بابا مجھ کو ڈر لگتا ہے

بابا میری مس کہتی ہیں
کل سے سب بچوں کو اپنے
گھر رہنا ہے، گھر پڑھنا ہے.!

میں نے سنا ہے !
ایک بڑے سے، کالی مونچھوں والے “انکل”
بومب (bomb) لگا کر آئیں گے
سب بچے مر جایں گے !!

بابا کیوں ماریں گے ہمکو !؟
ہم سے کوئی بھول ہوئی کیا ؟
ہم سے کیوں ناراض ہیں “انکل”؟

بابا ان کو گڑیا دے دوں ؟
یا پھر میرے رنگوں والی، یاد ہے نہ وہ نیلی ڈبیا
میری پچھلی سالگرہ پر، مجھ کو آپ نے لا کر دی تھی

اور میری وہ پیاری پونی
ریڈ کلر کی – تتلی والی !
وہ بھی دے دوں -؟
پھر تو نہیں ماریں گے مجھ کو ؟

یاد ہے بابا، ایک دفعہ جب !
مجھ کو ہاتھ پہ چوٹ لگی تھی .
بہت زیادہ درد ہوا تھا – !!
تھوڑا سا خون بھی نکلا تھا !!
بہت زیادہ روئ تھی میں !!!

کیا یہ بم بڑا ہوتا ہے ؟
بہت زیادہ چوٹ لگے گی؟
درد بھی شاید زیادہ ہو گا !!

بابا مجھ کو ڈر لگتا ہے

(عاطف جاوید عاطف

Phool mera watan

Happy Independence Day !!!

I dont know if its just me, or actually, people have been more into celebrating Pakistan, after the restoration of Cheif Justice of Pakistan. Be it T20 Worldcup, or Independence Day or anything else. For the last 10 years at least, after the atomic explosions by government, I dont remember a single moment, when I have felt this way towards Pakistan. All the mili naghme had become meaningless. They just wont appeal. Army, no mention. Just dont talk about them. Putting a flag-badge near your heart would seem childish. And all that.

Green Da Kolor of Love ... Spread It

Source

But now, thanks to Allah, the pride is back. Milli naghme are as inspiring as they used to be in childhood, even more. Anything green, appeals. There has been Facebook/Twitter compaigns to turn everything into green. Army is getting its respect back. People have started to believe in them again. Things are getting better.

The enemies have tried Taliban, they are pushed back. They tried to create an artificial hype of Taliban in Punjab and Sindh, they are set silent. They tried to bisect Punjab, and the break country as a whole into parts, they were met strongly. They tried to create shia/sunni Christian/Muslim riots, they have failed. Pakistan stood strong in the face of all the plans. Goverment deserves an applause for tackling all this.

They are not done as yet, as they are trying to play Balochistan, but hopes are high.

Then there are internal problems, of power-outage and sugar. Goverment still needs to answer these. If they try sincerely, these are non-issue, created artificially, and can be handled without much effort, but the stakeholders will lose money, and that is something which is holding goverment from doing anything.

Khair … lets hope for the best.

Pakistan Paendabad !!!

Punjab / 2 = ?

We have a good track record of creating issues from non-issues. Be it Lal-Masjid massacre, TTP, or anything else, we toss an idea, nourish it, and take extreme care to nourish it well, till the time it emerges as a monster, which we, who created it in the first place, are incapable of handling it anymore. Then we let it get to streets, and mourn the fruits it brings & work, dedicatedly, to find & toss another such idea. And the circle continues ….

Its creation of new provinces this time. And the pinnacle of this idea is to bi-sect Punjab, while the bi part is open to debate, as it can easily tranlslate into tri or multi for that matter. Its a different discussion whether its a good idea to go for smaller adminstration units or not, myself being a supporter of the notion, the problem we currently have at hands is “Do we need it?”.

I was commenting on the same issue at another thread, and I qoute here:

While I agree to the idea of smaller administration units; the logics behind and the fruits it may bring, this may not be, the right time to begin the debate.

We are already surrounded by a plethora of problems that our government has proven to be incapable of handling:

- We have more than 2 million IDPs at our hands, and we have no plan for them.
- Our army is at war at more than one fronts, and yet to conclude any single of them. Ironically, all the fronts are internal.
- We have people deciding our matters, who seem to have no clue whatsoever, of what they are talking about.
- We are yet to settle the issues in Balochistan.

and the list continues ….

Amid all this mess, I don’t see any rationale for starting an altogether new issue, which has no urgency of the nature. And I don’t know why, but to me, the way this issue has arisen, or has been made to rise, to national horizon, raises suspicions. I mean from nowhere, it just touched the national headlines.

And thanks to Eidee Man, for pointing out, its not just Saraiki Sooba then. While PPP may be sincere in bisecting Punjab, but then it has stuff to follow, that neither our government, nor us, the public, are prepared, mentally and technically, to absorb. What will immediately follow is Bahawalpur. Then its Karachi. And it will amplify Balochistan’s voice for no reason.

While in essence of the idea of having smaller administration units, Bahawalpur and Karachi should be welcomed, but the prevailing political mindset in the country, and the trend majority of my countrymen follow in their thought process, suggests to the contrary. It will give rise to political instability, as political stakeholders in different areas have conflicting personal/party-level interests, and if they found it ungoing with what they want, they will resist the situation in a manner, quite damaging to the integrity of the country.

As somebody has already said, we already have smaller administration units, districts, and divisions. We should give them more power, if we *have* to handle this stuff on an urgent basis, for which I don’t see any need in current situation.

IMHO, we should stay content with what we have, try (read struggle) to solve the current problems, and once we reach a state where we can find some breathing space, we can think about these administration improvements.

We should learn to prioritize problems as compared to enhancements, and concentrate on top priority issues.

While the legislative thrives with comments from the MPs hailing from different parts of the homeland, I look up to my Lord and pray, “Please save my homeland.” Aameen!

In our veins the blood runs green, not red

Congrats everybody.

Pakistan is through to World Twenty20 Cup’s final. South Africa retains the chokers’ tag as before. They are famous to choke under pressure, and are yet to win a major title in Cricket. And we, the greens, as unpredictable as ever, astonished the world with an outstanding performance, yet again.

Source: CricInfo.com – © Associated Press

The blood in our veins is indeed green. Facebook choked for around 20 minutes right after Pakistan’s win. It probably couldn’t stand the feed updates Pakistanis around the world generated in those 20 minutes. Most of Pakistanis out of Pakistan were relying on different online streams. And the streaming servers would choke down every now and then.

This win is also important at this point in time to let the world hear atleast one news from Pakistan that doesn’t involve bombs. We are living difficult times.

Younis Khan is being talked about as doing blunders by not having Umar Gul bowl his 4 overs’ spell, and giving the ball to Fawad instead who cost 15 runs to the side. Had Pakistan not won the match, this would have caused a big question mark on Younis Khan’s on ground decisions. But there is another opinion that Umar Gul was unable to do reverse swing from the end he was bowling, so to change his bowling end, his over was skipped. But may be Fawad was not a good option at that point in game.

Anyway … it was a success at the end of day. We are happy. Very happy. We pray for Pakistan to get through finals with same glory, and wish luck to the team.

I miss my Pakistan …

[ Source:  Musti Mohsin ]

Dharna ho ga, dharna ho ga

I was reading BBC Urdu a while ago, when I came across this on a news post:

تاہم شور مچنے پر اردگرد موجود سینکڑوں کارکن وہاں جمع ہو گئے اور انہوں نے حکومت کے خلاف نعرے بازی کی۔ ان میں بعض ایسی خواتین کارکن بھی موجود تھیں جنہوں نے اپنے بچوں کے ہمراہ رات اسی ٹینٹ میں گزاری تھی۔

Mr. President should be warned. If people have taken it to this level; mothers took their children along, to stay in the camp & participate in the protest in morning, this is not an ordinary gesture, its well beyond extra-ordinary rather. People would no longer tolerate him, and quite understandbly.

I wonder if he had any remote idea of what was to follow his move to tople the Punjab goverment. He is in the same row as was Mr. Pervez Musharraf when he took it against the Cheif Justice. And it would cost him the same, even more, may be.

He even managed to cause termoil in his own party. There clearly are two opinions there, more than two may be. As if that was not enough, he got his senior ministers to resign. And thats not only at the top level, workers at base level, feel ashamed of being affiliated with the party. He has got himself into a mess that he doesn’t seem capable of, to handle. He trusts the people around him, who are no better material to handle the situation than himself. God bless you Mr. President.

On the other hand, Mr. Nawaz Sharif seems to know what he has to do, knows it well rather. And he has got the courage to do that, which he never showed before this. The way he broke the police barriers, has not only shown good on himself, but has injected the courage into his workers and people in general as well. If there is police, no worries, just break them. When people get to this level of confrontation, that they dont take armed personnel into serious account, Mr. President, things are not good for you.

This move will also force other political leaders like Imran Khan & Qazi Hussain Ahmed to do something of the same level. Ripple effect will go to Lawyers as well. End result; Jeena ho ga Marna ho ga, Dharna ho ga Dharna ho ga. Kudos for Nawaz Sharif.

I have heard there is some acivity planned here in London as well, but I do not have details. They are planning for some march, but they didnt advertise it. Nobody seems to know about it.

Lets wait & see what turn things take from here. And lets pray things dont go voilent, thats the worst that can happen, waist of innocent lives. May Allah bless the homeland.

The pub experience

Last evening, I for the first time entered a pub.

A lets-have-a-drink party was offered by my manager. Infact it was our weekly team meeting, and as I have moved to a different project, I have been excused of the weekly meetings for a while now. So I was a bit surprised last evening when I got a message on internal IM, for a meeting in Meeting Room “P”. And I was wondering if they changed the meeting-room-names again ? as we dont have any meeting room named “P”, when my manager disclosed P is for Pub

As xmas holidays are almost there, it was a just a goodwill gesture to say good bye to 2008, as it was our 2nd last day in office before 2009.

Pub is more of a social place. Where you can sit, have a drink, and chat. Yup, thats it. This provide a good hangout for everybody, at reasonable prices.

It was a nice big cafe, serving only drinks. The place was quite cosy, keeping the outside temperature in view.  We sat there for 2-3 hours I guess, and chatted about almost everthing.

I was thinking about Pakistan. OK if we talk about Rawalpindi Saddar, how many decent places can you  name where you can get to with some friends in evening, and have a cup of tea, for a decent price. None, I am afraid. And its not just Saddar, its the same all over. And its not just pindi, its the same all over. Islamabad may have some good places to sit, but I repeat, decent price is also a concern.

Then there  are those chotay-ka-hotels, the small tea shops, where you can always get tea. Some of them also offer place to sit, but that is by no means decent. Its not clean, its not calm, and a lot of other concerns. So, not an option.

No wonder, we dont get anytime to sit with friends for a while, let alone socialize.

PS: Just to keep the records straight, I had an orange juice, and a coke-with-lemon. Yup, on rocks 

The security has been tightened …

upto a dangerous level.

While looking at “Guzashta Hafte ka Pakistan“, at BBC Urdu, this image seemed a bit odd.

I mean its fine, we have lady constables, and they carry MP44 (im not sure but it seems to be)  while patroling through the crowd. What seems odd was the position of fingers the ladies have, particulary the one ahead. If you see, its quite dangerously placed. Just a little push from side, which is quite easy to get in a crowd, and there you go …  Yeah, rite, its normally locked, but even then the guys are trained not to put it there, unless they intend to fire. I guess they might be posing for the photo. But if this is not the case, they need a bit more training may be …

The shoes have been traced …

I received this today on my class’ mailing list, and couldn’t help posting it here

The pair of shoes which was thrown at Mr. Bush in Iraq has links to
Pakistan, said a statement from Pentagon. They have the following
proofs:

i) The journalist had visited Pakistan earlier this year. There he was
inspired by the shoe throwing at former CM Arbab Ghulam Rahim and Sher
Afghan Niazi.

ii) He received his training of throwing shoes by a Pakistan based
Jihadi organization.

iii) The DNA sample of leather has revealed that the animal whose skin
was used for manufacturing the shoe had traces of grass which is grown
in North of Pakistan and this skin was collected by a Jihadi
organization on Eid-ul-Adha this month.

Hearing this, President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Yousaf
Raza Gilani have decided to ban the Jihadi organization and launched a
country wide crackdown against all the cobblers in Pakistan

Yeah, its funny, but contains some food for thought …

Commercialization ???

I was looking for some literature regarding sufi saint Hazrat Ali Hajveri (RA) and I stumbled upon this site. The site is maintained by some Dr Zia al Hassan. There are just a couple of pages, with no useful information or anything. But what caught my attention was the ads present at every available space. And ads too, a little unsuitable for a saint’s site:

One ad is for Slumdog Millionaire, and others take you to dating websites. And the web master is so blunt that he explicitly asks the visitors to click on ads.

Now if this website is run in good spirit, which it is not, then if you dont have money to run it, dont run it. Such good spirit is uncalled for.

And if you are tying to make money out of it, which you surely are, you better be ashamed of yourself, of being so cheap.

I wonder why an educated individual, who places “Dr.” before his name, has no respect for morals.