Adil Najam
These are distressing times. But this is not a time to be depressed.
This is a time, as Owais reminds us in his last post, to reaffirm our hopes for the future. True defeat would be to give up on those hopes. I have put up the splash image (on the front page) that I have to reassert and to remind ourselves that ultimately Pakistan will be what we make of it. Emergency or no emergency, no one can snatch our Pakistaniat from us. Not until we ourselves surrender it!
Back in May, at a moment of similar desperation, I had written a post where I had sought “solace in the one place where I always find it. In poetry. Especially in Faiz Ahmed Faiz’s poetry.” The video clip I had used there is worth repeating here.
I had written then – and it seems even more pertinent today to repeat it:
Here is Faiz – in his own words, in his own voice. The second half has the same poem masterfully sung by Nayarra Noor. Enjoy this rare find of kalam i Faiz, ba zaban i Faiz. But more than that, think about what he is saying and how it relates to what is happening today.
What I had to say (including about US role) I said at length in an NPR Radio show today (or here). But what Faiz has to say is far more profound.
The words of Faiz certainly cut deeper than anything I can say. They are an invitation to action. But they are also an invitation to thought. An invitation to responsibility. An invitation to continuing the struggle no matter what. An invitation to keep moving onwards despite the odds. An invitation to celebrate the spirit of defiance of those who will not give up.
I had ended that post by reaffirming ATP’s committment “to celebrating all the diverse trials and tribulations of being Pakistan … the mundane as well as the profound; the sad as well as the gleeful; the immediate as well as the long-term.” It is time, today, to repeat that commitment.
This is our commitment to Pakistaniat. We love Pakistan not because everything is right in it. But despite that which is clearly not right. And with a commitment to make right that which has gone astray. Ameen.
Families of arrested lawyers worry for theri loved ones:
http://free-pakistan.blogspot.com/2007/11/families -of-arrested-lawyers-worry-for.html
Chief Justice and his band of brothers had given common Pakistanis hope. A hope that no matter whoever was in power, as long as they were there, Pakistanis need not worry. Their presence had given ornidary Pakistanis confidence in judicial system and brought them closer to constitutional rule.
Pakistan’s founder was a lawyer and it’s saviours are also going to come from the lawyer community. This struggle should not end until the Chief and his brothers are restored to their rightful position, Mush is sent into exile to Jeddah (or better tried for high treason along with Shaukat Aziz and the Chauderies) and totally free elections are held under a government headed by Mr. Wajihuddin Ahmed.
what is destroying the dream that led to 14th Aug?
The “conspiracy of silence” by the so called Pakistani Intellectuals.
The Army has been so overpowering since the first year of Independence.
First C in C defied Jinnah.
Since 1857 we have been reading poetry and living under Baloch Regiment. In 1857 there was war of independence. Lukhnow and Delhi were razed. Who were the people who crushed the dreamers in these two cities? It was the Baloch Regiment. After 1947 they have carried on the ways of the British Masters as Pakistan Armed Company———just a name change from India Office(old Eat India Company).
2007 will be remembered as the year when Pakistanis started the Freedom struggle under a Free Judiciary.
Success or failure does not determine the validity of an Idea.
But we have a Chief Justice who spoke under the Martial Law (http://www.bbc.co.uk/urdu/pakistan/story/2007/11/ 071106_iftikhar_audio_zs.shtml)
and called on us all to defy the Dictator.
The way the son of the Chief Justice of Sind High Court was brutalized can only be called a criminal act. Who is the criminal?
Whatever designation he may give himself today he will meet his fate. He will be tried as a criminal.
History tells us that all tyrants fall.
(He is not even a clever tyrant. The two Judges who gave Lal Masjid back were the first ones to adorn his new court.)
i think it is time for people of pakistan to introspect. what has gone wrong. why is the land of the pure repeatedly getting into such mess! we are the same people here in india, may be that we look very silly sometimes, but we have hung on to our democracy. we faced turbulent times but we survived. why pakistan cannot do it. musarraf is not important, someone else would have done the same thing.what is destroying the dream that led to 14th aug?
Why do we mix personalities with the discussion of fundamental questions. The political discussions and value judgements are a separate issue.
We need to answer these questions:
Do we value our Constitution and our Flag that is a symbol of it?
Do we stand committed to hold our Flag high like all other nations?
Do we stand committed to cut any hand (irrespective of our political affiliations) that dares desecrate our Flag?
Do we believe that all Pakistanis are equal among equals?
Do we believe in the rule of Law (applied equally to all)?
That green flag was not obtained without sacrifice.
That green flag was obtained after the sacrifice of millions of our relatives who perished in the hope of holding it high one day.
That green flag was not obtained that we appoint a man to safeguard it and he turns around to desecrate it.
That green flag was not obtained that when it flies on the Supreme Court of Pakistan the trusted “safeguarder” should send tanks to surround it.
Look at the picture of the New York Firefighters who raised the Flag on 9/11 while there was fire all around them.
Do we have that commitment to our Flag?