Remembering Iqbal Bano (b. 1935 in Delhi – d. 21 April 2009 Lahore)

The great Ghazal singer of our time died in Lahore 21 April 2009. She gave new life to Faiz’s poem “Ham Dekhan gay”.Iqbal Bano, was an outstanding female Ghazal singer and a singer of both classical and modern ghazals. Bano was brought up and raised in Delhi. In 1952, a zamindaar from Multan married seventeen-year-old Iqbal Bano with a promise that he would never stop her music, but try to promote her. He fulfilled his promise until his death in 1980. After her husband passed away, Bano moved to, Lahore. It was observed that her temperament was particularly suited to vocal genres like thumri, dadra and ghazal.

I was grad five or six student in 1971, and still I cant forget the sadness, misery and hopelessness was in the faces of every adults in remaining Pakistan after fall of Dhaka. Teachers at school parents and other extended family members everybody was just crying and speechless…. Then ZAB takeover and there was hope in the air ….. during that time on Radio Pakistan there were number of new patriotic songs…. Some were amazing ….among them was …“Meray Watan ka nawjawan – watan ka geet gai ja” Iqbal Bano was the singer …. What a magic healing affect this song brought ….. unbelievable.

K2 ka Pakistan

No no I am not talking about the well-known slogan from K2 cigarette commercial. I am talking about our real K2 (King Kiani)… the pride of Pakistan ….. best of the best

The tradition to fabricate the urge for military rule in Pakistan goes back to late 50s. Rao Rasheed, Ex-IG police wrote in his book Jo mani dekha – that railway police arrested the man red-handed for planting the bomb in PWR train and during early investigation the poor guy shows his MI card that he is obeying the orders of his commanding officer. Actually Ayub Khan’s army intelligence was working on the justification-sheet for up coming military rule … then Fazli Haq’s diary about Zia – how he and his MI worked on the same lines in 1977 and then Asghar Khan’s letter to services chiefs …. Naeem Bukhari’s notorious open letter and Ansar Abbasi’s so called investigating report against CJ Iftikhar Chaudhry …

Now you guys must be thinking I will give some evidence that our king Kiani’s MI is also working to create some sort of justification-sheet…. the justification K2 might need ….
No no … now situation is very different …he is real king. . . . good professional soldier… and our Pakistani nation …. don’t resist anymore to any muggers ….. Similar to the act of the poor lady of Sadat Hassan Manto’s famous short story …. “Khool doo” ….

Don’t worry nature will not beat our dil dil Pakistan with two sticks . . . . one at a time only – now its time to get hit from Taliban ….. Don’t worry about Pak Fauj at this point of history …. they need some break …..

Ham sada hey aysay tha ki youn hi pazerai
Jis bar kizan aayin samjha ka bahar aayi - Faiz a Faiz

Jo bou ga wohi kato ga (As you sow so shall you reap)

“Khada Pita Sain Da – baki Nadir Shahi Da” - meaning of this Punjabi proverb is: whatever you consume from your earning, is yours, but the savings for rainy days and rest of your hard work earning will be looted by Nadir Shah’s Army.

This is still popular expression among old folks in Punjab. Social historians believe that this phrase comes into life during early 18 century when Nadir Shah and other Afghan warriors invaded Northern India year after year and every time when Afghan warriors entered in the cities they looted civilians regardless of there ethnic or religious background and brought the looted assets back to there mountain region of Tribal Areas and Afghanistan. When Mughal Empire (exception to Aurangzaeb’s time) was strong these Afghan warriors stopped invaded India but before and after they kept terrorizing the region, there was short break during Ranjit Singh’s era as well. Actually during Mughals, these Afghan warlords were getting enough from Empire, so they never felt the need for looting. British Empire also had hard time to protect Northern India from Afghan warriors but after several wars they sign treaties with Afghans and in 1883 successfully they established Durand Line as international boundaries.

Until 1980 it was more or less respected by all sides. In 1980s Pakistani army & CIA jointly initiated proxy war against socialist Afghan government to protect US interests in the region. In this ghost war they exploited Islam to motivate non-state actors to start terror against Afghan and Russian troops. Around the world, (brainwashed) youngsters brought into the region to start US sponsored terror against Afghan socialist government but majority of them were local Afghans and Pakistanis illiterate fanatics. This was the big blow for non state actors to grow larger then state power in the region. Durand Line was disrespected by CIA, Pakistan Army and militant jehadis for over 20 years. That is also a historic fact that the USSR did big mistake for entering there troops in Afghanistan. After USSR left Afghanistan and US also stop taking the interest in the country, then Pakistan Army found this golden opportunity to control entire Afghanistan and they did this successfully for number of years (through Talaban). With this mess, the arrangement of modern history, where boundaries were respected was jeopardize on the hands of non-state actors. Now the status of Durand Line is backed to before 1883 era.

In the year 2001 after 9/11 world was changed and Pakistan was forced to take ‘U” turn against there own creation, the beasts called Jehadi Talaban. These newly orphans were not raised to respect Durand Line or any other rules of Islam or civilized world. Now where we are? Are we going back to 18th century situation again? The time when some of the reliable Muslims clerics of Punjab and Northern India used to invite Afghans to invade India on the name of protecting Islam but once they reached, only scars of atrocity left behind.

Great Punjabi intellectual of that time Bulleh Shah was also among the critics of those Muslim clerics they supported Afghan warriors:
"Mullah te mashalch, donu iko chit Loka karday chanan, aap andheray wich” (The mullah and the torch-bearer Hail from the same stock They give light to others, And themselves are in the dark.) "Sach kanda bhanbhar balda nain”.

Unfortunately the masses never stand against terror on the name of Allah and unfortunately elite class of that time was also a part of that atrocity on there own people – this brought into the situation when everybody in Punjab was saying: “Khada Pita Sain Da – baki Nadir Shahi Da”
The moral of this story is: Jo bou ga wohi kato ga (As you sow so shall you reap)

Can we stop Pakistan falling on the hands of Terror?

Most of the people like me strongly believe, that the danger, state of Pakistan and its citizens are facing today is the direct result of there own policies during and after Afghan-Soviet war of 80s. Pakistani agencies and CIA created and trained these so-called jehadi savage groups to fight against Russians and later on we used them to control entire Afghanistan and then we tried to convert some of them towards neighbor hostile state. Other then USA and western world, Saudi Arab was the main sponsor of this evil adventure of 80s. To make Saudis happy these militant groups were trained with the coating of the fanatic interpretation of Wahabi Islam. After 9/11 under the pressure of USA and international community, Pakistan government (reluctantly) did “U” turn and they turn their guns against there own pets. At this point, the history changed and Bin Laden and his disciples took solo leadership position of these groups. After US war on Iraq and other foreign policies of President Bush, the public opinion in Saudi and other Muslim countries went further in favor of Al-Qaida/Jehadis. Generosity of rich Saudis and some other Muslims made these groups more resourceful and brutal. At now the terrorists are the loose network of three types of forces: a) Fanatics b) Lunatics c) Criminals. With this un-holly marriage, now the situation is that all these evil groups are out of control under the tent of Jehades.

This was very brief background. The question is - how to fix this mess and stop the nuclear power nation Pakistan falling in the hands of lunatics, fanatics and criminals?

The answers or discussions on the issue from different corners I am getting at this time are:

Pakistani Media: Major segment of them portrays soft corner for terrorists, most of them are suggesting that it is not our war because we don’t have this situation before US invasion of Afghanistan. They are suggesting don’t do any operation against them, you should negotiate with them. Some of the media anchors provoke government to take military action against the people they challenge the writ of the state. But when government takes action they flip into other side and criticizing government for killing there own people. (Lal-Masjid incident and tribal area military operations are the best fit examples of this).

Politicians: Other then present ruling party and his allies, majority of political parties taking the same position as media. Because this is the popular lines and it gives them easy fame.

General population: Because of the poor performance and bad governance of governments, they are not very much standing in back of any government but overall they are divided and confused. Majority of them believe on conspiracy theories that USA and India is playing all the evil game and our nukes are the target. But recent terrorist attacks in Punjab cities might change there attitude.

I think: Pakistanis have lot of potential, they can comeback safely out of this deadly situation. Regardless of there differences, the nation has to unit on this issue and as a first step they have to put pressure on media and political/religious leaders and there schools not to be sympathetic with these terrorist groups. Pakistan Army and political governments have to make it there number one priority and they should attack first on there supply lines, especially cash flow from rich Saudis etc., and on the basis of efficient intelligence network they should attack there leadership with iron hands on there sanctuaries, no matter those sanctuaries are in mosques or in madrasas in big cities or in mountains. At this time it feels me that Pakistan is bleeding badly and no-body is there to rescue this poor body.

With big hope that this situation will change – asjad

So called Islamic emails

From time to time we all receive some kind of so-called Islamic emails… I am posting some of the parts of my email to one of my friend who forwarded recently two emails to me:
This is my viewpoint on it... I am just writing few lines in response to the previous two emails you forwarded to me… I don’t means to hurt or offend you – please consider this just the opinion from elder brother… I am just expressing my personal opinion BUT you have the right to disagree totally or partially …

We know from centuries humans are discriminating and killing each other on the bases of color, race, ethnic, religious and linguistic basis and also on the basis of so many other artificial classifications. If we read the history critically from this perspective – most of the time greed for wealth and resources is the motive behind the wars and killing – but ordinary folks are too emotional about there religious, ethnic or any other circle, they lost the ability to see the real culprits behind or sometime they have there own evil wishes as well. I think being good human, being good Muslim and being the good followers of Prophet Mohammad (PBUH) we shouldn’t be the part of that hate and greed game.
This is going on from centuries that people from different believe systems hate and kill each others…. There leaders have there own agendas and ignorant followers are being used as ammunition, basically humanity is suffering in this war. We need to apply our intellect to think out of the box. I can’t speak on behalf of others but I like to say something about the message of the last prophet of Allah Mohammad (PBUH) – “All humans are one nation (Omata wahida Insaniya) and Allah is the creator of all” Can you eliminate hate with hate, can we control wild fire with lighting more fire? … Lets contribute to defeat this hate, we know we cant have complete success in this life but at least we can contribute few drops as a positive step OR at least we can satisfy our souls that we follow the rules we trust.

Lets come to first email about Coco-Cola logo: This message is floating from years and years. My kids brought this from school… Anyway, why should I need to flip the Coca-Cola logo horizontally? And then to do the adjustment of the image that might looks like with some non-sense meaning that really hurts my believe? Who is putting that much effort behind and to stretch in this way – I have nothing more to say about this type of people other then this, that the brain(s) behind these messages are not positive and Allah give them courage to spread the last message of Allah in some positive and effective manners.

Regarding the email about the death of an artist he drew picture of our Prophet – let me tell you that the artists they drew those cartoons were 12 or more and not the one as it was mentioned in the email. Is in it our responsibility to do some research rather the news is correct or wrong? Even if it is true - why we are giving importance to these non-sense and sick people. In the words of one of our famous sufi poet of Punjabi Mian Mohammad Bux “ Dusman mare ta kushi na karia – Sajna wi warjana”
I recognize the fact that there are lobbies and people in this world they hate our prophet and our believe and also hate us. But the message of Islam is not reactionary – it is final message of creator to all of his creation to take benefit of his accurate advice. If somebody or some nations don’t want to follow this advice it is bad luck for them… BUT we should be behaving in the light of high human values of Quran not based on the bad actions or practices of others as reactionaries. Does this makes sense? For me it is.
Regards,