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Posted by ali rehan munir in INDIAN GOVTS LIES EXPOSED on July 16th, 2013
Govt behind Parliament attack, 26/11: Ishrat probe officer
NEW DELHI: Jul 14, 2013, 12.30 AM IST
In what is certain to escalate the already vicious fight between the CBI and the IB over the Ishrat Jahan “fake encounter case”, a former home ministry officer has alleged that a member of theCBI-SIT team had accused incumbent governments of “orchestrating” the terror attack on Parliament and the 26/11 carnage in Mumbai. R V S Mani, who as home ministry under-secretary signed the affidavits submitted in court in the alleged encounter case, has said that Satish Verma, until recently a part of the CBI-SIT probe team, told him that both the terror attacks were set up “with the objective of strengthening the counter-terror legislation (sic)”.
Mani has said that Verma “…narrated that the 13.12. 2001 (attack on Parliament) was followed by Pota (Prevention of Terrorist Activities Act) and 26/11 2008 (terrorists’ siege of Mumbai) was followed by amendment to the UAPA (Unlawful Activities Prevention Act).” The official has alleged Verma levelled the damaging charge while debunking IB’s inputs labelling the three killed with Ishrat in the June 2004 encounter as Lashkar terrorists.
Contacted by TOI, Verma refused to comment. “I don’t know what the complaint is, made when and to whom. Nor am I interested in knowing. I cannot speak to the media on such matters. Ask the CBI,” said the Gujarat cadre IPS officer who after being relieved from the SIT is working as principal of the Junagadh Police Training College. Mani, currently posted as deputy land anddevelopment officer in the urban development ministry, has written to his seniors that he retorted to Verma’s comments telling the IPS officer that he was articulating the views of Pakistani intelligence agency ISI.
According to him, the charge was levelled by Verma in Gandhinagar on June 22 while questioning Mani about the two home ministry affidavits in the alleged encounter case. In his letter to the joint secretary in the urban development ministry, Mani has accused Verma of “coercing” him into signing a statement that is at odds with facts as he knew them. He said Verma wanted him to sign a statement saying that the home ministry’s first affidavit in the Ishrat case was drafted by two IB officers. “Knowing fully well that this would tantamount to falsely indicting of (sic) my seniors at the extant time, I declined to sign any statement.”
Giving the context in which Verma allegedly levelled the serious charge against the government, Mani said the IPS officer, while questioning him, had raised doubts about the genuineness of IB’s counter-terror intelligence. He disputed the veracity of the input on the antecedents of the three killed in June 2004 on the outskirts of Ahmedabad with Ishrat in the alleged encounter which has since become a polarizing issue while fuelling Congress’s fight with Gujarat CM Narendra Modi.
Gujarat Police has justified the encounter citing the IB report that Pakistani nationals Zeeshan Zohar, Amzad Ali Rana and Javed Sheikh were part of a Lashkar module which had reached Gujarat to target Modi and carry out terrorist attacks. In its first affidavit, filed in August 2009, the home ministry had cited IB inputs that those killed with Ishrat in the alleged encounter were part of a Lashkar sleeper cell, and had objected to a CBI probe into the “encounter”.
In its second affidavit, filed in September 2009, the home ministry, irked by the Gujarat government treating the first affidavit as justification of the encounter, said the IB input did not constitute conclusive proof of the terrorist antecedents of those killed. It supported the demand for a CBI probe.
Mani said Verma doubted the input saying MHA’s first affidavit was actually drafted by IB officer Rajinder Kumar, who looked after IB’s operations in Gujarat at the time of Ishrat “encounter” and now runs the serious risk of being chargesheeted by the CBI for hatching the conspiracy behind the alleged extra-judicial killings. Mani said Verma stuck to his guns even after being told that the home ministry did not need outside help. The former home ministry official said Verma insisted that the “input” was prepared after the encounter.
Posted by qinsarfaraz in Hindu India, HIndu Terrorism, MAKAAR HINDUS on July 15th, 2013
Here was an Indian star that I thought no end of, one who symbolised the warm, calming hug her people badly needed after their bruising tryst with foreign rule and an even more lacerating struggle to win freedom.
That was Lata Mangeshkar. She could switch from a gentle morning pick-me-up in a Marathi ‘Bhoopali’ to a more nuanced love expressed in Persianised Urdu, linking two diverse strands of free India’s cultural mix. She could dredge out Ghalib’s soul with a purist’s diction and sway with Shakeel’s rustic verse in an eastern UP dialect for Dhanno in Ganga Jamuna with the gentlest inflection of her vocal cords.
Perhaps she was a born polyglot, I would think with admiration. How else could she deliver Iqbal’s Kabhi ae haqeeqat emuntazar with the swirl of a dervish?
‘When I bowed my forehead in supplication/the earth itself pleaded with me: /Your heart is riveted to an icon of stone/Why do you waste your time in namaaz?’
I have leaned on Iqbal’s complex lines, which Lata sang with uncluttered ease only to illustrate the romance she engendered in the halcyon days that came with independence.
Lata Mangeshkar and Mohammad Rafi: what a team they made for a newly freed people. Their duets, so popular in Pakistan, in a sense defied the idea of Pakistan itself with their true notes. In some ways the duo single-handedly undid the communal damage that came with the partition, not just in India but in Pakistan too, where she remained a household favourite at the head of other great singers.
Then something snapped last week. In her moment of personal trauma, Lata Mangeshkar bared her heart. She revealed she felt orphaned by Bal Thackeray’s passing away, but she didn’t stop there.
She went on to describe the Shiv Sena chief as a “Hindu hriday samraat”, a ruler of Hindu hearts. We knew that it was how many of his admirers, his less intellectually gifted followers, shall we say, saw him.
People who knew her claimed that Lata Mangeshkar donated a sum of her earnings to the Shiv Sena. But all this was seen as a tithe decent folks often pay after 1992-1993 to keep nuisance at bay. But now she revealed she may have been a devout bhakta of Thackeray, the self-proclaimed fascist whose adulation of Hitler only matched his love for Nathuram Godse, Gandhi’s assassin.
Let’s leave alone his hatred of Muslims and of Pakistan. I thought a majority of people Thackeray hated were Hindus. They were Hindu Gujaratis, Hindu Biharis or their cousins from Uttar Pradesh, Hindu Tamils and others from South India, communists, Brahmins.
They were all Hindu, if they must be given that identity at all, but they were all targeted albeit selectively in different stages of the rise of the Shiv Sena. In one stroke Lata Mangeshkar had disowned millions of her ardent fans.
I am not even broaching Thackeray’s documented role in the demolition of the Babri Masjid. Did the singing diva of India, decorated with the country’s highest civilian honour, agree with the Ayodhya sacrilege? And did she get to read the Justice Shri Krishna Commission report on the anti-Muslim pogroms in Mumbai that followed the outrage in Ram’s birthplace? The killings, according to the report, were carried out by Thackeray’s foot soldiers, that she admires, in 1992-93. Is that what made her proud of the ruler of Hindu hearts?
Lata Mangeshkar has said she learnt some of the tricks of playback singing from listening to Noorjehan. They had a lot in common, including an army of followers that remained loyal to each, often to the exclusion of the other. They also sang for their armies, the real fighting ones.
And yet, as far as I can tell, Noorjehan would never have wooed religious fundamentalists, much less those who earn their keep from fomenting ill-will towards India. She wouldn’t have been a darling of Faiz if she had.
Thackeray of course had bigger fish to fry than playing The Godfather to his favourite admirer. He was a creature of India’s emerging consensus and that is the scarier part. It was his ability to cut across the political redlines, which anointed him as a more successful fascist than his other rightwing rivals have been shown to be.
Consider the grovelling and fawning news channels. And look at the grief writ on movie star Amitabh Bachchan’s face at Sunday’s funeral, or take corporate czar Anil Ambani who looked one of the most bereaved in the mêlée of Mumbai’s elite.
Both of them support the rightwing claimant to India’s top job, Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi, and both have political associations that shore up the supposedly secular government of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.
The fact is that Thackeray fulfilled corporate India’s need to suspend democracy if the going got tough and this would be done by a national consensus. He represented a militant, aggressive pro-market quest of the Indian state, one that can only be placated by bludgeoning its own people.
Every party needs to outdo the other in the bloody act. Lata Mangeshkar would appear to be a misfit in the gory denouement of India that Thackeray’s Shiv Sena revelled in. Else she could allow herself to beguile her fans with the siren call of fascism.
The writer is Dawn’s correspondent in Delhi.
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Posted by aka in PEOPLE WANT TO KNOW on July 15th, 2013
People want to know
Asif Haroon Raja
The new regime has been handed down a huge mess and is at a loss where to start from and which problem to tackle first. All macroeconomic indicators are in negative, national kitty is empty and foreign investment has dried up. It has inherited bankrupt economy, an unmanageable energy crisis, massive debt, lawlessness and fraught security situation. The new leaders are heard saying that they do not have the magic wand to put things in order in a jiffy and that it would require considerable time and resources to overcome the chronic problems. The last government also used to complain that it had inherited war on terror, faltering economy, energy crisis and disharmony between provinces. There are certain lingering doubts in the minds of the people about which they are heard talking.
The two stints of PPP from 1988 to 1990 and 1994 to 1996 together with harsh US sanctions set the stage for downslide of economic indicators. Cases of corruption against late Benazir Bhutto (BB), Zardari and others were first registered after President Ishaq Khan sacked BB’s government in 1993 and again registered in 1997 after President Farooq Leghari sacked BB’s second government. When some of the cases were nearing completion stage during Nawaz Sharif’s second stint in power, BB shifted to London in 1999. Gen Musharraf pursued the same cases through NAB. BB and others stayed in self-imposed exile till their way was cleared through NRO in October 2007 by Gen Musharraf. PPP leading lights, the bureaucrats associated with them in corruption scandals and thousands of MQM leaders and activists involved in heinous crimes were let off.
For ten years the accused kept the courts in a spin by adopting dilly-dallying tactics and didn’t allow a single case to conclude, which was so-called victory for the accused but a matter of embarrassment for our courts. Once the PPP returned to power after 2008 elections, its leaders continued with their old policy of evasion and defiance of higher courts after the Supreme Court (SC) nullified the NRO in December 2009 and reopened corruption cases including money laundering cases pending against the royal couple in Geneva, London and Madrid that had been closed by Malik Qayum at the behest of Gen Musharraf. PM Gilani refused to initiate letter to Swiss authorities to reopen the case as directed by the SC on the plea that the President enjoyed immunity. Gilani had to pay for this unwarranted defiance by losing his post and his right to take part in elections.
His successor Raja Pervez Ashraf hoodwinked the SC by first initiating a letter to Swiss authorities on 5 November 2012 to treat the letter written by Malik Qayum as cancelled but secretly posted another letter on 22 November 2012 asserting that the case may be considered as closed. Change of government has unraveled the unholy act in which Farooq A. Naek and former Law Secretary Yasmin Abbasi were involved. People want to know why so much of time and resources were wasted on Swiss case by the SC and that too without any outcome; whether it will be able to reopen the case in Geneva and get the looted $60 million back and also award exemplary punishment to those who deceived the SC and the nation.
PPP won 2008 elections because of sympathy wave generated after BB’s tragic murder and Zardari promising to get hold of her murderers at all cost. In its five years tenure, PPP leaders remained too engrossed in filling their coffers and saving themselves and their cronies from accountability, but made little effort to trace the killers of BB. Why couldn’t her assassins be traced and punished when Zardari claimed that he knew the murderers? Why was her chief security officer Rahman Malik who mysteriously vanished from the scene of crime, or those present inside her bullet proof vehicle not quizzed? Why was Scotland Yard hired for millions of dollars and then given a limited mandate?
Why was Musharraf allowed to leave Pakistan in November 2008 when BB in her email to Mark Seigal had mentioned four names including Musharraf as her possible murderers? Gen Musharraf has now been nominated as the prime accused involved in the 27 December 2007 murder. The people of Pakistan are apprehensive that this murder may also not be added in the list of unsolved mysteries? They want to know who assassinated her.
Blackwater made entry into Pakistan in 2007-08 and fuelled terrorism in cities. People want to know who facilitated Blackwater in Pakistan and let them hire hundreds of houses on rent in Islamabad and Lahore, permitted them to open a training facility in Sihala and scores of security companies like DynCorp for the import of weapons. They also question as to why the US was allowed to purchase 16 acres of land to expand its Embassy in Islamabad and thus enable it to eavesdrop on PM Secretariat and Presidency?
They ask why Hussein Haqqani was given a freehand to grant visas to Americans without clearance by ISI and Foreign Office. They are puzzled over Pakistani American Mansoor Ijaz’s sleazy role. After providing startling news about the Memo, hand-written by Hussein Haqqani to Financial Times on October 10, 2011 and fervently pursuing the case in SC for many months, he silently went off the radar screen of print and electronic media. People are eager to know whether this sensitive case will reach its logical end and the main accused Haqqani taken to task by the SC for his treasonous act.
I have written scores of comprehensive articles since 2006 pointing out that Gen Musharraf had allowed a freehand to CIA and FBI in the country and permitted the two agencies to establish Spider Web outfit in FATA under the garb of netting al-Qaeda operatives. Immigration offices on airports were under the control of FBI. ISI got alerted in 2008 and started taking preventive measures when considerable damage had been done. I also wrote about the role of Hussein Haqqani and Rahman Malik at the behest of President Zardari facilitating establishment of countrywide CIA network which enabled the US Navy SEALs to enter Pakistani airspace stealthily on 2 May 2011 and kill Osama. All this has been confirmed by Abbottabad Commission Report leaked by al-Jazeera TV as well as by former DG ISI Lt Gen Pasha. People want to know whether these criminal lapses will be investigated and the accused taken to task?
People are asking why no one has been held accountable for the barbarity perpetrated by the MQM thugs in Karachi on May 12, 2007 at the express wish of Gen Musharraf not to allow chief justice Iftikhar to move out of Karachi airport. They want to know who burnt alive the lawyers’ pursuing May 2007 case in Sindh High Court on April 9, 2008.
Another thing which is upsetting for the people is as to why Rahman Malik at the behest of PPP leadership constantly appeased the MQM knowing that its target killers were killing innocent people in Karachi? Instead of leashing MQM, the PPP launched Dr Zulfiqar Mirza and created its own militant wing in Lyari under the name of Amman Committee. ANP followed suit and so did Sunni Tehrik and TTP. Result was that over 7000 people died in Karachi in five years and mayhem has not stopped. Will anyone be held accountable for the willful massacre? People want to know whether Karachi will be de-weaponized, militant wings of political parties abolished and those on death row hanged.
People want to know who killed Dr Imran Farooq in London and why the PPP government didn’t cooperate with Scotland Yard when it wanted two accused supposedly linked with the murder and in custody of Pak authorities for interrogation. Will the government render all out assistance to UK in catching the killers of Dr Imran? It is UK government that has taken note of political violence of MQM and its Supremo and is proceeding against him and his colleagues on charges of murder of Dr Imran, money laundering and inciting violence in Karachi.
Kargil affair is also shrouded in mystery. It is still not clear whether Gen Musharraf initiated it at his own without taking all his Corps Commanders and PSOs into confidence and without taking clearance from the executive head. And if he did it at his own, what was his real motive.
Initiation of drone war in Pakistan by him also seeks explanation. While Musharraf admitted that he had allowed limited use of drone strikes and handed over Shamsi airbase for this purpose, President Zardari and former PM Gilani have yet to confess that they had allowed Obama administration to accelerate drone war as alleged by Wikileaks. Shamsi airbase remained operational till November 2011.
Was Railway deliberately given to sickly and nincompoop Ghulam Ahmed Bilour to ground it and thus deprive the military means of mobility during war? Were the public state corporations purposely handed over to unqualified and corrupt officials to destroy these institutions and make Pakistan a failed state?
People want to know who is responsible for energy crisis which has incapacitated our industry, forced industrialists to shift to other countries, tormented the people due to load shedding and gas shedding. If PPP regime inherited this problem why it failed to overcome the crisis as is being done by the current regime? Was the crisis really beyond the means of PPP or was it willful with mala fide intentions?
Well knowing that there were glaring flaws in electoral system as had been pointed out by Tahirul Qadri, why were the defects not removed by the PPP government or by the interim government or the Election Commission before holding elections thereby giving reasons to PTI to point fingers at Election Commission and caretakers of massive rigging on May 11, 2013?
Why has war on terror been aimlessly fought for over a decade without national security policy and national counter terrorism policy resulting in loss of 50,000 people and loss of $100 billion?
The writer is a freelance columnist. Email:[email protected]
Posted by malika in INTERNATIONAL on July 15th, 2013
Upright Opinion
July 14, 2013
The Paradoxes of Sex in American Society
By Saeed Qureshi
If someone is under the erroneous impression that American society is sexually permissive, then I may straight away tell you it is not. There are tricky snares laid around that make the outdoor sex a costly and scary undertaking. The sex culture here is a blend of queer paradoxes and intrigues that can turn sour for the fun seekers. More often than not, it would be difficult to distinguish between a street whore and an undercover police operative.
An individual desperately in search of a female could land himself in big trouble enough to ruin his future as a blemished person for all time to come. Those who are categorized as sex offenders carry this millstone for the rest of their lives. Once caught, they are treated as pariah and outcast in the society. The law is unforgiving and they would remain in jail for many years. They cannot live in common neighborhoods. Their dwellings should be far from school zones and they should report to the area police from time to time. In gutter magazines and tabloid papers their pictures are published. These papers are placed at counters of big stores and can be viewed by customers.
The so called sting operations carried by the police have several outlets. One would receive a sudden call from a female with an exceptionally tantalizing and sweet offer to meet her in a lonely or secluded place. She would mention of her being a teenage or young girl recklessly aspiring to make friendship or have sex. The young specifically from the immigrants, are usually enticed and allured thinking that it was a free society so there was nothing wrong with it. He unwittingly falls into a laid out trap.
When he reaches at the appointed location and had just started the conversation with the female (a cover up police officer), he is pounced upon by other operatives and thus starts a nightmarish phase of his life. The immigrant victims of such operations are treated very harshly and even deported. I would wonder why those who initiate sting operations to involve the unassuming through a tricky are not taken to task.
In other situations, the male singles and fun seekers alike would drive at such places mostly roadsides, where call girls make their appearance. But the moment one gets into a conversation all of sudden a police car would barge in and arrest the males letting off the girls. The girls are let off because they would be accomplices in that drama of catching the sex offenders.
In United States if a woman maliciously or vindictively accuses someone of sexual advances, it would be taken as a gospel truth. The first thing that the police would resort to is to handcuff and shove the man in jail. It would take a great deal of prolonged litigation that he could prove his innocence. The false accuser is seldom booked for the suffering caused to a citizen based upon concocted or blown up charges.
Polygamy is forbidden in America under the civil and religious laws. The Mormons whose one sect believes in sexual promiscuity and polygamy cannot follow their religious edits as it is forbidden to marry more than one woman at one time. The Muslims also permitted by Islam to have more than one wife cannot do so. And that is good by the way.
However, what nullifies all this farce or facade of keeping the society immune from sexual predators is to freely and uninhibitedly allow the teen age population to date( love meeting), indulge in sex and have children. Primarily it should be the underage generation to be strictly prohibited from sexual pursuits before the attainment of adulthood. In American every years a staggering amount over 20 billion dollars is expended on teen age mothers, delivery of the babies and follow up care and nursing.
The teen age motherhood is prevalent in most of western countries and United States because of the sexual permissiveness for the youth. According to a 2001 UNICEF survey in 10 out of 12 developed nations more than two third of the young people have had sexual intercourse while still in their teens. In Denmark, Finland, Germany, Iceland, Norway, the United Kingdom and the United States, the proportion is as high as 75 per cent.
In America, due to co-education and almost no check on the young generation and because of the biased legal protection, the teen age girls and boys can have sex at an early age. The teen mothers drop out of the high school during the pregnancy or after the delivery. So do the male partners who take up odd jobs to run the household and to bring up the child. They start the family and household at a much younger age. In hostels where the female and male students live together, the sexual intercourse is frequent.
The children are treated like holy cows to such an extent that an adult even a female is not allowed to touch a teen age boy or girl. Reportedly, many a female teacher lost their jobs for touching a student. This is the height of the sensitivity of discrimination in favor of boys and girls of even minor age. On the contrary there is evidence of incest in American society which could be caused because of the lack of moral awareness on this issue as well as children being the easy targets in the privacy of homes.
In almost every country there are areas for the comfort females to carry their business that is permissible under the law. The redeeming feature of that aspect is that one could release his pent- up sexual urge at such secluded yet highly guarded zones. In those countries the neighborhoods remain immune from sex predators. But here in America the outdoor sex is drastically curbed like in conservative Islamic societies.
Yet in practice, even in Islamic countries where rape, molestation or free sex is deemed as a social and religious crime, one can go to any length to give vent to his sexual needs. There are call girls available round the clock in both Islamic and Unislamic societies for a price. I would not mention places like Bangkok and the whole Far East and the Scandinavian belt where sex is accessible and as cheap and common as one can order a meal or buy a shirt from the market.
The pristine concept of celibacy was strictly adhered to by the Christians of the first four centuries. They generally observed sexual restraint, eschewed polygamy, rejected the extra marital sexual practices such as prostitution and homosexuality divorce, abortion, and exposure to death of unwanted infants. Bu the later generations of the priestly class desecrated this golden edit to their hearts’ fill. Just to mention two cases of nauseating degeneracy of the Roman Catholic papacy in recent times.
If allowing sex in controlled areas is anti-Christianity or a social vice, then all the priests and clergy class would have been as pious as Jesus Christ was. But history of Christendom testifies that these were the churches and cathedrals where worst kind of sexual debauchery has been going on for ages. Even in recent times, many priests have been posthumously charged with molesting hundreds of innocent children in church schools and ministries run under their supervision to impart Christian education. So where do we draw the line as to who is pious and who was not?
Priest Lawrence C Murphy a pedophile predatory priest sexually preyed upon 200 defenseless, innocent, adolescent deaf young boys and girls for 24 years (1950-1974). Another priest (Rev.) Brendan Smyth died in jail 13 years ago while serving 12 years for 74 sexual assaults on children. And there are countess such gory incidents encompassing several centuries of diabolic violation of basic Christian teachings. The purpose of alluding to these examples is to bear out that in order to satisfy their hedonistic desires how the humans wantonly trample the Jesus’ reverent ministry based upon piety and rectitude. The Catholic Church has been paying millions of dollars as compensation to the victims of sinful priests.
Paradoxically the rape culture is rife in the armed forces of the United States. There are countless complaints about the rape and forcible sex within the army. The rapes are either not reported by the victims or if reported these are either hushed up or seldom probed and the perpetrators prosecuted. One example of this trend of sexual perversion pertains to Naval Station Great Lakes where sailors receive specialized training A Pentagon survey reported by New York Times revealed that the number of sexual assaults during 2012 in that Naval station alone rose to 26,000. One can imagine the enormity of the uncontrollable sexual lust or carnal urge as to override the professional ethics and integrity in such a brazen way.
There is also pervasive adultery and sexual encroachments in the offices, shops and work places by the owners or the bosses on their subordinate female staff. Such incidents go mostly unreported and hidden because the females fear losing jobs and prefer to keep such incidents secret from their families. Such are the queer paradoxes that bedevil our society.
I shall omit a detailed opinion on the epidemic of same sex marriages. It would be difficult to rationalize or justify a man marrying a man and woman with woman. Living as friends could bear some logic but entering into matrimonial bonds like female and males in fact defies a rational explanation. At best or worst it could be explained a kind of homosexuality in case of two males and a kind of lesbian propensity in case of the females living together as partners. Indeed it cannot be for procreation of the human progeny. The underlying purpose could also be to share the burden of life and to draw the state benefits as married partners.
Now in Europe and elsewhere in the world there are brothels for a permissible sexual activity. Here in our country the brothel or red zone area are unthinkable. The result is the frequent incidence of rape, forced molestation and similar heinous acts by the lecherous individuals. Absence of brothels though is very plausible from moral point of view, yet it has its pernicious fallout. The sex seekers then explore the massage parlors; hook-up the stray girls on the roadsides or from the pubs and clubs. More often than not it turns out to be costly, risky and troublesome affair.
By curbing the option for a permissible sex in marked outlets interspersed in Far East and the European countries, the American society in fact forces the sexually deviants to change their partners through divorcing and remarrying. It is for these compelling reasons that there is a high rate of divorces in this country (60 %).For the affluent and rich individuals; it might not be hurtful and economically disturbing. But for an ordinary person with meager means and limited resources, it entails a host of mental and financial sufferings. Those among the citizenry who cannot afford to enter the rigmarole of divorce and remarrying go into the sordid pursuit of rapes or outdoor sex relations. There have been several instances reported in the press that the rapists killed their victims to wash off the evidence.
In a nutshell this society gives a free hand to the teen age boys and girls to have free sex, the girls to become pregnant and for the couple to leave the education incomplete. On the other hand, the adults under the burden of stringent conditions resort to criminal options for sex that land them either in jail, burden them with enormous financial difficulties and segregation from the society as offenders. Many among those who divorce and remarry suffer from economic hardships besides psychological and mental disorders.
For children born out of the previous marriages, the separation of parents is traumatic and would leave deep scars on their tender minds due to separation of their parents. And let us not forget the crushing burden of child support that turns many males and females paupers.
The simple solution of this conundrum is that during their schooling, the teen age dating in school premises or in class rooms should be sternly curbed for which a strategy can be worked out with the help of teachers and parents.If adults find more liberal environment and resort to permissive outlets minus sting forays, it could drastically reduce the divorce rate, curtail abhorrent crimes as rape and sexual assaults. It could be instrumental is halting to a reasonable scale the separation of families for the sake of having a new sex partner. This society has got to be realistic. Even now the covert sex cartels are operating. But utilizing those is dangerous and exposing oneself to a Pandora-box of troubles.
The writer is a senior journalist and a former diplomat
This and other articles can also be read on www.uprightopinion.com.
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Posted by AghaSaad in " RIAZ THE SHAITAN OF PAKISTAN, Asif Zardari Crook Par Excellance, Nawaz Sharif Massive Corruption, NAWAZ SHARIF SAGA OF ABSOLUTE & CHRONIC CORRUPTION, NAWAZ SHARIF US & SAUDI AGENT, Nawaz Sharif US Agent, Nawaz Sharif Womanizer, Nawaz Sharif-The Prime Minister from Hell, NAWAZ SHARIF: THE LOOTER, Nawaz US Agent on July 14th, 2013
Nawaz Sharif becomes a recluse,1/3 honeymoon passes without agenda
Politically Incorrect
Amir Mateen
The first month of the new National Assembly and the new PML (N) government gives some contours of how Nawaz Sharif wants to run his third government in Islamabad.
For a start, the Prime Minister has become quite a recluse this time around. He keeps himself away from the Parliament, the media and even from his party members. He spoke twice to the National Assembly so far. His first speech was just a sketchy account of the government’s intentions. The second time he came to the Parliament was to announce the indictment of Pervaiz Musharraf in the treason case before it was laid before the courts.
He hardly appears before the media after becoming the Prime Minister and is only seen in photo-ops issued by the government. Even his media managers keep the journalists at arm’s length. We wait for Nawaz Sharif’s policy speech that was supposed to announce his grand agenda for this country.
The government’s pace is definitely slow. It does not give the impression of a government that has got its homework done and offers solutions on the fast track. It’s almost been a month since the National Assembly took oath and nearly 50 days since May 11 when the PML (N) knew it was coming to power.
One third of the supposed 90-day honeymoon period is over and we are yet to know the larger contours of the government objectives.
Interior Minister Chaudhary Nisar plans to announce his national security plan this week. Whether it matches the hype built around it and gives us hope of peace in near future–only time will tell.
More important, we hold our breath to listen to what has the entire country going through hellish days and sleepless nights—the energy plan. Already, the government backed out of its election bravado and party manifesto about resolving electricity load-shedding in two years. We just hope it’s as good—and transparent—as they claim.
But the Parliament and the public is totally out of the loop on foreign policy. We have no idea what is the government policy on Iran gas pipeline. PPP’s Naveed Qamar asked why the crucial project was missing in the budget but was not given any response. The parliament was not taken into confidence about the US-Taliban talks in Doha and Pakistan’s role in it. Despite protests in the Senate, the government did not explain the contours of our Afghanistan policy and the post-US withdrawal strategy. The Prime Minister briefly mentioned about the Chinese offer about making road and rail link from Gwadar to Khunjrab but no details were shared even as he leaves for China this week.
We know about the government intentions on peace with India but the details, again, are missing. All we hear are rumours about tension between the Special Assistant and the Advisor to the PM on foreign affairs.
Frankly, it does not look as a government that had 13 long years to prepare a shadow agenda and to groom its team for Cabinet jobs. The Cabinet core of Ishaq Dar, Chaudhary Nisar, Khawaja Asif, Shahid Khaqan Abbasi are all experienced hands to run their Ministries but the challenge before them is no small either. We have reservations about other Ministers. Some are simply being trained on the job.
Ayaz Sadiq was groomed for the Railways at the Parliamentary Committees but he was promoted as the Speaker at the last minute. Khawaja Saad Rafiq is making extra effort to become Laloo Prasad Yadav of Pakistan but, in the words of a colleague, “Khawaja Sahb was made the Minister not to sort out Railways but the idea was for the Railways to sort him out.” It is rarely that the sharp-tongued Saad is seen nonplussed.
Zahid Hamid was transferred to the Ministry of Science and Technology after his name came up as one of the drafters of Musharraf’s 2007 Emergency order. Now, how will a lawyer handle a Science Ministry. And if you read the objectives of the Ministry of Science and Technology you might wonder why should it exist in the first place. His predecessor, Khurram Dastgir, an engineer by profession, is now made Privatisation Minister. “It’s akin to deputing a cobbler for a gardener’s job or making a cook run a poultry farm,” quipped a journalist. What has Rana Tanvir to do with Defence Production or Sara Afzal Tarrar with Health Ministry.
Anusha Rehman, we are told, has a degree in law but was made IT Minister because she types the minutes of official meetings on a computer. She could be a better Public Relations Minister considering the intense socializing she does in the House. Pervaiz Rashid might happily oblige her with his Information Ministry as “I have no secret funds and no power to take journalists on official junkets.” He said this in a lighter vein in the Press Gallery the other day.
The key Ministers are seen only in talk shows and are generally not accessible even when approached for their version. This could be because of tactics, arrogance or, we are forced to infer, they do not have much to say.
Riaz Pirzada, a perpetual turncoat, was made a Minister to adjust a pressure group from South Punjab. If this be the criterion, Javed Ali Shah was already seen spitting venom against the government in the corridors.
The PML (N) was smart to divert the public attention from the unpopular budget to Musharraf’s treason trial and the Swiss cases. But it’s about time the PML (N) came out with something of its own.
Luckily for the government, the opposition is equally disappointing. The PPP is only concerned about wriggling out of its corruption cases. The battalion of Sindhi Waderas that it has brought to the Assembly is pathetic is not a shadow of the PPP we once knew. And the PTI will need a lot more to make an impact. The experiment of introducing new faces and academics in the Parliament has backfired. None of them has shown any spark so far. The ‘Naya Pakistan’ has luckily a handful of old Parliamentarians to save it from utter failure.
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