Self Talk

A human crisis, or one of the several human crises born on this unfortunate land, displacement of North Waziristan residents on account of military operation has taken a heavy toll on over all wellbeing of the residents. It has been decades since people of this and adjoining areas had sustainable peace. The law and order situation has been frail since the invasions and wars started off many years ago and generations have passed without an end to the misery. The latest in this story have been the internal displacements to enforce writ of the state, and in this particular case, writ of Pakistani state. Few years back it was Sawat and Buner where military operation had to be launched, this time it is North Waziristan, allegedly a safe heaven for terrorist for long time. The people are asked to vacate their houses and move to another safer place where camps are established to house them and provide them with necessary modalities of life. Being a far-flung area, education and health faci...

Shahid Khan Afridi has announced conditioned retirement from international cricket. He is unhappy with the treatment that he has been given as captain. He has every reason to feel angry as his performance as a captain has been more than expected. Although not an extraordinary manipulator of the game, luck had been on his side in one day internationals recently. He has led the team with passion and that speaks volumes about his leadership skills. As far as intelligent strategic moves are concerned once team lands in the ground to play, I wouldn’t rate him as one of the best captains of Pakistan. But still he has been making us feel proud, happy and sometimes furious at him with crickentainment over the years. Alas, he has met the same fate as many of our heroes did previously. But, is that the end? I think NO. Afridi is kind of a person who has always listened to his heart. I believe his career is far from over. There are no quick chances of a reshuffle in Pakistan Cricket Board as th...

Next general elections are no more out of sight in Pakistan. One and the only clean politician and famous philanthropist in our country, Imran Khan, needs to move the masses. This is high time for him to appear on national scene as a true alternative. Thanks to his naïve ways of politics, he seems far away from sweeping the national election this time. But that can be made possible if he listens to some advice. 1. The impact of internet, especially social networks like Facebook and Twitter has shown its potential in last US presidential election as well as recent Middle East uprisings of Tunisia, Egypt and others. Imran Khan must come in close touch with the youth through Twitter and Facebook where he can convey his message in real time and gather feedback. 2. A talent hunt for candidates should be started now. Or if he has already chosen few people, they should be announced now. They should be asked to appear on their respective constituency’s skyline and should try to convey Imran...

In the age of twitter and facebook, witnessing a regime change in Egypt looked quite awesome. In fact I was quite lost into its final hours, stuck to live transmissions of BBC and Aljazeera, following people tweeting live from Tahrir Square and reading Cyril Almeida’s nice analysis in Dawn on regular basis. The history unfolded before my wide open eyes. It was unbelievable. Although I expected bloodshed many times in the last week, I kept my hopes high and wished the people a win.  More so because it was a led by Egyptian youth, using the social network forums to organize protest against the sitting president. Although Hosni Mubarak had been a favorite of Europe and US, he could no longer keep his hold on the government and had to surrender to the will of masses. Internet has started bringing meanings to people’s lives and now we can expect almost anything happening anywhere in the world. So is the potential of this technology. For a true democracy in Egypt, there is a long way to...