Owais Mughal
The source of following news items are the Pakistan’s two largest Urdu dailies, viz Jang and Nawa-i-waqt. Now bring a smile to your face and take a look at these news.
(1) ye water cooler aap ka hoa: Neelam Ghar
Neelam Ghar (Auction House) was Pakistan Televison’s longest running stage show. One thing that I remember from it was how easily the host Tariq Aziz used to gift Water Coolers to his audience. For every right or wrong answer he used to raise his arm in the air and shout:
“na meray bhai…jawab ghalat hai..magar Water Cooler aap ka hoa…”
(No brother… your answer is wrong…but you have won a Water Cooler)
This water cooler was mostly of Rahbar brand whose motto used to be ‘is meiN pani thanda 24 ghantay rehta hai’ (It keeps water cold for 24 hours). Following news tells us how Lahore Press Club arranged a version of Neelam Ghar for journalists and their families. What made me smile was the list of give aways. Looks like they tried to copy gift-list from the original Neelam Ghar. And sure enough, our famous Water Cooler was included in hundreds of gifts that were given out to the attendees. This news by the way is from daily Nawa-i-waqt of July 25, 2007.
(2) Five Year Old Ghee Proved to be Bad for Health after Lab Tests
My Comment: Was Lab test necessary to prove it :) Also note how they got rid of the ghee later on. They burned it. A friend of mine pointed out to me that the smoke of burned ghee must have been very good for health. This news was from Jang Multan of July 6, 2007.
(3) Names of some Upcoming Lollywood Movies
This is a collection of three different news items collected over the past month. The names of these movies show a trend in the society. Should I say a divided society? – as there was this Shoaib Mansoor movie which also got released this week.
For our English readership the names of these movies roughly translate as: The Barbaric Rajput, Achoo Lahoriite, The Absconder Rajput, Bala the Criminal and The Unique Huntress
:)
(4) A Baby Snake came out of a Chicken Egg…..TWICE
The mere fact that news like this can make up to the largest Urdu daily of Pakistan, Jang speaks volumes of standard of Urdu journalism. News is from Faisalabad (Chichawatni) local section of June 7, 2007.
(5) Mirror! Mirror! On the Wall: says Paris Hilton
This news appeared in Jang Karachi, of June 15, 2007 while Paris Hilton was still in jail. It explains why Paris Hilton stopped looking in the mirror because of her guilt. It further tells us about what noble thoughts were coming to her mind while she was reflecting on her life in the solitude of jail etc etc.
This was the the 8th post in our series on Hot Off the Urdu Press. The previous seven news collection of this series can be read here: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7.
English newspapers might score better than their Urdu counterpart, as far as literature is concerned, the limited exposure I have of it, Urdu seems far more advanced in thought than the English one even though ive just started reading the Urdu one.
“Wehshi Rajput”, “Ishtahari Rajput”, seems like the Jats and the Gujjars have been given their due share of heros/villians in Punjabi cinema, now its the Rajputs turn, wonder whos gonna be next after Rajputs, perhaps AraaiNs, or maybe Sheikhs!!
off course Syeds would be a tad sacrilegious :)
By showing news like these from Urdu newspapers, what kind of mesage we are sending to Urdu speaking people. I think the writer is not ingnoring the fact that he is creating more gap between Urdu and English readers.
As we know these kinds of stupid stories are also published in American newspapers. So please stop this series and try to close the gap between Urdu and English readers.
I think writer is only trying to prove that English news are athentic and Urdu newspapers are not reliable. This is not true, our Urdu journalism has influence on general public and they are doing good job to provide all kinds of literature and news to general public.
“The mere fact that news like this can make up to the largest Urdu daily of Pakistan, Jang speaks volumes of standard of Urdu journalism.”
End of story.
On a tangent, several years ago after a break of may be five years I read jang online and practically laughed on every headline. It almost seemed like a different world to me. They had also published despicable statements by different politicians against others on the front page. Jang, Pakistan’s largest Urdu daily, in a way depicts the state of pakistani society today.
whats with the names of these urdu/punjabi films(btw I think there should be a separate post on Lollywood movie titles) while no thought is put in the actual movie they should atleast comeup with decent names. Few names I remember:
Bhudda Shaer
Mehindi walae Hathh
Mard jeenae nahee daetae
Guns and Roses – Aik Junoon
.. and the list could go on