Adil Najam
The pictures coming out of Islamabad are not good. Not good at all.

Here is yet more evidence - as if we needed more evidence - of a society at war with itself. The hostage-taking by women students from Jamia Hafsa in Islamabad of the residents of a house that they allege is a brothel [...]

Raza Rumi
Who doesn’t know Feryal Ali Gauhar?
A novel at the top of The New York Times international bestseller list, years of television appearances and a highly publicised marriage to Jamal Shah that became fodder for countless gab sessions, have caricatured and made famous her persona. Had I not known her personally, I too may have [...]

Raza Rumi
An email from a Pakistan based writer friend made me recall Parveen Shakir. The poem, Tomato Ketchup, written most probably in the memory of Sara Shagufta (the modernist Pakistani poet who committed suicide in the footsteps of Sylvia Plath).
I am not drawing conclusions or imagining comparisons. My writer-friend is neither suicidal nor at the [...]

Adil Najam
Report from News (21 February, 2007):
A fanatic shot dead Punjab Minister for Social Welfare Zill-e-Huma Usman “for not adopting the Muslim dress code” at a political meeting here at the PML House on Tuesday. A party worker caught the accused, Maulvi Sarwar, and handed him over to the Civil Lines Police. Huma was [...]

Adil Najam
I recieved a couple of emails with this picture today, and then saw it poste by Vaqas on Metroblog Lahore (see earlier picture here). A great picture by Awais Lodhi. We at ATP have a long-standing fascination with rickshaws (here, here, here, here an here). But, this, of course, is about political commentary, not [...]

Adil Najam
Saw this phoptograph in Dawn today and was mesmerised by the interplay of light and shaddow.
My immeidate reaction was to think of this verse from Faiz.
I realize I have already used it before as a title (and am sure will do so again). But it seems to fit, even if the context of the [...]