions about minutia as applied to social issues, which were irrelevant in the American paradigm. The community, which should have spent its intellectual energies contributing to the development of a civil society based upon justice for all, spent its energies discussing minute points of Islamic jurisprudence. This might have been useful for Egypt or Pakistan but was of no relevance in the American context.

Fourth, no attempt was made to codify a Sharia of nature. This is clearly an area where Islam can round off the jagged edges of a global materialist civilization. Western civilization tried to reconcile reason with faith.

Unable to do so, Medieval Latin scholarship separated reason from faith, confining faith to the church and abandoning the created world to secular reason. Islam has also struggled with this issue and has yet to construct a coherent position acceptable both from the rational and belief perspectives. A Qur’anic perspective on this issue would be a contribution to the civilization of man. An attempt in this direction has been made by the current writer in his article, “Why the Scientific Revolution Did Not Take Place in the Muslim World”, published in previous issues of Pakistan Link.

Lastly, too much effort was spent spelling out the dos and don’ts of religion. Rituals took preponderance over the innate spirituality of faith. Scholarship became synonymous with quotes and quotations. The long saga of intellectual stagnation which started in the late seventeenth century continued, accompanied by ethical rot. No attempt was made to define citizenship in a modern, secular state from an Islamic perspective or to articulate an ethical vision for Muslims living in a technological, secular, post-modern society.

It is in the context of these challenges that we attempt the compilation of an ethical treatise for American Muslims. What does it mean to be a Muslim in a modern, secular, democratic, technological state? What are the modalities of an Islamic life in a pluralistic society wherein Muslims are a small minority? The issues faced by Muslims in Europe, Canada, Australia, Russia, China and many parts of Africa are similar and the lessons learned from the development of an American ethics (Akhlaq e Amrikiye) can be useful in other parts of the world.

We imbibe the example of Nasiruddin al Tusi, who realized that he could not challenge the Yasa (Rasa) but asked himself how Muslims of his era could survive and thrive within a hostile Mongol framework. History proved him right. The renewal of Islam fostered by the Sufis and the Akhlaqi schools saved the day and Islam emerged triumphant from this period of adversity. The challenges faced by Muslims in the modern world demand a similar effort today. (Continued next week) GIRL FROM P22

Muslims in America must share some of the responsibility for this state of affairs.

First, there was a tolerance, indeed nurturing of right wing ideas. The writings of Hassan al Banna, Syed Qutb and Maryam Jameela were swallowed wholesale by some of the new immigrants. Wahhabi ideas, hoisted atop petrodollars acted as a counterpunch to moderate ideas.

Secondly, during the heady expansion of the Muslim presence in the thirty years from 1965-1995, the community overextended its political reach, engaging in empty rhetoric about international issues it could not influence. Political realism and emotive intelligence gave way to oratory. The American Muslim community allowed itself to be sucked up into this empty rhetoric. It was a case of a child attaching a police badge to his uniform and pretending he was a policeman.

www.PakistanLink.com

it made me feel,” she says. “It got me emotional.”

Her second favorite moment was reaching the Khunjerab Pass.

“The journey there took me so many days and I was struggling with my motorcycle.

“It wasn’t very powerful and I had to take it up the mountain, so when I finally reached the destination, it was a huge achievement,” says Irfan.

For now, Irfan is focusing on her studies, but she’s making plans for more trips.

On her list are journeys to Mithi, a small town in southern Sindh province where both Hindus and Muslims live together, the Swat Valley -- known as the Switzerland of Pakistan for its stunning scenery -- and even all the way to Dubai, where she was born.

No doubt, her father would be proud.

She now keeps a blog Zenith Irfan: 1 Girl 2 Wheels to document her journeys.

(Halima Ali is a London-based freelance journalist and editor. - CNN)

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P10 – PAKISTAN LINK – MARCH 4, 2016

Help Build the Future of

Orphan Girls in Pakistan!

Saghir Aslam and his wife Bushra Aslam well known philanthropists and founders of IEWS and Saba Homes, for the past 50 years have been helping people. Many years back they felt the need for an institution that will cater for the most vulnerable and poorest of the poor; the orphans in Pakistan. They left comfortable lives they were living in America, to not only build the institution for orphans but to help Pakistan change its global image from a terrorist country to a peaceful, peace loving, prosperous Pakistan.

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www.PakistanLink.com

PAKISTAN

MARCH 4, 2016 – PAKISTAN LINK – P11

The Big Five and Their Top Executives’ Salary

n By Kazim Alam Karachi: Total remuneration of the National Bank of Pakistan (NBP) president increased 51% in 2015 despite the share price of the stateowned bank plummeting 22% over the same 12-month period.

According to the bank’s annual securities filing, NBP President Syed Ahmed Iqbal Ashraf received total compensation of Rs71.1 million last year, which was Rs23.9 million higher than the comparable figure for 2014.

Meanwhile, the share price of NBP at the end of 2015 clocked up at Rs54.04, down 22.2% from the beginning of the year when it sold at Rs69.46.

Almost one-third of Ashraf ’s total remuneration in 2015 was in the form of bonus. His bonus for 2015 clocked up at Rs23.3 million, which was 9.4 times higher on a year-onyear basis.

Although the share value of NBP declined by more than one-fourth over the year, the unconsolidated profit of the bank surged 27.9% to Rs19.2 billion for 2015. In percentage terms, NBP posted the highest year-

on-year expansion in the net profit among the five largest commercial banks, also known as Big Five.

Although Ashraf received the highest raise in the total remuneration last year, he was hardly the highest paid bank CEO in Big Five.

Highest paid CEO: United Bank President and CEO Wajahat Husain topped the list with his total compensation in 2015 clocking up at Rs127.3 million. A year-on-year comparison of the UBL CEO’s total remuneration is not possible because the figure for 2014 (Rs246.5m) included Rs100.7 million paid as severance cost to its former CEO on the cessation of his employment.

Husain added almost Rs3.8 billon to UBL’s bottom line in 2015, as the bank’s unconsolidated profit for the year rose 17.3% to clock up at Rs25.7 billion. The share price of UBL, however, declined 12.3% over the 12-month period amid bearish trends on the local bourse.

Even if rent, utilities and medical allowances are excluded, the annual managerial remuneration of the UBL CEO translates into a compen-

sation of over Rs9 million per month for 2015.

UBL was the third most profitable bank in the country until 2014.

But its net profit surpassed that of MCB Bank last year, making UBL the country’s second most profitable bank.

HBL: Another bank CEO who received a major raise last year in his total remuneration was Nauman Dar of Habib Bank (HBL). His total remuneration jumped 41.3% in 2015 to reach Rs75.1 million. Meanwhile, the share price of HBL dropped 7.4% to reach Rs200.12 on Dec 31, 2015.

HBL is the largest banking entity in Pakistan in terms of both profitability and branch network. Its net profit went up 14% last year to reach Rs35.4 billion, which was Rs9.7 billion higher than its closest competitor.

MCB Bank: MCB Bank CEO Imran Maqbool was the second-best paid among the CEOs of the Big Five cohort. His total remuneration for 2015 clocked up at Rs84.7 million, up 14.9% from a year ago. However, the share of MCB Bank shed as much as 29% over the same 12-month period.

The year-on-year decline in the share price of MCB Bank was far greater than the corresponding drop in share prices of the rest of the largest banks. MCB Bank’s unconsolidated profit for 2015 amounted to Rs25.5 billion, up 5% from a year ago.

ABL: Allied Bank (ABL) CEO Tariq Mahmood received total remuneration of Rs46.3 million in 2015, up 7% from a year ago. His total compensation for 2015 was the lowest among his peers at the other four banks.

The share price of ABL declined more than 17% last year while its net profit amounted to Rs15.1 billion, up only 0.7% from a year ago. Yet he received a bonus of Rs19 million, which is 41% of Mahmood’s total annual compensation for 2015. - The Express Tribune

Women’s Bill in Line with Quaid’s Vision: CM Lahore: In the face of harsh criti-

cism by religious forces, including the one sitting as the PML-N ally in National Assembly the JUI-Fazl, on the anti-domestic violence law, Punjab Chief Minister Shehbaz Sharif has defended the legislation saying it is in line with the vision of the father of the nation.

“The Punjab government’s women development initiatives are in line with the vision of the Quaidi-Azam. Role of women is critical for progress of Pakistan,” he said in a tweet from his official twitter account on Sunday.

Maulana Fazlur Rehman (JUIF), Sirajul Haq (Jamaa-e-Islami) and Prof Sajid Mir (MJAH, also a PML-N ally) have rejected the law as anti-Islamic and a move to westernize the nation.

The JUI-F has even announced launching a campaign against the legislation.

In an earlier tweet on Feb 24 (when the law was passed by the Punjab Assembly), the chief minister said it is a good news that the assembly passed the Protect of Women against Violence Bill unanimously.

He said the law would ensure protection to women against do-

mestic violence, psychological and economic exploitation, abusive language, stalking and cyber crime.

VISIT: The chief minister visited the residences of police constable Muhammad Asif who died in firing at a police picket in Allama Iqbal Town and two brothers Bahadur Ali and Safdar Ali who were murdered in Samanabad.

He expressed sympathies and condolences with the aggrieved families and announced provision

of free houses to the widow of the constable and the mother of the deceased brothers as well as complete support for their children.

The historic Punjab Protection of Women Against Violence Bill 2015 that faced a lot of opposition even from the government quarters and was finally passed by the Punjab Assembly on Wednesday provides, for the first time in the history of the country, comprehensive protection to women against a range of crimes.

www.PakistanLink.com

MQM Seeks to ‘Clear Misunderstandings’ with Army

The MQM will leave no stone unturned for clearing the air

Karachi/Hyderabad: Karachi/ Hyderabad: The Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) seeks to remove all misunderstandings between the party and the military for ‘Pakistan’s betterment and strengthening’.

Addressing a news conference in Karachi on Sunday, MQM leader Farooq Sattar claimed that in the past few years, misunderstandings had developed or were caused to develop by some elements between his party and the country’s armed forces.

The MQM wants to clear all of them for the betterment and strengthening of the country, he added. “Irrespective of what these misconceptions were based on, the MQM will leave no stone unturned for clearing the air again and reviving the spirit of 1947, when the country had gained independence.”

Dr Sattar said the country needed a national agenda, whereby all the political parties, the military and the people must work together.

Former MQM minister Rauf Siddiqui told the media that his party had

found the military’s role outstanding in eliminating extremism and terrorism in North Waziristan under Operation Zarb-e-Azb. “The MQM pays tributes to the martyrs who lay down their lives fighting terrorism.”

Meanwhile, MQM’s Hyderabad chapter has allegedly exposed a mega land scam in the city “involving over 20,000 acres of government land being handed over to private builders and developers”.

MQM MNA Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui made this disclosure during a news conference that was convened to expose the ‘big guns’ behind the ‘dodgy land deal’.

He claimed that the National Accountability Bureau was already investigating the ‘scam’ and two officials of the Hyderabad Development Authority (HDA) had also been arrested.

But, he stressed, the powerful people behind the ‘scam’ needed to be exposed. “The Sindh chief minister, chief secretary, member Board of Revenue, member Land Utilisation and other relevant officials should also come under investigation.”

Siddiqui claimed that the HDA had given away some 2,800 acres in Kohsar, Latifabad taluka, to a certain real estate developer. “The land was meant for developing a low-cost housing scheme for the poor.”

Pointing out ‘another illegality’, he said, “The HDA itself is yet to acquire the 2,800 acres from the revenue department after making the due payment.”

The MQM went on to claim that the Sindh government, through the HDA, had also signed a deal with the same builder for another 20,800 acres in the same area. “[After its lease expires next year] the land will be transferred back to the Sindh government, which decided to use the HDA as a tool to retransfer it to [the developer],” said Siddiqui.

Fazl Plans to Launch Movement for Husbands’ Rights

Karachi: The Jamiat Ulema-e-Is-

lam-Fazl (JUI-F) chief Maulana Fazlur Rehman on Sunday once again lashed out at the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz for passing Women Protection Bill in Punjab, which he says is an attempt to destroy the family system in Pakistan.

Addressing party workers, he termed the Women’s Protection Bill (WPB) a violation of the Constitution and Shariah. “Now I plan to launch a

campaign for protection of husbands ,” he said jokingly.

He said the Pakistan Tehreek-eInsaf and the PML-N joined hands to follow the Western civilization by approving the bill.

Reacting to JUI-F chief ’s ranting, senior PML-N leader Uzma Bukhari said the maulana was causing pain to women by passing such remarks and name-calling.

Speaking to media on Saturday, he said he feels a pity for husbands in Punjab after the passage of the Women Protection Bill.

The Punjab Assembly adopted the bill last Wednesday. Since then, the maulana has been criticizing the PML-N for the legislation.

Taking a dig at Shahbaz Shairf , the JUI-F chief said the Punjab chief minister is Khadim-e-Aala in his own house.

Fazl said Islam makes the husbands and wives the protectors of each other’s honor but such a law will disturb the basic fabric of a Muslim household.

“If a woman gets treated badly, she should go to her family or tribal elders and if she doesn’t get justice then she can go to the courts because this is our culture,” he said.

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P12 – PAKISTAN LINK – MARCH 4, 2016

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PAKISTAN

MARCH 4, 2016 – PAKISTAN LINK – P13

Taseer’s Killer Mumtaz Qadri Hanged in Rawalpindi’s Adiala Jail

Rawalpindi: Mumtaz Qadri, an

Elite Force commando convicted of killing former Punjab governor Salman Taseer, was executed at the Adiala Jail at around 4.30am on Monday, police said.

Qadri shot Taseer 28 times in broad daylight in Islamabad’s Kohsar Market on January 4, 2011. He was sentenced to death for assassinating Taseer on Oct 1 the same year.

His mercy appeal was rejected

by President Mamnoon Hussain.

“I can confirm that Qadri was hanged in Adialia jail early Monday morning,” senior local police official Sajjid Gondal told AFP. A prison official confirmed the execution of Qadri.

Cries were heard from inside Qadri’s house as hundreds of men and women gathered, and mosques could be heard broadcasting news of the execution, an AFP reporter there said.

“I have no regrets,” Qadri’s brother Malik Abid told AFP, tears rolling down his cheeks.

He said the family had been called to the prison Sunday evening by officials who said Qadri was unwell.

But when they arrived, he greeted them with the news that authorities had deceived them, and that his execution was imminent.

“We started crying, but he hugged us,” Abid said.

Two weeks after Taseer was killed, the only Christian minister in the federal cabinet, Shahbaz Bhatti, was gunned down in Islamabad. He too was a critic of the blasphemy laws.

In August 2011, Taseer’s son was kidnapped from his car in Lahore.

Shahbaz Taseer’s wherabouts remain untraced.

Strict security measures were taken within the jail premises and a heavy contingent of Law Enforcement Agencies (LEA) personnel were deployed to avoid any untoward incident.

All routes leading to the Adiala Jail were sealed. LEAs personnel were also deployed across the city in view

“I can confirm that Qadri was hanged in Adialia jail early Monday morning,” senior local police official Sajjid Gondal told AFP

of agitation and protests.

The body of Mumtaz Qadri was handed over to his family members and was moved from the jail under tight security cover.

Qadri’s last meeting with his family was arranged late on Sunday night.

An anti-terrorism court here sentenced Qadri to death on two counts for murder and terrorism in Oct, 2011.

In a 40-page statement submitted to the court, Qadri said at the time Taseer’s statements in support of Asia Bibi, a Christian woman charged with blasphemy, had provoked him to kill the governor.

The Supreme Court of Pakistan in October last year maintained the conviction of Mumtaz Qadri by an Anti Terrorism Court, overturning Islamabad High Court’s (IHC) March 9 verdict, which had dismissed Qadri’s appeal against his death sentence under the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC) but accepted his plea to void the Anti Terrorism Act’s (ATA) Section 7.

The government had approached the apex court for including the terrorism charges as a second offence in the punishment.

The court warned at the time that in Islam a false accusation can be as serious as the blasphemy itself, and that calls for blasphemy law reform

“ought not to be mistaken as a call for doing away with that law”.

The Supreme Court dismissed Qadri’s review petition against his death sentence in December last year, with the judge heading the bench observing that the petition could neither establish errors floating in the judgment nor blasphemy charges against the former governor.

The trial and appeals process in Taseer murder case lasted four years.

Governor Taseer’s killing was the most high-profile political assassination since former prime minister Benazir Bhutto was murdered in a gun-and-suicide attack on a Rawalpindi election rally in Dec 2007.

Reaction to hanging: Protests erupted in several areas of Rawalpindi and the capital an hour after the news of the execution spread.

Dozens of Rangers and police in riot gear as well as ambulances were stationed outside Qadri’s home in the city early Monday, an AFP reporter there said.

Protesters torched tires against Qadri’s execution in Hyderabad.

Shops and business centers were closed in a town in Nindo Shaher, a town in Sindh’s Badin district on a call of different religious parties to lodge protest against Qadri’s hanging.

Strict security measures have been made in all towns of the district.

Experts Find Flaws with HEC’s Varsity Ranking n By Kashif Abbasi Islamabad: The ranking of public sec-

tor universities announced by the Higher Education Commission (HEC) has several flaws.

Some education experts believe that the ranking should be carried out by independent bodies as per international practices.

The HEC recently announced the fifth ranking of Pakistan’s higher educational institutions which was mostly based on research output and PhDs produced during the year 2014.

Out of the total 100 marks, 15 were for quality assurance, 30 for teaching quality, 41 for research, 10 for finance and facilities, and only four for social integration/community development.

However, there was no parameter to know employability – one of the major concerns for Pakistani graduates. Similarly, there was no input from students.

The HEC ignored some other important criteria such as international outlook and employers’ perception.

Globally, rankings are done by neutral bodies such as The Times Higher Education Ranking, US News College

Ranking, QS University Rankings, and Maclean’s University Rankings (Canada).

“If producing PhDs is one of the main components for ranking, I’m sorry.

Currently, our universities are producing more and more PhDs by compromising on qualities,” said an educationist who wished not to be named. He said employability should be a major criterion to know the worth of any institute.

“Across the globe, there are some parameters for ranking. There is a general practice under which independent bodies conduct ranking but here the HEC – the funding sponsor of universities – is itself ranking institutions,” he said.

Another educationist, Prof Dr Pervez Hoodbhoy, said the HEC’s ranking had no credibility.

“If HEC says a university is good or bad, it could be either. One should not pay slightest attention to it (ranking) because HEC uses wrong or irrelevant criteria for assessing the universities.”

He said everyone knows generating research publications or giving PhD degrees had become the easiest thing to do.

“Some individuals have produced hundreds of papers but if you ask them a simple field-related question, they would not be able to answer it.

“We have a massive PhD production factory in the so-called highly-rated universities but they are actually producing incompetents,” Dr Hoodbhoy added.

Last year, the International Islamic University Islamabad (IIUI) and Liaquat University of Medical and Health Sciences, Jamshoro, had expressed doubts over the ranking procedure of the HEC. The University of Peshawar was put at number five in the general category but this year it was ranked at number eight.

Vice Chancellor Prof Dr Mohammad Rasul Jan said besides other factors the ranking of his university downed because he had closed the evening shift to improve the quality of education.

“Following the closure of the evening classes, the strength of our university decreased significantly. Due to this, we have gone down in the ranking,” he said. Dr Hafiz Abid Masood, a spokesman for IIUI, said the university had some concerns over the HEC ranking...

Dawn

www.PakistanLink.com

Protest Erupts in Pakistan over Hanging

Protestors burn a picture of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif to express anger on the hanging of Mumtaz Qadri

Rawalpindi: Protests broke out hours after Pakistan executed Malik Mumtaz Hussain Qadri, who had killed a governor over a call to reform a blasphemy law in 2011.

Officials stepped up security in the garrison city of Rawalpindi as hundreds of people began gathering at Mumtaz Qadri’s family home early Monday, and some roads were closed in Islamabad as authorities braced for protests from hardliners.

Qadri, a former police bodyguard, shot liberal Punjab governor Salman Taseer 28 times in an upscale market in Islamabad in 2011.

He later admitted the killing, saying he objected to the politician’s calls to reform controversial blasphemy laws — a hugely sensitive issue in Pakistan.

Qadri’s body was being displayed to supporters at his family’s home in the city, where Rangers and police in riot gear as well as ambulances and dozens of police vehicles were stationed, an AFP reporter said.

Armed Rangers could also be seen on the roof of the building housing Qadri’s residence, while authorities blocked some roads in the neighborhood.

Cries were heard from inside the house as hundreds of men and women gathered, and mosques could be heard broadcasting news of the execution.

“We have beefed up security in Rawalpindi to maintain law and order and to deal with any untoward situation,” Gondal said.

In Karachi, some petrol stations were closed after Qadri’s supporters ordered them shut.

Blasphemy is a hugely sensitive issue in Pakistan and Qadri had been hailed as a hero by many conservatives eager to drown out any calls to soften the legislation.

Critics including European governments say Pakistan’s blasphemy laws are largely misused, with hundreds of people languishing in jails under false charges.

Taseer had also been vocal in his support of Asia Bibi, a Christian woman who had been on death row since 2010 after being found guilty of insulting the Prophet Muhammed (pbuh).

Qadri’s lawyers drew on Islamic texts to argue that he was justified in killing Taseer, saying that by criticizing the law the politician was himself guilty of blasphemy — an argument rejected by the lead judge.

Qadri lost a petition for the Supreme Court to review his sentence in December last year.

In recent years, according to a report in The New York Times, he maintained a kind of privileged sta-

tus within the prison population, and was said to have managed in 2014 to persuade a security guard to shoot another prisoner who was accused of blasphemy. The man was wounded but survived.

In October 2015, the Supreme Court upheld his death sentence, and last week, a request for mercy he had made to President Mamnoon Hussain was rejected.

After Qadri was hanged, supporters began gathering to view his body at his home in Rawalpindi. By early afternoon, the expressway connecting Islamabad and Rawalpindi was blocked by protests.

In Lahore, large police contingents were deployed to thwart demonstrations. Some markets had closed in the southwestern city of Karachi, where religious groups have a sizable presence, and the police had been sent to others. Protests were also reported in smaller cities.

Media coverage of the demonstrations, however, were muted. The government, through a regulatory body, pressured local television news networks not to broadcast footage of protests. And the evening talks shows, which ordinarily thrive on political controversy and heated arguments between guests, refrained from focused discussion of Qadri’s execution.

Religious leaders warned of protests ahead. “We will not digest this step of the government,” said Raghib Naeemi, a prominent cleric based in Lahore.

Raza Rumi, a member of the visiting faculty at Ithaca College in New York and a consulting editor of The Friday Times, a Pakistani weekly, said, “The execution of Mumtaz Qadri indicates the resolve of the Pakistani state to reverse the tide of extremism that has gripped the country for decades.”

Speaking of the execution of.

Qadri, he added: “In a narrow sense, justice may have been delivered under the existing laws. But Pakistan’s Parliament would have to think beyond the death penalty and institute measures which inhibit the creation of people like Qadri. It is time to revisit blasphemy laws.”

There was no formal statement

by Mr Taseer’s family regarding the execution, and major political parties also refrained from issuing statements.

Most schools, according to another news story, closed down Monday in the capital, Islamabad, and the nearby garrison city of Rawalpindi in fear of violence by supporters of the executed former police guard Mumtaz Qadri.

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US Using Ties to Reduce India-Pakistan Tensions: Kerry

n By Anwar Iqbal Washington: The United States maintains close ties with both Pakistan and India because they help reduce tensions between South Asia’s two nuclear-armed neighbors, says US Secretary of State John Kerry.

A transcript released on Sunday shows Secretary Kerry arguing in two recent congressional hearings that the US has been working “really hard” to advance a “rapprochement” between Islamabad and New Delhi.

In one of the statements he indirectly confirmed media reports that the US had been quietly encouraging the two prime ministers to hold bilateral talks.

“We encourage that. I think it’s required to encourage both leaders to engage in the dialogue that they’ve engaged in,” he said.

“And needless to say, we don’t want to do things that upset the balance. But we do believe that Pakistan is engaged legitimately in a very tough fight against identifiable terrorists in their country that threaten Pakistan,” he argued.

Secretary Kerry noted that Pakistan has deployed “about 150,000 to 180,000 troops” along the Pak-Afghan border.

US defense experts fear that increase in tensions with India could force Pakistan to bring some of those troops to its eastern border, allowing the Taliban

Center for Excellence in Journalism Opens at IBA Karachi: An initiative for the professional training of journalists in Pakistan, the Center for Excellence in Journalism (CEJ), was inaugurated at the IBA (city campus) on Saturday. The CEJ is a collaboration of the Institute of Business Administration (IBA), International Centre for Journalists (ICFJ), Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism and the United States Department of State.

Speaking at the inaugural session, dean and director of the IBA Dr Ishrat Husain said that at present 280 participants were attending the program by covering 10 training modules and workshops. They included television production, editing, and documentary making with workshops on emotional safety and handling trauma. The upcoming courses include news writing and reporting, editing for both TV and print media, as well as data journalism.

“Last year in June, about 150 reporters and alumni of the US Department of State-funded exchange programs congregated in this building to learn new tools of reporting and news gathering.

Keeping that in mind, the IBA will soon introduce a master’s journalism degree program,” he said.

Elaborating, he said CEJ had an advisory board which comprised editors, assistant editors and news directors.

The CEJ, which is on the fourth floor of the Aman Tower, has a television studio of its own apart from editing rooms and a section dedicated to multimedia.

Vice president of programs at the ICFJ Patrick Butler said the CEJ came to fruition through a grant by the US Department of State. “We are all in awe of the kind of work Pakistani journalists produce despite facing threats and

intimidation. Many of the journalists I had met around five years back were unanimous in their opinion that there needs to be a training course for journalists. I’m glad we are finally able to do that,” he said. He added that almost a quarter of the participants during the exchange program organized by the ICFJ were women.

14.36 Billion Remittances from Pakistan to India in 3 Years New Delhi: India received an esti-

mated US $14.36 billion in remittances from Pakistan in last three years, if World Bank’s ‘analytical estimates’ are to be believed.

Interestingly, World Bank itself says this is “not an actual official data” and only “an estimate based on logical assumptions”.

The World Bank’s Migration and Remittances Factbook 2016 says, “India was the largest remittance receiving country, with an estimated US $72 billion in 2015, followed by China (US $64 billion) and the Philippines (US $30 billion).”

World Bank said those living in Pakistan sent US $4.9 billion to India in 2015. Its Bilateral Remittance Matrix put the money flowing from Pakistan to India in 2014 at US $4.79 billion and US $4.67 billion the year before that.

The numbers are astonishingly high considering direct remittances are highly restricted and there may not be many NRIs in Pakistan who would be sending money back home.

to move freely in and out of Afghanistan.

The US is finding it difficult to balance its relations with India and Pakistan even as a high-powered Pakistani delegation reached here on Sunday for a strategic dialogue that seeks to enhance Islamabad’s relations with Washington.

Adviser on Foreign Affairs Sartaj Aziz leads the delegation, which also includes Planning Minister Ahsan Iqbal, Minister for Water and Power Khwaja Asif, the Interior Secretary, DG Joint Staff Lt Gen Majid Khan and representatives from half a dozen other departments and ministries.

Ambassador Jalil Abbas Jilani will represent Pakistan at talks on counter-terrorism and non-proliferation.

The discussions on non-proliferation precede a nuclear summit Washington is hosting next month. Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and his Indian counterpart Narendra Modi are both attending the summit.

Secretary Kerry will lead the American team at the strategic dialogue, which will include officials from the National Security Council, the Defense Department and the US intelligence community. - Dawn

Outgoing Commander of US CENTCOM Calls on COAS

Rawalpindi: General Lloyd J Aus-

tin, the outgoing Commander United States Central Command (US CENTCOM), paid a farewell call on Chief of Army Staff General Raheel Sharif at the General Headquarters on Sunday.

According to the Inter Services Public Relations (ISPR), General Lloyd Austin paid rich tributes to the professionalism and achievements of the Pakistan Army in the ongoing operation Zarb-e-Azb. He also acknowledged the efforts of Pakistan for regional stability.

General Austin acknowledged Pakistan’s facilitation role in the reconciliation process in Afghanistan. He also thanked

Bogus Help Centers Spark Pakistan ID Card Fraud Warning

Asma Has a Face-off with Lawyers, Judges at LHC

n By Rahila Bano

Lahore: A full bench of the Lahore

London: Fraudulent UK help

centers are charging hundreds of pounds for fake identity cards for visa-free travel to Pakistan.

National Identity Cards for Overseas Pakistanis (NICOP) were launched in 2012 to simplify travel.

Online applications opened in August 2015.

Self-styled advice bureaus some run from homes - have since opened, charging for help to submit web forms.

But some are not authorized and put people at risk of identity fraud, the High Commission of Pakistan has warned.

Anyone fraudulently using logos belonging to the Government of Pakistan will be prosecuted and the High Commission will not be responsible for any money lost or information stolen from applicants, it warned.

The benefits of NICOP cards include visa-free entry into Pakistan, official citizenship and the right to open a bank account and buy or sell property.

One woman told BBC Asian Network she lost £300 when she used a fake advisor.

They had to travel to consulates in Birmingham and Manchester to get real ID cards.

She said: “We heard that a man in the community was offering the service; we thought he had something to do with consulate.

“He applied for our cards online but, when they arrived, one had the wrong name on it, another the wrong address and one stated the CENTERS, P28

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High Court on Friday adjourned till March 28 the hearing of a petition seeking ban on the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) and a high treason case against its chief Altaf Hussain.

As the proceedings commenced, petitioners’ counsels Azhar Siddique and Aftab Virk said that MQM counsel Asma Jahangir made contemptuous remarks about the case in a TV program. They said that Jahangir’s remarks about the court verdict banning media coverage of Hussain’s activities were objectionable.

They submitted recording of the television program to the court.

They alleged that it was routine for Jahangir to make remarks about court orders.

When asked to explain her conduct, Jahangir tendered a verbal apology for her remarks about the order. The court directed her to submit a written apology, but she refused. She said the court order banning media coverage of MQM chief activities was defective and she did not accept it at heart. She explained, “I am making a verbal apology not for the judges sitting on the bench but for the dignity of the institution (judiciary).”

Jahangir said she did not trust the bench hearing the case. In response, a judge said, “You have double standards, as you do not do what you say. You are committing contempt of court and you should submit an apology in writing.”

She refused to submit a written apology, saying she did not want to write something that her conscience did not like.

Gen Sharif for the hospitality extended to him during his visits to Pakistan.

To pay tributes to the Shuhada of Pakistani Security Forces, General Lloyd Austin laid a floral wreath at the Yadgar-e-Shuhada.

Pakistan Tasked to Bring Taliban Leaders to Table Islamabad: Pakistan has been

entrusted with the task to bring 10 Taliban leaders to the negotiation table for the next phase of the Afghanistan reconciliation process.

According to Afghan media, the four-member coordination group gave this responsibility to Pakistan. In this regard, the Afghan government has handed over to Pakistan a list of names of Taliban leaders, which includes members of the Haqqani network.

The next round of negotiations with the Taliban leaders is expected to take place in the first week of March and Pakistan has offered to host the talks.

But the Taliban in Qatar have expressed their ignorance to the above development, saying they are unwilling to make any modification to the pre-conditions put forth by them for participating in the reconciliation process.

Imran Khan Thanks Gen Raheel for Hospital Land in Karachi Karachi: Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) Chairman and founder of the Shaukat Khanum Cancer Hospital, Imran Khan, on Sunday thanked Chief of Army Staff General Raheel Shareef for “granting land” for the construction of the cancer hospital According to DawnNews, a 20-acre plot in Karachi’s Defense Housing Authority City – located near the KarachiHyderabad Super Highway – has been allotted for the Shaukat Khanum hospital.

An agreement for the purpose was reached four days ago between the DHA administration and the hospital.

Imran Khan’s Cancer Hospital Trust has already established two hospitals – one in Lahore and the other in Peshawar.

The Shaukat Khanum Hospital in Peshawar, inaugurated in December last year, was constructed on land gifted by the ANP-led government in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

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COMMUNITY

MARCH 4, 2016 – PAKISTAN LINK – P17

Community Link Friday, March 4, 2016

VOL. 26/10 PAGE 20

A Journey into Europe through Hearts and Minds

24 Jumadal-ula 1437 H

PAGE PAGE 27 17

PAGE 22 egum PAGE

A Pakistani Girl’s Boundary-Breaking Bike Journey

Shoaib Malik Helps Win Second T20

For news, updated round the clock, visit

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Interfaith Gathering in Bay Area Repudiates Anti-Muslim Rhetoric

“Hands Around the Mosque” was aimed at seeking support of all ethnic and faith groups in the current uneasy environment fomented by the Republican hopefuls

n By Abdus Sattar Ghazali

T

he Islamic Society of East Bay (ISEB) held an interfaith gathering on Sunday, February 28, 2016. The interfaith event drew a large crowd from near and far.

The event was co-sponsored by the American Muslim Voice as well as the neighboring St. Paul Fremont United Methodist Church.

As reported by the Mercury News, around 250 people attended the event. Its theme - “Hands Around the Mosque” – was aimed at seeking support of all ethnic and faith groups in the current uneasy environment fomented by

the Republican hopefuls, particularly Donald Trump. Not surprisingly, the Mercury News published a report about the event with the following headline: In Bay Area, Trump’s anti-Muslim rhetoric repudiated.

Sharon Noguchi of the Mercury News wrote: “His name was never spoken in two hours of speeches, but Donald Trump’s anti-Islamic rhetoric and the Islamophobia it has churned up were roundly repudiated Sunday, as Bay Area civic and religious leaders told Muslim residents and neighbors: You are one of us and you are not alone.”

In brief but emphatic and

sometimes passionate speeches, about two dozen pastors and rabbis, mayors and activists spoke at Hands Around the Mosque, an interfaith event intended to build understanding, Noguchi added.

Here are a few excerpts from the speeches reported by Sharon Noguchi: “We can smell fascism when it’s arising, and it’s beginning to arise in the country,” said Rabbi Michael Lerner, editor of the Berkeley-based Jewish Tikkun magazine. “It scares us.”

Christians are uniquely challenged to actively build bridges of understanding among religions, said the Rev. Vincent Raj, of the

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Episcopal Diocese of El Camino Real on the Monterey Peninsula.

The Hebrew Bible commands “remember the stranger with kindness,” said Rabbi Neil Penn, of Beyt Tikkun in Berkeley.

“Americans after 9/11 have been quick to condemn, too quick to pass judgment,” said Scott Haggarty, president of the Alameda County Board of Supervisors.

Abbot Jianshu Shifu of the Zen Center of Sunnyvale, reminded people that there were no good and bad people, just people who do go and bad deeds.

Rabbi Michael Lerner, cofounder of the Network of Spiritual Progressives, did not blame Trump supporters, but an economic system that is squeezing, disenfran INTERFAITH, P28

P18 – PAKISTAN LINK – MARCH 4, 2016 n By A.H. Cemendtaur

W

hat attracts the South Asian diaspora?

Urdu poetry does.

Two separate organizers in the San Francisco Bay Area holding frequent literary meetings on Urdu poetry and filling up the halls, furnish proof of the assertion.

Who attends these meetings? Does the Bay Area have that many people from UP, Bihar, Hyderabad (Andhra), and UP’s largest city in Pakistan, Karachi? Not really. Only a small number of attendees speak Urdu as their first language.

These meetings are attended by people from all over South Asia --from South India to Kashmir,

n By Saboohi Ahmed

T

he Newport-Mesa-Irvine Interfaith Council, a branch of the National Interfaith Council, provided an opportunity to its members to visit a local Sikh temple in Santa Ana and learn about Sikhism.

The Council is currently headed by Lane Calvert of the Baha’i Faith and assisted by Vice President Rev. Dr Sarah Halverson, pastor of the Fairview Community Church.

The event was organized by Executive Director of the NMIIC Mrs Farrah Khan on February 11th 2016 and hosted by the Sikh Temple of Santa Ana. The guests were greeted by Mrs Sukjit K Dillon who is the President of the Temple and a delicious vegetarian meal “langar” was served to the guests which included members of many faiths, including Islam, Church of Latter Day Saints (Mor-

T

n By Petula Dvorak

hrough the driving rain, despite the flood watch, the stalled cars and the tornado warnings, they pushed onward Wednesday night to get to the mosque in Northern Virginia. They had a Super Tuesday mission, and time was running out.

“Abstaining from voting is also a vote,” read one of the talking points in their action plan.

“If Muslims do not vote, openly Islamaphobic leaders do not pay a price,” said another one.

Even the kids who just finished Arabic class — like the girl whose pink hijab matched her Hello Kitty backpack — knew that something big was happening in Virginia in the coming week, and the adults at the All Dulles Area Muslim Society were talking about it.

“My dad said he doesn’t know who he’s voting for yet, but he said he’s going to vote against Trump no matter what,” one of the girls declared.

Guess what, Donald Trump? Your bigotry has inspired Muslim-American voters like no presidential candidate has done before.

“We’re organizing phone banks, we are getting people registered to vote, we’re telling them how important their voices are,” said Abdul Rashid Abdullah, who was helping run the civic engagement meeting at the mosque in Sterling, Va., that rainy night.

Jimmy Carter knew that one way to win the trust of the citizenry was to appeal to people’s moral vanity. He was elected president in 1976 promising “a government that is as good and honest and decent and competent and compassionate and as filled with love as are the American people.”

Jimmy Carter knew that one way

Remembering Ibn-e-Insha and Nasir Kazmi

all using that language as a tool of communication when engag-

ing with other linguistic groups.

On Sunday, February 28,

over 200 people attended a literary program held to remember

Visit to a Sikh Temple

mons), Presbyterians and Catholics.

An introduction to Sikhism was provided by Mr Avinder Chawla who is secretary of the Temple.

His talk touched on all the main aspects of Sikhism including mono-

theism, charity and honesty. He described how the Sikh Temples provide two meals every weekend to all people for free throughout the year without asking for any compensation or regard for the religion of

the visitors. He also discussed the strict dress code followed by Sikhs and the explanation of the turban.

The audience particularly enjoyed the demonstration that Mr Chawla gave of tying his turban. Unfortu-

Donald Trump’s Bigotry Has Inspired Muslim American Voters like No Candidate before to win the trust of the citizenry was to appeal to people’s moral vanity. He was elected president in 1976 promising “a government that is as good and honest and decent and competent and compassionate and as filled with love as are the American people.”

The mosque does not take an official position on candidates or political parties or make any endorsements.

Their civic engagement committee and get-out-the-vote efforts are non-partisan.

But Abdullah, 43, who works in IT and lives in neighboring Herndon, Va., said there’s no doubt why Muslim voters are especially energized this election cycle and why election folks are seeing more interest from Muslims in participating in the Super Tuesday primary than they’ve ever seen before.

It’s called Islamaphobia. And it’s real. Reports of hate attacks against American mosques tripled last year compared to previous years, according to the Council on American Islamic Relations.

And in Northern Virginia, where one of the nation’s largest concentrations of Muslims have lived with few incidents for decades, the shift in attitude is palpable.

In Fredericksburg, threatening shouts and open hate marked a meeting about the expansion of a mosque that has been in the city for almost three decades. Another mosque received a fake bomb. And yet another got threatening calls.

One Virginia school system shut down for an entire day when parents mounted a fierce backlash after they

learned their kids practiced a few lines of Arabic calligraphy as part of a world geography lesson.

I talked to women who have walked in their communities for decades wearing hijabs who are now threatened and harassed in public.

It’s tempting to blame all of this on Islamic State and frightening terrorism attacks in Paris and San Bernardino, Calif. But it wasn’t like this, even after Sept.

11, 2001, Muslims say.

This round of Islamaphobia has been fueled by Trump’s incendiary rhetoric calling for a “total” ban on Muslims entering the United States — hate speech that has helped make him the front runner for the Republican presidential nomination. But it’s also been bolstered by leaders who have remained silent.

“This rise of Islamaphobia? It has inspired our activism,” said Remaz Abdelgader, a 22-year-old George Mason University student and Bernie Sanders campaign volunteer.

Abdelgader, who lives in Alexandria, Va., said she got weird looks here and there for her hijab, but had never experienced outright discrimination.

But she was in a crosswalk recently, and a man took a sharp turn toward her in his car, nearly running her over, she said. He rolled down his window and told her to go back to where she came from and that next time, he’ll get her.

“And I was like, ‘Oh. It’s real. And it’s on,’” she said. And she threw herself into political activism, campaigning and doing voter registration drives.

The Muslim population is relatively small in the United States — about 3.3

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million, according to a report last month by the Pew Research Center.

But American Muslims have the potential to be a powerful influence at the ballot box because one of their major population concentrations happens to be in one of the country’s battleground states, Virginia.

About 2 percent of the state’s population is Muslim, one of the higher concentrations in the country, according to the Public Religion Research Institute.

“I tell people, some of these wins in the primaries are won by a small margin,” Abdullah said. “And if all of us Muslims vote, we can be the ones to make that difference.”

In the past, Muslims haven’t been a dominant force in US politics.

“Our community is in its political infancy,” said Saif Inam, a policy analyst at the Muslim Public Affairs Council.

Like many immigrant populations, the first wave of people were hard workers, more focused on survival, Inam said.

In old-world thinking, some Muslims believed it was improper to vote for a non-Islamic government. And so the first generation was largely silent. Even their children weren’t noticeably politically active, especially after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, when most Muslims wanted to blend in and avoid calling attention to themselves.

And then Trump began his antiMuslim rampage, suggesting that all Muslims in the United States be placed on a special registry and prohibiting newcomers from joining them.

Suddenly, American Muslims were paying attention and speaking out.

COMMUNITY the lives and arts of Ibn-e-Insha and Nasir Kazmi. The program, arranged and emceed by Urdu teacher Hamida Banu Chopra, was sponsored by Ashraf Habibullah of CSI (Computers and Structures, Inc.).

Anshuman Chandra, Veeny, Atiya Hai, Salman Siddique, Anil Chopra, Ravi aka Khurshid, Ashraf Habibullah, Surender Chibbar, and Dipti Bhatnagar recited poems of the two poets. Professor Nabeela Kiani presided over the literary meeting held at the India Community Center, Milpitas, and read a short paper on South Asian society’s capacity to absorb rebels, heretics, and perceived loonies. nately, after the events of 9/11 Sikhs have had to suffer greatly from hate crimes and discrimination in the United States as they are sometimes mistaken for persons from the Middle East.

The guests also had the opportunity of hearing from the world renowned cardiologist Dr Harvinder Sahota who is a founding member of the Sikh Temple in Santa Ana. Inventor of the “Sahota Perfusion Balloon” used in angioplasty, Dr Sahota is a great philanthropist and scholar of the Sikh faith. It was a pleasure to hear his account regarding the historical origins of Sikhism in India and how the concept of monotheism and a casteless society was introduced by the first Guru.

The Newport-Mesa-Irvine Interfaith Council provided a wonderful example of showing how people from different faiths can get along side by side and yet maintain their distinct religious identities.

There are parallels to the LGBT movement, said Sarah Cochran, “which is funny for me to say, being a Republican.”

Cochran is the Virginia state director for Emerge USA, a group working to bring Muslims and Arabs into the political process.

For too many years, a majority of LGBT folks countered discrimination and hate by living quiet, closeted lives.

Then the attitude became, “We’re here, we’re queer, get used to it.”

That awakening is a little bit of where the Muslim population is headed.

Cochran said it’s been a tough road, getting politicians to come meet with mosques and the Islamic community. “Sometimes, they’re still worried about backlash,” she said.

“Sometimes, we see America treating us like we’re a cancer,” said Ibrahim Moiz, a Fairfax, Va., lawyer who is outspoken in his Northern Virginia Muslim community about adapting Islam to modern US living.

Moiz was quoting a recent Ted Talk

by Dalia Mogahed, director of research at the Institute for Social Policy and Understanding in Washington, who said: “Today we hear people actually saying things like: ‘There’s a problem in this country, and it’s called Muslims. When are we going to get rid of them?’ So, some people want to ban Muslims and close down mosques. They talk about my community kind of like we’re a tumor in the body of America. And the only question is, are we malignant or benign? You know, a malignant tumor you extract altogether, and a benign tumor you just keep under surveillance.”

American Muslims are part of the lifeblood of this country, and this election year they are going to insist that Americans get used to it. The Washington Post

COMMUNITY

MARCH 4, 2016 – PAKISTAN LINK – P19

Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy Meets Community Members in Los Angeles

Glimpses of the reception hosted by Consul General Abdul Jabbar Memon in honor of Oscar winner Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy. Pictures by Anwar Khawaja

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COMMENTARY

P20 – PAKISTAN LINK – MARCH 4, 2016

I

n By Tariq A. Al-Maeena

n a time fraught with suspicions and uncertainties between faiths, some individuals continue to challenge the notion that the twains will never meet. One of them is Ambassador Akbar Ahmed, a world-renowned anthropologist, Islamic scholar and a filmmaker.

Dr Ahmed, who is currently the Ibn Khaldun Chair of Islamic Studies at the American University in Washington, DC, has been credited by many with contributing to the forging of better communication protocols and improving relations between the Muslim and the Western worlds. He has been called “a communicator and conduit between East and West”.

Two months ago, the Institute of Strategic Studies in Islamabad (ISSI) hosted the official Pakistan launch of “Journey into Europe” a film produced by Dr Ahmed. It was screened in front of a capacity crowd featuring elite members of Pakistan’s diplomatic corps and top Pakistani scholars.

In an unprecedented study, the film explores Islam in Europe and the emergence of Islam in European history and civilization. The film was shot across the European continent in Germany, the UK, France, Spain and Bosnia. In a grueling two-year project of fieldwork and research, the film deals with relations between the Muslim world and the West. It is “a fascinating documentary covering relations between the Muslim world and Europe spanning many centuries, starting with the period of the Muslim presence in Andalusia and Sicily, tracing the Ottoman expansion into Europe, and understanding the more recent era of colonization and immigration.”

In the film, some of Europe’s most prominent figures, including presidents and prime ministers, archbishops, chief rabbis, grand muftis, heads of right-wing parties, and everyday Europeans from a variety of backgrounds, are featured in a call to discover Islam’s place in Europe

A Journey through Hearts and Minds

and to push for greater peace in our world.

Dr Ahmed’s “Journey into Europe” has been described as a film about Europe. “It is about how Europe should be more cohesive, more coherent and more integrative. His captivating and gripping odyssey takes us from Andalusia to Sicily to the Balkans to Britain to France to Germany to Denmark, all places jolted periodically by the tremors of simmering religious discord.”

The film has been making its rounds through Europe and more recently the United States of America. It will be showing at the end of the month at the film festival in Williamsburg, Virginia. It received praise from some of Europe’s most prominent leaders. Rowan Williams, the former Archbishop of Canterbury, said: “It is hard to exaggerate the importance of this work”; while Dr Haris Silajdzic, the former president and prime minister of Bosnia and Herzegovina, added that “Ambassador Akbar Ahmed’s latest

project on Muslims in Europe is yet another illustration of his vision by offering us understanding of, commitment to, and hope and compassion for humanity.” Paul Smith, the US director of the British Council in Washington, wrote: “The film is a compelling, gracious, thoughtful study and we’re proud to be involved in it.” The Rev. Dr Carol Flett, Ecumenical and Inter-religious Officer for the Episcopal diocese of Washington, DC, observed: “The film points out the need for religious leaders to speak up and teach compassion, and bring inter-religious education to children and adults of all faith traditions so that everyone recognizes the other as their neighbor and a child of God, created by the one and the same God.” The film is not a rehash of history, but about “pressing contemporary issues of multiculturalism in Europe, cross-fertilization of the Islamic and European civilizations, stereotyping, Islamophobia, terrorism and violent extremism. The

message of the documentary is not despondence but hope. It explores how Christians, Muslims and Jews can live together and promote harmony and peace.”

This is precisely the message that must resonate loud and clear. Christians, Muslims, Jews and people of other beliefs must join hands and

The film has been making its rounds through Europe and more recently the United States of America.

It will be showing at the end of the month at the film festival in Williamsburg, Virginia.

It received praise from some of Europe’s most prominent leaders.

Rowan Williams, the former Archbishop of Canterbury, said: “It is hard to exaggerate the importance of this work” promote peace. We cannot just nod our heads and not be proactive. We must within our sphere of influence try to eliminate sowing discord and suspicion against those whose beliefs may differ from ours.

The forces against a harmonious bond between people are many. It is in our interest not to let ourselves be overcome by hatred or rejection but by the message of love and acceptance. That is the underlying theme of the film.

A Pakistani Startup Promises to Deliver Amazon and Ebay Goods in a Week

n By Muhammad Omer Hayat

I

magine if you could visit any online retailer in the world, buy what you like and have it delivered to your doorstep in Karachi or Lahore in a week.

It would open you up to Amazon, eBay, Walmart and hundreds of other e-retailers in America and Europe, allowing you to buy directly from their online outlets at the listed prices and receive products at your home in a maximum of eight days.

Sounds too good to be true?

Our initial sentiments were just as skeptical — but a new venture on the block promises to deliver exactly that.

Asif Seemab, the founder and CEO of pkship.com explains how the startup will deliver on its big Unique Selling Point.

A first in Pakistan?

This model is not novel; entrepreneurs have employed it in other countries. But for Pakistan, this is a first.

PkShip users are given addresses in the US, the UK, Germany and China. Whenever they visit an online retailer and make a purchase, they will get their products delivered to the closest global address, from where PkShip will send them the packages to their address in Pakistan.

This is different compared to outlets such as homeshopping. pk,shoppingbag.pk, and yayvo.com, who deliver products from Amazon and eBay without customers mak-

ing the purchase directly.

We test the service No one has really offered this before, so we decided to test the service to find out if it really is all that it promises.

While we can vouch for PkShip’s punctuality, there were multiple issues we encountered.

We ordered an electric toothbrush with separate heads, priced at around $49 on Amazon. The package weighed about 0.5kg, which according to the shipping fee table on PkShip, should cost us $15 to transport to Pakistan.

The customs or import duty on a toothbrush is 20 per cent of the price. For all prospective buyers, it is essential that you go through this document on the FBR website to know what you will be charged as duty.

Per our calculation, 20pc of $49 equals around $10. That puts the total price of our purchase at $74 ($49+$15+$10).

But here’s the catch. We ended up paying around $90 for the purchase. Turns out we missed the 15pc sales tax and the 6pc income tax in our calculation.

At the end, we paid almost $16 more than what we had set aside for the product.

Hidden charges?

At first glance, it appeared to us that the sales tax and income tax would be included in the costing.

Having to pay the ‘unknown charges’ at delivery was a disappointment to say the least.

PkShip CEO Muhammad Asif Seemab

But how could have this been avoided? And what does it mean for PkShip’s customers?

While the service is a first for Pakistan, there is a corollary. Customers will have to be selective about what they want to buy because not every purchase will end up making economic sense. Buying an iPhone and getting it delivered via PkShip would be a good idea.

But that may not hold true for other goods such as our electronic toothbrush.

And this is where Seemab’s vi-

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sion of “educating his customers” will have to come into play. Unless customers are shown they will end up paying less through PkShip, the service will fail. It seems a lot more work needs to be done.

Will an upgraded user interface help?

We certainly think so. Their website is still very basic and one has to focus to understand how to go about making an actual purchase. It was also very surprising that there is no calculator on the website to allow customers to determine how much a certain purchase will end up costing them.

In our case, we were caught unawares of the sales and income taxes, despite having done considerable research on the service. An onsite calculator would have certainly made things more transparent.

How do they ensure products are cleared without delay by Pakistan customs?

Seemab tells us they have partnered with FedEx, UPS and DHL, three of the largest and most renowned courier services in the world, to take care of customs clearance and payment of duties.

“These courier companies go by the books so there is no reason the customs department will stop our shipments. The courier companies will pay customs duty on our shipments (on our customers’ behalf). We pay them (courier companies) after clearance and charge the same amount to our customers along with the shipping fee. It’s as simple as that,” says Seemab.

“PkShip is paying huge money

to these courier companies in order to complete the customs documentation to ensure timely clearance at customs house.”

So there is no avoiding the duty then, which is not so much of a hassle if timely delivery, without any damage to goods, is ensured.

“The rule of thumb is that the prices of branded products will always be cheaper on the brand’s own outlet/website. So our business model is eliminating the middlemen to pass on maximum savings to the final customer.”

Seemab says the venture is also going to empower the ‘Deals’ page at pkship.com to save customers’ time in finding “deep discounted products across the globe.”

“We’re writing power algorithms in order to update our page for deep discounted deals.” In this way, PkShip also aims to help users in finding goods that can be delivered at their doorstep cheaper than from anywhere else on the web.

In the first three weeks since their launch in Dec 2015, PkShip had 500 registered users.

“We expect to grow in volume soon,” says Seemab.

Our verdict PkShip is a new service for Pakistan’s online shoppers and there is no doubt that their business model holds the potential to change the dynamics of Pakistan’s retail industry.

Kudos to the team behind the venture, but if this service is to become mainstream, there is much more that needs to be done. – Dawn

COMMENTARY

MARCH 4, 2016 – PAKISTAN LINK – P21

No Truce in Syria

n By Nayyer Ali MD

A

“cessation of hostilities” agreement negotiated by outside powers, primarily the US and Russia, was supposedly agreed to and meant to take effect this week in Syria. So is this the end of the Syrian Civil War? No chance.

In fact, the war is going to go on with escalating intensity, and surprisingly, with Assad and Russia driving towards victory.

The Syrian Civil War broke out in 2011 as the Arab Spring washed over the country triggering peaceful protests that were met with brutal violence, torture, and mass shootings meant to crush the rebellion.

But Assad was not able to win at the outset, and the peaceful protestors morphed into an armed rebellion.

Over the next four years, the battles shifted, with Assad holding a core stretching from Damascus north to Homs and then to the coastal region where the Alawite minority, the sect that Assad belongs to, mostly resides. The rebels seized much of the land south of Damascus to the Jordan border, the northern regions next to Turkey, and captured half of the critical city of Aleppo. But the rebels were divided into hundreds of small militias, and dependent on weapons from Turkey and Saudi Arabia. They were never able to secure anti-aircraft missiles, because of fear that those could be seized by terror groups and used against civilian airliners in the West.

Over time, two rebel groups became the strongest forces. In the northwest, it was JN (Nusra Front), who were openly tied to Al-Qaeda and put on the UNSC list of terror groups. And in the east, a new force, originating among Iraqi Sunnis, seized Raqaa and most of eastern Syria along with the Sunni regions of Iraq. This group, known as Daesh

or ISIS, is also a designated terrorist group, and went about trying to set up a “caliphate” while engaging in terror acts such as the Paris massacre, the bombing of the Russian passenger jet out of Sinai, and even creating an outpost of control in the Libyan town of Sirte.

For the last few years I have held the view that eventually Assad was going to lose. While he had a heavy advantage in firepower such as artillery, tanks, and aircraft, he also suffered critical shortages of manpower. Ongoing monthly casualties could not be sustained forever, and his military would eventually collapse, as it rested mostly on the 20% of Syrians who were Alawites, as no one else really wanted to fight for the regime.

By early 2015, it looked like this scenario was beginning to appear.

Rebels made major gains in the north, and Assad had to retreat from Palmyra in the east and allow ISIS to seize the ancient town. Morale was crumbling.

It was at this point that foreign intervention came to save Assad.

Putin dispatched two squadrons of fighter-bombers to give heavy air support, while Iran brought in volunteers to fight for Assad, including Shia from Afghanistan, Pakistan, and most importantly, very competent units from Hezbollah in Lebanon. These reinforcements, and the pounding of Russian aircraft, have pushed the rebels back on their heels. Assad is closing in on surrounding Aleppo, and the fall of Aleppo would cripple the so-called “moderate rebels”.

It is in this context that the cease-fire talks have taken place.

The actual agreement does not end fighting in Syria. It asks that the Syrian government and the designated “moderate” rebels cease hostilities for the present time, with the hope of a political resolution then being pursued. But there is no cease-fire with JN or ISIS. What this does is give Assad and Russia a chance to now destroy JN in the northeast, and to go after ISIS in the east. The capture of Raqaa alone would be enough to collapse ISIS in Syria. This is where the fighting will concentrate if the

cease-fire holds elsewhere.

In a few months though, Assad will have seized back much of Syria, and the rebels would be standing alone against Assad, without JN and ISIS in the fight. At that point, any negotiation would really be a dictation of terms by Assad. The rebels would be in a very weak position to negotiate the end of Assad’s dictatorship. In my view, it looks like Assad will win his civil war.

If Assad wins what will it mean for Syria? For those heavily involved in the rebellion, they will have to seek a life in exile, Syria will be too dangerous. For the 10 million displaced Syrians, it will mean a chance to return to their shattered cities and homes and start the process of rebuilding. For Assad, it means his system survives for the foreseeable future. Just as in Egypt, it will have come full circle. The one exception will be the Syrian Kurds. They have carved out a large strip along the north of Syria that they control, but they have not taken sides in the civil war and have not attacked regime forces. It is likely that they will be

the only “winner” as they will get to keep a new semi-autonomous status.

The Syrian refugee crisis may also come to an overall end. Out of 20 million Syrians, 10 million have been displaced from their homes.

7 million moved elsewhere within Syria. 3 million reached refugee camps in Lebanon, Jordan, and Turkey. And of those, in the last year, about 200,000 have set off to enter Europe. The Europeans are struggling over who should take in this influx and provide the help needed to get them on their feet. But the European influx is still only 2% of the total refugees, and the 10,000 that Obama has offered to take in is a mere drop in the ocean.

Some critics have asked why the US should shoulder the burden of defeating ISIS in this whole mess, rather than the military forces in the region. It certainly is logical that it is the Syrian government that should destroy ISIS in Syria, and the Iraqi government should do the same in Iraq. But the ground realities are quite different. In the multiplayer Syrian civil war, the government wants to primarily destroy the moderate opposition, and is willing to leave ISIS for later. The Turks and Saudis want to focus on defeating Assad, and leave ISIS for late too.

The Kurds are interested in creating self-governing regions in Syria and Iraq, but do not want to get entangled with fights with others outside their own regions. The US wants to defeat ISIS in Syria and Iraq, but doesn’t want to use its own ground forces, and does not want Iraq’s Shia militias closely tied to Iran to do the fighting. The US instead wants the Iraqi army, which collapsed last year when ISIS overran much of northeastern Iraq, to be rebuilt and to do the fighting. This takes a lot of time.

Within a year though, we could see ISIS defeated in both Syria and Iraq, and Syria’s war begin to wind down in favor of Assad. The intervention by Russia and Iran, along with other Shia fighting men, has turned the tide.

Can Pakistan Leverage Qatar LNG Deal to Get Better Iran Gas Deal?

P

n By Riaz Haq CA

akistan has recently negotiated a good bargain with Qatar for importing $16 billion worth of liquefied natural gas (LNG).

Pakistan will import as much as 20 million tons of the super-chilled gas annually from various sources including Qatar, enough to fuel about two-thirds of Pakistan’s power plants. Gas shortage has idled half the nation’s generators.

A 75 percent drop in LNG prices since 2014 has dramatically reduced the cost of the South Asian country’s energy needs, according to a Bloomberg report.

LNG arriving in Pakistan from Qatar will fetch 13.37% of the preceding three-month average price of a Brent barrel (considering the present Brent price as a proxy, that would equate to $167.5 per 1000 cubic meters), according to a report in Azerbaijan’s Trend News. It translates to $4.50 per million BTUs. A comparison with Iran’s gas deals with Turkey and Iraq indicates that Iranian gas will not be competitive with Qatari LNG on Pakistani market. In 2014, Iran was exporting gas to Turkey at above $420 per 1000 cubic meters but the figure plunged to $225, or $6 per million BTUs, currently due to low oil price. Iran previously said that the price of gas for Iraq would be similar to Turkey’s price.

International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) arbitration court has recently ordered Iran to reduce its gas price to Turkey by 15% after Turkey complained. It’s not clear if Iran will comply but even if it does, its price will still be $5.10 per million BTUs, much higher than the Qatari LNG price of $4.50 per million BTUs for Pakistan.

As recently as two years ago, LNG shipped to big North Asian consumer like Japan and Korea was sold at around $15 to $16 a million British thermal units. Late last year, the price hit $6.65 a million BTUs, down 12% from September, according to research firm Energy Aspects. It

expects prices to fall further in Asia this year to under $6 per million BTUs, as a wave of new gas supply in countries from the US to Angola to Australia comes on line, accord-

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ing to Wall Street Journal.

Petronet LNG Ltd, India’s biggest importer of liquefied natural gas (LNG), is saving so much money buying the commodity from the spot market that it’s willing to risk penalties for breaking long-term contracts with Qatar.

Will Pakistan be able to negotiate a better price with Iran? It seems difficult given the fact that the Iranians have a reputation of being very difficult to deal with. Here’s an excerpt about Iranians’ negotiating style from IranianAmerican author Vali Nasr’s book “The Dispensable Nation”: “I remember a conversation in 2006 with Jack Straw, who was then Britain’s foreign secretary, about his time talking to Iran. He said, People think North Koreans are difficult to negotiate with. Let me tell you, your countrymen [Iranians] are the most difficult people to negotiate with. Imagine buying a car. You negotiate for a whole month over the price and terms of the deal. You reach an agreement and go to pick up the car. You see it has no tires.

‘But the tires were not part of the discussion,’ the seller says.

‘We negotiated over the car.’ You have to start all over again, now wondering whether you have to worry about the metal rim, screws, or any other unknown part of the car. That should give you a sense of what talking to Iran looks like”.

Regardless of whether Pakistan succeeds in using Qatar price leverage with Iran. it’s good to see Pakistan finally beginning to take advantage of historic low gas prices to alleviate its severe load-shedding of gas and electricity.

In addition to signing the Qatar LNG deal, Pakistan has launched its first LNG import terminal in Karachi and started receiving shipments from Qatar. Pakistan has also signed a $2 billion deal with the Russians to build a northsouth pipeline from Gwadar to Lahore. But the country needs to rapidly build up capacity to handle imports and distribution of significant volumes of LNG needed to resolve its acute long-running energy crisis.

COMMENTARY

P22 – PAKISTAN LINK – MARCH 4, 2016

‘If People Don’t Go to Jail for Honor Killing, How Will They Know It’s a Crime?’

Los Angeles: “How is this going down in your home country? You keep poking your lens where it’s least welcome,” CNN Chief International Correspondent Christiane Amanpour asks filmmaker Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy during an interview on “Amanpour”.

“I think it’s very important to have these difficult conversations. We aren’t going to make the country a better place if we keep glorifying the good things about it. We must talk about issues that confront Pakistan - and there are many issues that confront the country,” Chinoy replies.

The filmmaker, who won an Oscar in 2012 for her documentary “Saving Face” which highlights the plight of acid attack survivors, was in the running for another golden statuette this year. ( She won the award on Sunday) Her documentary on honor killing, “A Girl in the River: The Price of Forgiveness”, is one of five films nominated for an Oscar in the ‘Best Documentary ─ Short’ category at the 88th Academy Awards this year.

Chinoy’s critics have, in the past, taken issue with her highlighting what they call the ‘negative side’ of Pakistan. But she thinks, “It’s very important to have these difficult conversations... It’s very important to shake the status quo.”

“The most hopeful thing about this film is that it started a national discourse in Pakistan about honor killings ─ something we desperately needed to have,” she says.

Prime Minister Nawaz Sharn By Halima Ali for CNN Karakoram Highway:

The Karakoram Highway in Skardu connects China’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region with Pakistan’s Gilgit-Baltistan region.

Zenith Irfan’s father used to dream of leaving his home in Pakistan to travel around the world on a motorbike.

His early death meant he never fulfilled his wish.

As his eldest child, Irfan decided to take up the challenge -- and along the way smash stereotypes in Pakistan as a female biker.

The 21-year-old student from Lahore has become a fearless rider in the past two years, traveling through regions of the conservative country where it’s taboo for women to venture out unaccompanied, let alone on two wheels.

But the transformation didn’t come easy to her.

In 2013, when her younger brother bought a simple bike with a small 70cc engine, her mother urged him to teach Irfan how to ride and encouraged her to finish her late father’s ambition.

“At the beginning it was a big struggle for me,” says Irhan. “I was so confused about how to manage the gear, the clutch, the brakes.

“It was very confusing and frustrating but then I got the hang of it.”

She began using the bike to run errands around Lahore.

In June last summer, she decided to venture further afield with a six-day solo trip through the Azad Kashmir region, a disputed region in northeastern

if, Chinoy tells Amanpour, announced that his government “will introduce legislation as early as next week, talking about how honor killings need to be stopped, that there is no place for them in society”.

“He has said there is no place for honor killings in Islam... For a prime minister of Pakistan to make such statements sends a very positive signal. It doesn’t mean honor killings will end tomorrow but it does mean that the leadership is taking this very seriously and they will have laws that will counter it,” she says.

‘Nothing wrong with killing women’: But, Amanpour asks, even if PM Nawaz stands up for law and order and basic women’s rights, what about what happens in villages and homes? “It’s families taking the law into their own hands.”

Chinoy agrees. “Right now, as the law stands, when a father kills his daughter or a brother kills his sister, the family can forgive.

The wife can forgive her husband, the parents can forgive their son, so very few people go to jail for honor killings in Pakistan.”

What that means, she says, is that in entire villages, towns and cities, people know of others who have killed women in their family and are walking free - which gives the impression “that there is nothing wrong with killing women”, she says.

She stresses the need for a law that acts as a deterrent to the practice of honor killings. “We need to start sending people to jail, we need to start making ex-

amples of them,” she says. “If people don’t go to jail for it, how will

they start thinking it is a serious crime?”

A Pakistani Girl’s Boundary-Breaking Bike Journey

Pakistan that borders India and China.

“I want to go to Kashmir because I’ve heard so much about it,” she adds.

“They say ‘Kashmir, Jannat E Nazir,’ meaning it’s a paradise on earth.

“I don’t want to be that person who just sees it in pictures -- I want to go and experience it for myself on my motorcycle,” says Irfan.

She traveled first to Pakistan’s capital, Islamabad, then rode against stunning backdrops of mountains, rivers and lush landscapes to Murree -- a suburb located on the southern slopes of the western Himalayan foothills.

From there she rode on to Pakistan-administered Kashmir’s capital Muzaffarabad.

Then she continued through the region’s forested Neelam Valley with picturesque towns and villages like Sharda and Kel.

“When I was on the road, it was like a coming together of my mind, body and soul,” she says of being out of the congested cities. “I felt free.

“I could meditate properly. I really felt different, very emotional and liberated.”

Buoyed by the success of her first long distance trip, in August 2015 she decided to go even further, biking 3,200 kilometers from Lahore through North Pakistan up to the Khunjerab Pass on the border with China.

On arrival, she was pleased to be told that while foreign female riders had previously traveled there, she was the first Pakistani motorcyclist the locals had met.

Over the course of 20 days, she had traveled to places including Deosai Plains -- one of the highest plateaus in the world -- and Chilas, a very con-

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servative small village where residents hostile to outsiders threatened her with rocks.

Her main concerns were about road accidents as she motored alongside trucks on treacherous roads.

The ever-present danger wasn’t enough to stop her.

“I’m not so fearful because I know that if death has to come, it’ll come anyway even if I’m at home,” says Irfan.

“I can’t avoid it. I can’t obstruct my dreams because of a fear of death and accidents.”

She adds that her chief concern was being a woman rider in a places where this can cause outrage.

“There aren’t many female bikers here, it’s a very small segment of society,” Irfan says.

She combated this by ditching feminine clothes and concealing her-

Saba’s story: “One day, I was reading a newspaper story about a girl who had been shot and thrown in a river in a gunny sack and survived in what appeared to be an attempted honor killing. I called up the hospital and arrived there... And right from the beginning, the girl was determined to fight. She was determined for her story to be told, because she said she didn’t want any other woman in Pakistan to go through what she went through.”

However, the existence of the law of forgiveness and pressure from the community has forced Saba to forgive her attackers.

“Her father is free from jail.

[Due to] the loophole that exists in the law in Pakistan, the community forced Saba to forgive her father and uncle. They are walking free, but have given a guarantee that they will not harm her again. But she is lucky, because in many cases when the culprits walk free, they do come back and kill,” Chinoy says.

Saba, whose father and uncle tried to kill her for marrying a man of her choice ended up staying with her husband, but is still living near her parents.

“She did, indeed, get married to him. She’s had a son with him. She’s living with her in-laws right now in a home not far from where her parents live.”

Chinoy says Saba wants to raise her son to be someone who respects women.

“She said, ‘If the prime minister changes the law, I’m going to go to Islamabad to his office and thank him in person’ “. self beneath helmet, boots and jacket.

“They obviously thought I was male,” she explains. “Whenever I stopped to ask directions and they realized I was female, they didn’t know what to do.

“They just stood there with their mouth open and didn’t know how to respond.

“I went away so quickly, didn’t give them time to digest the fact that I was a woman asking them directions.”

But while she was nervous of people’s reactions, she says she only received one negative comment from a man who told her “girls don’t ride motorcycles.”

Irfan found tremendous support and encouragement along the way -from other tourists, soldiers at security checkpoints and some of the few women she encountered.

Among them, she recalls, one woman in Misgar -- a tiny village near China -- left a lasting impression.

“We couldn’t understand each other as she was talking in her own language. She told me through a local translator, ‘What you’re doing is unbelievable.’

“She was very happy to see me there,” says Irfan.

While her ride was physically demanding, she says the positive memories of her trip outlast the discomforts.

“I’d never seen snow before, so I think the best part was when I saw snow on the mountains,” she says.

“It was something I usually see on the Internet or TV, and when I saw it in real life -- so clear and white and very beautiful -- I can’t express how GIRL, P9

WOMENS WORLD

MARCH 4, 2016 - PAKISTAN LINK

WOMEN

MARCH 4, 2016 – PAKISTAN LINK – P23

By M. Shirazi

B

eauty conscious women are always on a look out for unique yet elegant outfits.

Some like plain yet trendy cuts and patterns while others prefer heavily embroidered clothes. Yes, we all want to look gorgeous and our outfits surely play an important part.

So, those who are looking for formal or semi formal clothes are in luck as recently, designer Tabassum Mughal announced the launch of her luxury formal collection in collaboration with Al Zohaib Textiles. This is a limited edition collection that features up to ten colourful designs inspired by beautiful flowers. The fabrics used for this formal line includes velvet, pure silk, chiffon, net and crinkle chiffon. The outfits have intricate embroideries coupled with cutwork that are just perfect for a formal or a semi formal occasion. Special attention has been paid to the colour palette by using bold contrasts of hues.

The launch event, managed by Tehmina Khaled of Take II, was a small but classy affair that featured a fashion presentation where models wearing Tabassum's formal luxury collection mingled with the guests. The hair and make-up for the event was done by Nadia Hussain. Speaking about her collection, the designer said, "I have

www.PakistanLink.com www.Pakistanlink.com

put my heart and soul into designing this collection which is truly a representative of the modern young woman who celebrates her life and wants to feel good wearing fun yet elegant designed clothes. I have inculcated some beautiful embellishments and embroideries that make these formal joras versatile enough to be carried on weddings and all other formal occasions."

Tabassum Mughal's brand has come a long way since its inception in 2007. Her dresses are not only beautiful but also extremely feminine and regal. Don't forget to check out her collection!

COMMENTARY

P24 – PAKISTAN LINK – MARCH 4, 2016

Setting Your Financial Priorities n By Saghir Aslam Rawalpindi, Pakistan

(The following information is provided solely to educate the Muslim community about investing and financial planning. It is hoped that the Ummah will benefit from this effort through greater financial empowerment, enabling the community to live in security and dignity and fulfill their religious and moral obligations towards charitable activities) Balancing your financial responsibilities can be difficult, but there’s one constant: Find way to save.

Happiness is the place between too little and too much. What should you do? Make plan balancing act: paying bills, saving wisely in the event of emergencies, and investing in anticipation of children’s college tuition or your own retirement.

I love this because our culture is so driven by having more, no matter what you have. The desire for more” stuff “actually contributes to a financial bind for many families. According to money.com, roughly two of three American would struggle to raise $1,000 in cash for an emergency expense. In many cases, a lack of financial priorities leads to overspending, leaving too little money to cover expenses and saving. As a result many have little choice but to continue working into their retirement years.

For most Americans, however, retirement will span three decadesand that key thought should be near the forefront of your planning efforts.

“It should cause you to think differently about planning for the future.

Overcome shame and get started Avoid temptation to plow ahead with no plan, possibly because they think they don’t earn enough to save or because poor decisions have left their finances in such a mess that they don’t want others, including family members to know.

JNU FROM P6

right of self-determination for the people of Kashmir at university campuses should be encouraged by the authorities concerned. University campuses very often provide true moral leadership for a nation, because youthful rebellion and resistance to corruption in high office grow out of the intellectual vitality of an exchange of ideas that are nurtured, and where public policy is discussed. What is true or good tends to percolate to the top, because it is almost always concerned with justice. Young people live under the domination and control of their parents, and they become very observant of moral inconsistencies in which adults do not do as they say their children should do.

These young people are not picking up arms or throwing stones.

There is no rebellion here. They are simply voicing opinions. Universities have historically been places to have free and balanced discussion on the issues of national concern, such as Kashmir. It is here at campuses that ideas germinate and ultimately change the world.

Terrorizing the student population is possibly the worst thing a government could do. Blowback is inevitable. How can individuals be patriotic and ignore the rule of law?

How can these people call them-

You should never be embarrassed about what you make or the situation you are in, “it might similar to theirs. Many are struggling to make ends meet; and many don’t think they can save. The worst thing an individual can do nothing, seeking a trust and competent advisor who is associated with a reputable institution, one whose credibility stands on its own.

Move saving up your priority list Smart planning starts with a simple principle; pay yourself first.

“Typically when we budget, we budget all of the required obligations that we have-mortgages, car loans, utilities-and then we budget our spending”. I wrote earlier that I will write more on selecting a financial adviser.

First if your financial adviser is talking about selling you limited partnerships, insurance policies other products with higher commission.

You can be sure he is trying to get rich quick.

His interest is basically how much he makes out of this deal and how fast. He is not what I call a financial adviser. He is very much interested to get rich quick. It is easier to identify them if you carefully read what I have written this time and what I wrote previously. Over the last few decades I have dealt with lot is so called financial adviser and they are easy to spot.

I will try to elaborate this in another article as this is very important to get the best financial planner.

Please allow me to share with selves patriots while ignoring basic human rights and the civil liberties enshrined by law and the Constitution, the very laws which form the foundation of civility and respect and the ability to live together as a community, which they now claim to defend? What are they championing but some autocratic regime that prohibits free speech and the right to protest actions by their government that seem to infringe upon basic rights? This is not the “Mother India” of any Indian worthy of the name. Shall we start goose-stepping now or wait for a command?

All 193 members of the United Nations have signed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which states very clearly, “It is essential, if man is not to be compelled to have recourse, as a last resort, to rebellion against tyranny and oppression, that human rights should be protected by the rule of law.” Dissent must be permitted, because it is a firewall to rebellion. For peace to prevail, we must all have recourse to our grievances, and that is often expressed through dissent.

Bureaucrats and politicians, persuaded by special interests or the need of holding on to their elite privileges, are often inhibited from saying publicly many of the views that more intellectually and politically liberated and unconstrained

you. Some time people say it’s easier said than done. My respectable brothers and sisters want I want to share with you is not theory. It is what practically I have done when I was poor working student trying to pay my college expenses and living expenses some time living on just plain old beans and cheapest bread I could find to fill the stomach, even then every single pay day I set aside few pennies for rainy days.

It just so, happen Allah. S. T. blessed me thanks for all his blessing all my life. I had 401. K plan when I worked. When I started my own business I created employee benefit plan trust.

Whereas I had to put in same percentage of their salary in savings as I did mine. Many shirt sided people think and say why should I put money for the workers I can save alone without the plan. All of us know some times it is difficult to discipline ourselves and save regularly without the plan. I am very thankful to Allah S. T that I did, it not only saved for myself and my wife who was working in our business it help many workers to accumulate money. Whatever plan you want to adopt not just try practice to save every pay day you will be glad that you did.

I did not count words must be enough.

(Saghir A. Aslam only explains strategies and formulas that he has been using. He is merely providing information, and NO ADVICE is given. Mr Aslam does not endorse or recommend any broker, brokerage firm, or any investment at all, nor does he suggest that anyone will earn a profit when or if they purchase stocks, bonds or any other investments. All stocks or investment vehicles mentioned are for illustrative purposes only. Mr Aslam is not an attorney, accountant, real estate broker, stockbroker, investment advisor, or certified financial planner. Mr Aslam does not have anything for sale.) students will voice. Yet, to lead effectively, they must be able to listen to something besides the echo chamber inside their own heads.

And they must also have the courage to respond to it and be accountable for it. A government stagnates and will ultimately fail if the bridges are lost between those who lead and those who reluctantly go along for the ride.

I totally agree with Rajdeep Sardesai, a senior journalist of India who said, “Yes, I am anti-national because in a plural democracy I believe we must have a dialogue with Kashmiri separatists as we must with those in the North-East who seek autonomy…Prosecute all those who break the law, incite violence, resort to terror, but don’t lose the capacity to engage with those who dissent.”

Kashmir is the center of gravity in this highly charged dispute between Pakistan and India, and the Kashmiris themselves are currently being treated as chattel, like cattle in a pen to be herded about. They are not citizens with a voice in dealing with their own affairs. Who is discussing it? We have a fire in the living room while the leaders are having tea in the boudoir.

Listen to us.

The BJP led government is us

JNU, P28

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RELIGION

MARCH 4, 2016 – PAKISTAN LINK – P25

Ten Special Features of Ramadan

Gems from the Holy Qur’an

n By Dr Muzammil H. Siddiqi (Khutbah at ISOC – Ramadan 4, 1434/ July 12, 2013)

I

t was in the month of Ramadan that the Qur’an was revealed as guidance for mankind, clear messages giving guidance and distinguishing between right and wrong. So any one of you who is present that month should fast, and anyone who is ill or on a journey should make up for the lost days by fasting on other days later.

Allah wants ease for you, not hardship. He wants you to complete the prescribed period and to glorify Him for having guided you, so that you may be thankful. (Al-Baqarah 2:185)

Ramadan for us Muslims is not just the month of fasting; it is the month of virtues, values, happiness and blessings. It is the only month that is mentioned by name in the Qur’an.

The Prophet –peace and blessings of Allah be upon him- called this ‘a blessed and a great month.’ Ramadan has many features: spiritual, moral as well as historical and cultural. Books have been written on various aspects of Ramadan and for centuries Muslim poets have sung the songs in its joys and blessings. I want to mention here 10 special features of Ramadan: 1. Month of the Qur’an: The most important feature of Ramadan is that it is the month in which the Qur’an was revealed. Its revelation came in the Night of Qadr, a night that is better than one thousand months (Surah al-Qadr 97). The Night of Qadr did not occur only fifteen hundred years ago; every year this Night also comes in Ramadan and brings the honor and blessings from Allah. The Qur’an is the Kalam Allah, the speech of Allah, the most beautiful and most powerful speech. It is the most authentic and most comprehensive manual to reform and improve the life of human beings, whether individuals, families or nations. It addresses all human beings and can help every person in any land, any time and in any situation.

We should increase our link with the Qur’an read it every day. In this month specially we should read it from cover to cover at least once. We should also reflect on its meaning and message.

2. Month of Patience: Fasting is patience and it teaches patience. The

From the translation by Muhammad Asad (Leopold Weiss) About the translator: Muhammad Asad, Leopold Weiss, was born of Jewish parents in Livow, Austria (later Poland) in 1900, and at the age of 22 made his first visit to the Middle East. He later became an outstanding foreign correspondent for the Franfurter Zeitung, and after years of devoted study became one of the leading Muslim scholars of our age. His translation of the Holy Qur’an is one of the most lucid and well-referenced works in this category, dedicated to “li-qawmin yatafakkaroon” (people who think). purpose of fasting is to learn Taqwa, self-discipline and self-restraint. This is the highest virtue in Islam and it is the key for moral and spiritual growth and development. Fasting is to learn how to control one’s appetites as well as one’s desires. The fasting person does not learn only how to control his stomach; it is also to control one’s tongue, ears, eyes, hands and feet.

Fasting person has to focus his/her heart and mind towards Allah. We call the sick people patients, but patience is not only for the sick and weak; the healthy and strong people also should be patient.

3. Month of Prayers and Remembrance of Allah: Salat and Dhikr are the special features of this month. Fasting makes the heart humble and it is the humble people who pray. We should pray our five daily prayers on time. We are also supposed to spend some time in Qiyam al-layl, the night prayer. Every person should spend time doing extra prayers and the Dhikr of Allah.

4. Month of Repentance and seeking Allah’s Forgiveness: The gates of Allah’s heaven are open in this month; the gates of Hell are closed and rebellious devils are put in chain.

Allah stretches His blessed hands to receive every repentant person. Every day and every night the angels of Allah call those who seek goodness to come

forward and leave anything that is bad and evil. Ramadan is the best time to turn to Allah and seek His forgiveness.

The Prophet –peace be upon him- said, ‘He is a loser who finds Ramadan and does not receive forgiveness.’

5. Month of Charity and Generosity: This is the month of giving and helping those who are in need. This is the month of doing more charitable works. The Prophet was the most generous person all the time, but in Ramadan his generosity had no limits. He was as charitable as the morning breeze. Muslims give their Zakat, Sadaqatul-Fitr and other charities (sadaqat) during this month. Every good deed done in this month brings hundreds and thousands times more blessings.

6. Month of Kindness and Good Relations: Ramadan is a great time for building good relations within the family, among relatives, neighbors and co-workers. We should apologize and ask for forgiveness if we have done wrong to anyone. We should forgive those who have done wrong to us. We should not get involved in fights and disputes at this time. We should go out of our ways to reconcile any differences.

7. Month of Brotherhood and Sisterhood: In Ramadan we fast together.

Fasting builds a special bond among us. Our happiness is in the happiness of other Muslims and our pain is in the pain of others. This is the time we should be more concerned about the situation and condition of our Muslim brothers and sisters all over the world.

We should pay more attention to their situations, their difficulties and pains. We should help the needy and stand for justice for those who are deprived of justice.

8. Month of Great Victories:

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Ramadan reminds us of the victories of Muslims over their enemies. The events of Badr, the Victory of Makkah and many other glorious events took place during this month. Ramadan is the month of peace but it is also the month when Muslims defended themselves and stood firm against the forces of evil and oppression. Allah gave victories to the believers at the most difficult times because they followed the path of justice and righteousness.

Their victories were not for material gains and personal or national glory, but they were for the truth, justice and righteousness.

9. Month of Du’a: After mentioning fasting and the significance of the month of Ramadan, Allah says in the Qur’an: When My servants ask you (Prophet) about Me, I am near. I respond to those who call Me, so let them respond to Me, and believe in Me, so that they may be guided. (AlBaqarah 2:186) Fasting brings a person very close to Allah and it is the best time to pray and ask Allah for His blessings and mercy. All our prayers, especially in the state of fasting, are very effective.

The prayer indicates one’s sincerity, devotion and humbleness to Allah. It brings its results here in this world or its reward will be given in the Hereafter.

10. Month of joy and happiness: The month of Ramadan brings special joy to believers. The Prophet –peace be upon him- said, The person who fasts has two joys: when he makes iftar he feels happy and when he shall meet his Lord he shall be happy with his fast. (Ahmad, Muslim and Nasa’i) Those who fast they feel happy when they complete their day’s fast at sunset. They appreciate the food and drink that Allah has provided for them. They thank him and recognize His blessings and bounties. Those who fast will also have a special happiness when they shall meet their Lord.

He shall greet them with greetings of peace and grant them special honor and grace them with His mercy and kindness.

May Allah help us to take full advantage of this month and make this a month of joy and happiness for us and for others through us. Ameen.

Chapter 5,Verse 2 ……… And never let your hatred of people who would bar you from the Inviolable House of Worship lead you into the sin of aggression: but rather help one another in furthering virtue and God-consciousness, and do not help one another in furthering evil and enmity; and remain conscious of God: for behold God is severe in retribution!

Chapter 5,Verse 3 Forbidden to you is carrion, and blood, and the flesh of swine, and that over which any name other than God has been invoked, and the animal that has been strangled, or beaten to death, or killed by a fall, or gored to death, or savaged by a beast of prey, save that which you [yourselves] may have slaughtered while it was still alive; and [forbidden to you is] all that has been slaughtered on idolatrous altars.

And [you are forbidden to] to seek to learn through divination what the future may hold in store for you [ 1 ]: this is sinful conduct.

Today, those who are bent on denying the truth have lost all hope of [your ever forsaking] your religion: do not, then, hold them in awe, but stand in awe of Me! Today have I perfected your religious law for you, and have bestowed upon you the full measure of My blessings, and willed that selfsurrender unto Me shall be your religion [ 2 ].

As for him, however, who is driven [to what is forbidden] by dire necessity and not by an inclination to sinning – behold, God is muchforgiving, a dispenser of grace. _________________________ Translator’s Notes: 1. This implies a prohibition of all manner of attempts at divining or foretelling the future.

2. According to all available Traditions based on the testimony of the Prophet’s contemporaries, the above passage – which sets, as it were, a seal, on the message of the Qur’an – was revealed at Arafat in the afternoon of Friday, the 9th of Dhu ‘l-Hijjah, 10 H., eighty-one or eighty-two days before the death of the Prophet. No legal injunction GEMS, P28

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SPORTS SPORTS

MARCH 4, 2016 - PAKISTAN LINK

MARCH 4, 2016 – PAKISTAN LINK – P27

Pakistan Overcome Hiccups for Seven-Wicket Win

MIRPUR: UAE's decision to bat seemed a bit like someone doing away with the veggies so they could get to the meat quicker. All their captain Amjad Javed hoped for was "120 to 130" runs; they got 129. Pakistan tried to sink their teeth into the target and suddenly found it was more than they could chew. The top three fell by the time the fourth over of the chase began, but Shoaib Malik and Umar Akmal buckled down and took Pakistan to a seven-wicket victory in Mirpur.

While that margin indicates it was all hunky dory, Javed's new-ball burst and the way he could rally his team together had given UAE a strong

chance to record their first victory against a Full Member. He took three wickets off his first seven balls to make his team believe, and then made sure they did not waver by slinging his arm around every one of his bowlers while he was at the top of his run-up and clapping his hands until they stung.

Pakistan were 17 for 3 when Akmal and Malik got together. They recognised the momentum was with UAE, but knew they could turn it around. They just had to bide their time, to keep their wickets intact and take the chase deep so that the ball wouldn't be swinging and their experience could trump UAE's adrenaline.

The first boundary of their fourth-

wicket partnership came off the 15th ball and the next one came off the 31st but overhauling a target of 130 doesn't take pyrotechnics. Just patience.

There was a moment when UAE could have stormed back. With 40 runs to win from 26 balls, Malik dragged a Mohammad Shahzad bouncer from outside off and the resulting top-edge seemed destined for deep square leg's hands but Usman Mushtaq, who was brought into the XI in place of Saqlain Haider, dropped it. Malik reached his fifty with a four and a six off the next two balls he faced and along with Akmal sealed Pakistan's victory with their unbeaten 114-run partnership.J

Dhoni, Waqar, Malinga Unhappy with Pitches in Asia Cup DHAKA: Indian captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni, Sri Lankan skipper Lasith Malinga and Pakistan's head coach Waqar Younis feel that green top pitches in Bangladesh are hardly ideal preparation for the upcoming World T20 since most of the batsmen are struggling in the on-going Asia Cup. The round-robin clashes in the Asia Cup competition here have been played on a surface that has surprisingly assisted pace bowlers more.

The green tops have made life difficult for the batsmen with the bowlers calling the shots. Barring India's Rohit Sharma, who hit a stellar 83 against Bangladesh, none of his team-mates have even crossed 50 in the tournament so far. While Virat Kohli came up with a fighting 49 against Pakistan, others in the batting line-up have found the going tough.

The big question that arises is that can this be termed an ideal preparation for the participating

teams ahead of World T20 to be played in India? Skipper Dhoni doesn't seem to think so.

"Against Bangladesh we struggled to reach 166 in the first match, and in fact would have got to only 140 had Rohit and Hardik Pandya not batted brilliantly," said Dhoni.

"Other than that there have been low-scoring games which I feel is not good. We thought it would be good practice ahead of the World T20, but it's not in terms of hitting." J

Bangladesh Ready to Come to Pakistan, Claims Shaharyar KARACHI: Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) chairman Shaharyar Khan has claimed that the Bangladesh cricket team is willing to play in Pakistan, but did not reveal if and when a series is planned.

Shaharyar was speaking to the media on his return from Bangladesh, where he witnessed the low-scoring tie between Pakistan and India.

"Bangladesh have agreed to come and play in Pakistan, with matches being planned in Karachi and Lahore," he said.

Pakistan will also be taking part in the upcoming World T20, Shaharyar reaffirmed. "Pakistan will be travelling to India to play the World T20, and the security of our national team is the responsibility of the Indian government and authorities," he said. "When the Indians came to Pakistan in 2004 and 2006, we gave them top-level security and hopefully the same would be done with our team as well."

When asked why Sir Vivian

Richards was not brought in for the World T20 as a mentor, Shaharyar replied that the board did put an offer on the table but terms could not be agreed. PCB was willing to give $30,000 to Richards for both the Asia Cup and World T20, but he decided to instead work with PTV Sports as an expert. 'Afridi should talk to PCB about retirement plans' Reports have been circulating that Pakistan T20I skipper Shahid Afridi is thinking about carrying on after the World T20, despite suggesting earlier that he would retire from cricket after the mega event in India.

Afridi recently responded to the rumours by stating on social media that all the talk about his retirement is baseless as he has not taken anyone's advice regarding the issue and is focused on the Asia Cup for now.

The all-rounder had further said that he will make his career decisions keeping what is good for the country in mind.J

Indo-Pak Match at Dharamsala Will Not be Allowed: CM-HP SIMLA: A keenly-awaited clash between India and Pakistan in the 2016 T20 ICC World Cup - to be played in Dharamsala, Himachal Pradesh - might just not happen, or be moved to another city.

Himachal Pradesh Congress on Sunday asked the BCCI to either cancel the proposed India-Pakistan T20 World Cup match slated for March 19 at Dharamsala, Himachal Pradesh or shift the venue to any other city.

The executive of the Himachal Pradesh Congress Committee also criticised the secretary of Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) and BJP MP Anurag Thakur for the

decision to hold the match in Dharamsala.

Leaders of the Congress party, which rules the state, are asking the Indian cricket board to cancel the match in order to "respect sentiments" of family members of those killed in the 2 January terrorist attack on the nearby Pathankot air base, allegedly by Pakistani men.

At the least, the 19 March game should be played elsewhere, the politicians have told the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI).

The local unit of the Congress party has threatened to stage protests and halt the match. J

Amir Appreciates 'Generous' Kohli Praise, Vows to Live Up to Expectations MIRPUR: It was reminiscent of the Oscar-nominated movie The Revenant. Pakistan's Mohammad Amir played Leonardo de Caprio, almost lost to cricket after the spot-fixing episode. Once the ban was lifted, Amir is on a comeback trail, trying to make up for the lost five years.

It couldn't have been a better stage than an Indo-Pak game in the Asia Cup. Pakistan's misguided missiles in batting flopped and defending a paltry total of 83 they needed wickets upfront. It was Amir (in pic) who turned a seemingly one-sided match on its head with three wickets in his first two overs.

But then Amir ran into a master batsman Virat Kohli, who adapted to the needs of the Mirpur pitch and batted with a 'switched-on' mind. The duel between Amir and Kohli lasted 15 deliveries but it proved how the battles are won.

After the match, Kohli showered praise on Amir. "I would like to congratulate Amir for the way he bowled; I actually congratulated him while he was bowling. It was amazing to play such a spell. I said this before; he is a world class bowler."

Amir said Kohli's praise made his day. It was generous of him what he said for me," Amir told Mirror. "It's the sort of encouragement that you need and when it comes from a super star like Virat, it means a lot. On the other hand, it's a big challenge for me as well because it adds to my responsibility to prove that I am worth that praise.

Even before the match, he used some good words for me. It was very kind of him."

Amir said Rohit Sharma's wicket was big. "I watched him bat in Australia where he scored a lot of runs so it was important to get him early. J

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PAKISTAN

P28 – PAKISTAN LINK – MARCH 4, 2016 GEMS FROM P25

whatsoever was revealed after this verse: and this explains the reference to God’s having perfected the Faith and bestowed the full measure of His blessings upon all the believers. Man’s self-surrender expresses itself not only in belief in Him but also in obedience to His commands: and this is the reason why the announcement of the completion of the Qur’anic message is placed within the context of a verse containing the legal ordinances ever revealed to the Prophet Muhammad.

JNU FROM P24

ing all its muscles to oppress all voices of dissent. We condemn the high handedness of police on the peaceful protesters at these educational institutions.

We demand the unconditional release of all students including a very respected scholar SAR Geelani and Kanhaiya Kumar who have been detained for voicing their political beliefs on JNU and other university campuses in India.

The security of all students and in particular Kashmiri students on various university campuses including JNU is the responsibility of the state. Kashmiri students have been targeted because of their political beliefs and their landlords have ordered them to vacate the flats. These are Constitutional violations that are bound to be challenged in a court of law. The flagrant and unlawful arrest of a student for speaking his beliefs and protesting peacefully is unacceptable.

“Silence becomes cowardice,” Mahatma Gandhi said, “when occasion demands speaking out the whole truth and acting accordingly.” The Indian intelligentsia, academics, writers and scholars have the collective responsibility to educate the Indian public square that Kashmir is not the integral part of any member country of the United Nations. Not for a moment. And its future status has to be ascertained according to the wishes and will of the people of Jammu & Kashmir irrespective of their religious background and regional affiliations.

That demand has always been there and will always remain. The Kashmiri claim historic grounds for an identity that is uniquely their own. The promise of self-determination has never been relinquished.

The problem India has in blocking any settlement of the Kashmir issue makes absolutely no practical sense whatsoever. Why wear blinders and pretend that the problem doesn’t exist? Why has your propaganda not worked for almost 70 years? Drinking the cool aid will not get rid of a cancer in the stomach. There is no “integral” anything. Hundreds of thousands of people have disappeared or been killed because they were demanding the right of selfdetermination which was agreed to by both India and Pakistan and endorsed by the United Nations Security Council.

Women’s honor is being violated. Half the youth are in jail for expressing their political beliefs.

Communities are on lockdown every other day. Border shelling has been persistent. And I don’t think it’s because India has one big happy family in Kashmir hanging on to the dhoti wrap of Mother India.

This is not rocket science. If the Kashmir question were resolved, much of the hostility between India and Pakistan would dissolve. The region would not be living on the edge

of a nuclear holocaust. Trade between the two countries would flourish. Jobs and meaningful lives would be created. Families split apart by the conflict could join together again.

There would be no more shelling at the ceasefire line. Those 700,000 Indian military and paramilitary forces could go home and do something constructive instead of beating up on women and children. What intelligent person could not agree with that?

It’s time for the leaders to grow up. Start acting like you are the public servants you have been elected to be. Make life worth living for all of the citizens. Listen to their needs.

Hear their complaints. Respond to their suffering. Show them that you are true patriots.

- gnfai2003@yahoo.com TALE FROM P7

Army, General Sharif has had ample opportunities to wrap up the country’s bone-corrupt political claptrap, if he’d so wished. General Pervez Musharraf, a charlatan compared to the noble Raheel Sharif, did this when given half a chance by the same Nawaz whom Raheel has served with such aplomb, poise and dignity. There were other Khakis before Musharraf who usurped power on similar spurious and trumped up excuses.

Musharraf, never above mischief, tried to egg on Raheel when he unveiled his plan to step down at the end of his term. Musharraf himself was so shameless that he didn’t wince even once before giving himself innumerable extensions at the head of the army.

So, pedigree it is that defines the character of a man whether in civvies or in Khakis. Raheel hasn’t only given ample proof of his noble blood line but in doing so he has also given the world a peek into the disciplined force that Pakistan army’s elite officers’ corps is.

That the people of Pakistan have more faith in their army than politicians defining the country’s democratic setup has been borne out every time a public opinion poll is conducted. Raheel has come up head-and-shoulders above Nawaz or any other politician, for that matter, in every survey of the people.

Why the Pakistanis trust their army chief more than their prime minister and their generals more than their political leaders is because of the common perception—which is also the right perception—that the men in uniform are cleaner than those hogging the political stage.

Why is there a nationwide call for Raheel to stay on in his job? Because the people of Pakistan think that his continuation at the top is essential, given the fact that operation Zarb-e-Azb is not quite done yet and changing the guard in the middle of a war should best be avoided.

But Raheel wants the nation to trust that whoever may succeed him at the command of the army would have the same commitment to rid the country of the scourge of terrorism as he does.

That’s faith in the chain of command and the inborn discipline of the officers’ corps. What Raheel wants the country to believe—and its people to trust—is that this ongoing and yet-unfinished war is not his own alone; it’s a cause as dear to the rest of the military chain of command as to him.

Raheel’s nobility should be given the people’s approbation. If the nation can put up with the ignoble Nawaz and his cabal of knaves and poltroons, there’s no reason why they shouldn’t have faith in a successor to Raheel’s ability to finish the job commenced on his watch.

As for Nawaz and his party, the time will come, in two years at the most, to hold them accountable at the bar of the people; they too must pay for their

sins like any other criminal. (The author Paul Fremont United Methodist Church.

Samina Sundas, Founding Executive is a former ambassador and career diploDirector of the American Muslim Voice mat) - K_K_ghori@hotmail.com Foundation, said her organization’s initiative, the Miracle Movement of Peace and CENTERS FROM P15 Friendship, is aimed at fostering a tighter person lived in the United States.”

She said they paid £90 for each card sense of community among fellow Amerand were told it would cost £100 per card icans. “If all of us sit down with each other and talk to each other, all the ignorance to have the details amended.

Another advice session was closed and fear will just fly out the window,” Sundown by authorities after a businessman das told the Mercury News, adding: “We advertised the service at a mosque in could send a loud and clear message to Greater Manchester. the world: In California, this is how we do Consul General of Pakistan in Man- things. We support each other with kindchester, Zahoor Ahmad, said: “The Con- ness, with love, and with compassion.” sulate does not hold surgeries in private Syed Inamdar, former President of places and had not authorized it.” the ISEB, also graced the event. His serThere are around 1.17 million Paki- vices for the ISEB and the Muslim comstanis living in the UK and around 3,500 munity were recognized. Syed Inamdar, NICOP applications are processed each who was on a wheel chair, was accompaweek. - BBC nied by his daughter Syeda Reshma Inamdar, who is also a very active member of the Bay Area Muslim community.

INTERFAITH FROM P17 In following the theme of the event chising and alienating most people. “We need to address the hunger in people for “Hands Around The Mosque,” the guests an alternative,” he said, and transform the clasped hands as they formed a circle in the courtyard of the mosque. social order.

The Hands Around the Mosque The program began with the recitation of the Holy Qur’an by Luqman Zac- event included a candle light vigil around ria from the ISEB Sunday School. Tahzeeb the Peace Pillar outside the Mosque and Siddiqui presented the translation of the the Methodist Church. The vigil was Qur’anic verses. Sister Nawal Saleh, teach- aimed at expressing solidarity with the er of the Sunday School, prepared the stu- seven-million strong Muslim American community. dents for qirat.

At the end of the program, Areeba After the recitation of the Holy Qur’an, Abdus Sattar Ghazali, a member Yasin offered vote of thanks.

Syed Rifat Mahmood, President of of the ISEB Board of Directors and Senior Adviser of the American Muslim Voice, the ISEB interim board, thanked all ISEB formally welcomed the guests on behalf of volunteers who helped to make the prothe ISEB and AMV. gram successful. The volunteers included: Maryam Levenberg, LuthfaZecria, Shama Khan, Anamika Nath, Raffat ShaBasheer Albasheer, Zena Siddiqui and reef, Akila Atarwala, Raheel Khan, Asad Bilal Hashmi, students of the Sunday Khan and Human Khan.

School, presented nasheed, a traditional Special thanks to Farooq Hussaini Islamic song. Taha Khan, another stu- for setting up the sound system. And dent of the Sunday School, related the his- special thanks also to Chandni Restautory of the nasheed: Residents of Madinah rant for providing dinner for 250 guests at sang to welcome Prophet Mohammad a very short notice.

(PBUH) upon his arrival to Madinah after being forced to leave Mecca. The song is DIALOGUE FROM P1 over 1400 years old and is considered the Reaffirming the importance of straoldest in the Islamic culture and tradition. tegic dialogue, which provides vision and Sister Eman Khaddour prepared the stu- direction for this bilateral partnership, dents for the nasheed presentation.

Aziz and Kerry reviewed the progress Shahram Marleen, Social Secretary made in its six working groups, which of the Muslim Community Association, represent core areas of joint interest and was MC of the program which was paused cooperation, including energy, security, for the Asr prayer. Many of the attendees strategic stability, and nonproliferation, went to the prayers hall to watch how the Defense Consultative Group, law Muslims pray. They thanked the ISEB for enforcement and counterterrorism, ecoproviding an opportunity to watch a Mus- nomics and finance and education, science, and technology. lim prayer live.

They also looked forward to the The speakers at the Interfaith gathering were given only three minute to speak fourth annual US-Pakistan Business because there were two dozen speakers Opportunities Conference, the first to be held in the United States, which will which included: Bob Wieckowski, California state bring scores of US and Pakistani exsenator; Patrick Burt, Mayor of Palo Alto; ecutives from across all sectors to New Bill Harrison, Mayor of Fremont; Lily York City this year, and a meeting under Mei, Vice Mayor of Fremont; Shirley Lin the Trade and Investment Framework Kinoshita, Silicon Valley United Nations Agreement (TIFA) in 2016.

Association‐USA president; Rev Ben The two countries also acknowlDaniel, senior pastor, Montclair Presby- edged the importance of sustaining coterian Church in Oakland; Rabbi Sheldon operation on shared interests through Lewis, Past President of the Board of Rab- US civilian assistance, in line with the bis of North California; Teresa Castella- intent of legislation known as the ‘Kerrynos, community activist; Rev Dr Andrew Lugar-Berman’ act. Finally, they charged Kelle, chair of the Board Silicon Valley In- the Working Groups with continuing terreligious Council (SIVIC); Rev. Dr Ei- to meet according to a mutually deterleen, Altman, Associate Pasto, First Con- mined schedule.

“The United States commended gregational Church of Palo Alto; Rev John Oda, pastor, Lake Park United Methodist Pakistan’s exemplary generosity in hostChurch, Oakland; Juliette Suarez, Fellow- ing one of the largest, longest lasting ship of Reconciliation; Dr Sharat G. Lin, refugee populations and reaffirmed the San Jose Peace & Justice Center & South US commitment to humanitarian asAlameda County Peace & Justice Coali- sistance for Afghan refugees, returnees, tion; Rev. Melanie Weiner, associate min- and displaced persons in the region,” the ister at Foothills Congregational Church statement read. in Los Altos; Girish Shah, past-president and cofounder of Jan Center of Northern OSCAR FROM P1 California in Milpitas; Rabbi Chaim Ko- cording to Maiza Hameed, a lawmakritzinsky, Congregation Etz Chayim, Palo er in Mr Sharif ’s party who is workAlto; Komal Ahmad, founder and CEO ing on the effort. of Copia (which creates efficient food Despite that official support, efwaste management and feeds individuals forts to improve protections for Pakiin need); and Sun Hee Kim, pastor of Sait stani women remain fraught and face

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deep resistance…

In a telephone interview, Ms. Obaid-Chinoy said she was happy to have at least restarted conversation about honor killings.

“The thing about Pakistan is that if you want change and if you want to struggle for change in that country, there’s always a heavy price to pay,” she said. “There are so many wonderful people who have been working on legislation and awareness for years.

If my film can hopefully play a small part in getting legislation passed and introspection on why this exists in our society, how it manifests, it’s a victory.”

In rural areas, in a traditional practice known as karo kari, landlords and leaders of tribes convene a meeting after a couple has eloped or is discovered to have a relationship, and they issue a verdict that the couple be put to death. Eloping couples are often hunted down and killed. Many of these leaders wield considerable political influence and escape prosecution.

“These landlords don’t let anyone into their houses — that’s where these decisions are made, not in our police stations,” said Bilquis Bano Edhi, who runs one of the largest charitable networks in Pakistan with her husband, Abdul Sattar Edhi, and their family…

Ms Hameed, the lawmaker who was working on the new effort to pass a law against honor killings, said the new legislation would seek to eliminate the pressure on women to forgive their families — a central point of Ms Obaid-Chinoy’s film.

The onus, Ms. Hameed said, would be on judges to decide whether women were being coerced into pardoning their families, and judges could annul any attempts at forced mediation, and indict and punish those involved…– The New York Times According to another report, Sharmeen Obaid Chinoy made history on Sunday as the only Pakistani to win two Oscar awards.

Wearing a floor-length black Sana Safinaz coat over a matching dress, Sharmeen had earlier walked the red carpet with her mother and the SOC Films team.

“I have another one!” said Sharmeen as she took the stage to accept the award, her second after she won an Academy Award for Saving Face in 2012.

CRICKET FROM P1

en 58. He and Shoaib Malik, who scored 41, combined in a 70-run partnership for the fifth wicket.

MEETING FROM P1

announcement has been made yet.

On the status of Pakistan-India relationship after Prime Minister Modi came to power in May 2014, Sartaj said that the situation was not good in the first year. “But the last two months are better,” he said. Ahead of Nawaz-Modi meeting, he said that there was likelihood of a meeting between the foreign secretaries of the two countries.

“We do not know (when foreign secretaries would meet). Indian foreign secretary has to come to Islamabad first. We are hoping that now,” he said after the breakfast meeting with Defense Writers Group.

INFRASTRUCTURE FROM P1

feeling of achieving the right relationship and the two sides had good arrangements to start the reconciliation process.

But the surge in insurgency was a setback as while everyone expected the violence to pick up after the withdrawal of the ISAF forces, the insurgency became much stronger than was expected and delayed the talks, the adviser said.

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P30 – PAKISTAN LINK – MARCH 4, 2016

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ENTERTAINMENT & LIFESTYLE

ENTERTAINMENT

ust minutes ago Sharmeen Obaid Chinoy made history as the only Pakistani to win two Oscar awards.

Sharmeen was awarded the Oscar in the category Best Documentary - Short Subject for her documentary A Girl in the River, which follows the life of an 18-yearold girl who is a survivor of an honour killing attempt.

Wearing a floor-length black Sana Safinaz coat over a matching dress, Sharmeen had earlier walked the red carpet with her mother and the SOC Films team.

"I have another one!" said Sharmeen as she took the stage to accept the award, her second after she won an Academy Award for Saving Face in 2012.

"This is what happens when determined women get together,"

J

MARCH 4, 2016 – PAKISTAN LINK – P31

continued Sharmeen. "From Saba, the girl in my film who remarkably survived honor killing and shared her story, to Sheila Nevins, Lisa Heller from HBO and Tina Brown who supported me from day one. To the men who champion women, like Geof Bartz who has edited the film to Asad Faruqi, to my friend Ziad who brought this film to the government, to all the brave men out there like my father and husband who push women to go to school and work and who want a more just society for women!"

"This week the Pakistani PM said he would change the law on honor killing after watching this film -- that is the power of film!" said Sharmeen in closing.

Sharmeen has been in Los Angeles for the past week in preparation for the Academy Awards,

arguably Hollywood's biggest night of the year.Sharmeen had previously said that while she was excited by the prospect of winning another Oscar, she would consider her work on the documentary a 'real' success if she managed to help convince stakeholders to pass the Anti-Honour Killing bill.

Sharmeen definitely caught the government's attention with A Girl in the River -- the film was screened at the PM House in Islamabad just last week. Following that, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif said that honour killing was a critical issue and voiced his government's determination to eradicate this practice from society.

Just a few hours before her win Sharmeen had stated in a Facebook post:"In just a few hours the team of A Girl in the River: The Price of Forgivenesswill walk the red carpet at the Oscars! Whether we win or lose today we should be very proud of the fact that this film has ignited a national discourse about honor killings in Pakistan and has spurred the government to work on tougher legislation!

That achievement shows that we are maturing as a democracy and today I'm so very honored and humbled that we have been able to move the needle on this issue."

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P32 – PAKISTAN LINK – MARCH 4, 2016

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