Adil Najam

This seems to have suddenly become a news-heavy day. Lal Masjid blast on teh one hand and now Musharraf-Benazir meetings. The News reports on this:

The second round of meeting between President General Pervez Musharraf and former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto is underway here, the reliable sources said. The first round of the meeting lasted for about lasted for 55 minutes and it was a short a meeting. The ISI chief, some personalities of Arab countries and western diplomats also attended the meeting, the other sources said. Although the details of the meeting were not issued, however, the reports said that Musharraf and Benazir discussed important issues including current political situation in Pakistan.

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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.

Bilal Zuberi

Karachiites will certainly remember fiery speeches from Altaf Hussain and other MQM leaders of the 1980’s and 1990’s where he argued and pleaded against the rural-urban quota system which had been imposed in the Sindh province since 1973. MQM, at that point, had argued strongly that such a quota system was not only undemocratic, but also prejudiced, and sought to alienate the educated urban middle class, and create a permanent rift between the Sindhis and the Mohajirs.

The argument, as I remember clearly from public rallies and TV appearances of Altaf Hussain, was that Pakistan needed to move towards a merit-based system, and far away from a quota system. This would be just and equitable, and would also ensure that the best qualified people were taking up government jobs.

With that party manifesto in mind, the news today in Daily Times that Sindh gov’t has decided to do away with a Rural-Urban quota system, in favor of a political party based quota system, where MQM gets to have 50% of the appointment offers, comes as a surprise.