A Martyr in the Making
By Col. Riaz Jafri (Retd.)
Rawalpindi, Pakistan

Rauf Klasra in The news, June 7, 2007 says, “Renowned scholar Dr Ayesha Siddiqa secretly reached London on Wednesday after she ‘received a message that a charge sheet is being prepared to put her on trial’ for writing a book against the Pakistani military establishment.”
The manipulative media is trying once again to put another feather in its cap by making yet another martyr in Dr. Ayesha Siddiqa. If she has just advanced her date of departure for London by a week or so, it does not necessarily mean that she has fled the country due to the threats from the authorities conveyed to her by her 'close family friends'! Does she not intend to return to Pakistan for good, or will the 'threats' whither away soon? And, if someone is bent upon punishing her, aren't there hundred and one other means and methods of doing so?
Dr. Ayesha Siddiqa is an intelligent being and a learned citizen of Pakistan. She must have lived here for most of her life and known, considered seriously, and pondered over what could or could not happen to her, her family and others for writing the book. And, yet she chose to write it. Does it not show her confidence in the powers that be that no harm would come to her? But, here is the media, giving it the dirty twist. Please STOP playing upon it any further here and now.
For God's sake stop denigrating Pakistan all over the world. Has any American, European or Brit come to Pakistan to malign his/her country? It is truly lamentable that we Pakistanis bend ourselves backwards in telling the world about us and our country that should not be even mentioned in hushed whisper.

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TV Anchors

Some of the TV anchors in an effort to surpass their competitors not only go out of the way to side with the opposition and judiciary but in the process also inadvertently (or may be by design) malign the armed forces. Some of them are noticeably obvious with their body language and facial expressions in that the moment a panellist says something in favour of the opposition or the legal fraternity their faces brighten up and the moment someone supports the government or blames the opposition for politicising the judiciary despair is writ large on their faces. My dear TV anchors, your viewers expect you to be neutral and please try to be so even if you find it trying. Since the army is castigated in its absence on your talk shows and you seem to enjoy it, at least that’s what I gather from your gestures, please allow an ex-army man to come to its rescue and suggest you a question to pose to your legal panellists, both lawyers and the ex-judges:
Can you, Sir, swear by your honour, (mind it Allah SWT is all knowing and seeing and hearing you right now) that you have never taken bribe or bribed someone during your legal practice or holding a judicial office?
Though the Transparency International places judiciary third in order of corruption after police and power in Pakistan, yet I know they will manage to wriggle out of it, one way or the other, for they are the past masters of this art. Therefore, now Mr. Anchor it will depend upon your skills and acumen to extract an answer out of them.
Needless to say that you will fail. But before that happens, let me ask, do you or your producers have the guts to include such a question in your talk show? Can the warriors of the pen rise to the occasion?
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A Matter of English

I do earnestly hope that by discussing the English language and not the substance or matter of the affidavit filed by the CJP before the SC, I am not transgressing the limits of discussing a matter subjudice before the court. It is only the English language that I am concerned about and not any of the subject matter of the affidavit.
In para 2-C of the text of the affidavit, which is freely available on the Internet, it reads:
On this the Respondent said that there are a few more complaints against the deponent as well.
This sentence is in ‘indirect narration’ form. And, in this form if the speaker uses the past tense (the Respondent said) then the past tense has also to be used in the subsequent clause. I think, it should have, therefore, been “---- there were a few more complaints ----" instead of “--- there are a few more complaints -----" in the sentence.
I am quite alive to fact that very able and learned lawyers and counsellors of the CJP would have vetted the affidavit from all angles before submitting it to the SC, and that they cannot afford to have any lapses of the language in an affidavit filed by and on behalf of the most august the Honourable Chief Justice of Pakistan. I am only a matriculate (Punjab University 1947) and have obvious limitations of the English language and its grammar. I would, therefore, highly appreciate if some of your more learned readers could correct me on this account.

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