By Rifaat Hamid Ghani

WE ought not be fooled into thinking the opposition lacks direction and vacillates. Being adaptive and responsive to circumstances is different from being confused and at a loss. Not having narrow tunnel vision is not equivalent to lacking focus; nor is uncompromising rigidity always a sign of strength. Undeniably, the parties in the PDM have different agendas and outlooks, and the PPP and PML-N especially are in fierce competition. What should give everyone cause for thought is that, despite these differences, they, and other significant parties and leading figures in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan, are united in regarding the incumbent federal government’s prolonged inadequacy and the PM’s fixation on excluding oppositional politicians, and repeated trespasses into provincial management with a view to extending his party’s terrain, as straining the national fabric.

By Rifaat Hamid Ghani

The PTI has too many spokespersons. The spin has become self-defeating. It no longer leaves listeners merely dizzy with listening: the noise is so loud that far too many have stopped listening or can’t make out exactly what is being said. And, in the meanwhile, there may be a whole new message which even a fanatically attentive audience is losing out on.

Now that, the perspicacious sceptic say, is the whole point — engaged in lip-reading in a deafening din, we don’t look where the real action is. It’s the juggler’s sleight of hand in auditory form.     However, when you give up trying to make sense of the statements and messages being fed you, you start to think for yourself. Or to put it another way when you are glutted you start to digest. So, where are we heading – what is actually happening?      In an off-the-cuff session with journalists after

By Zubrida Mustafa

“A few years to my sum of years,/ I am still stuck in the in-between./ A relic in this vale of tears,/ A reluctant ‘was’, ‘has-been’.” — Chris Z. Abbas

THESE verses were penned by a dear friend describing old age, three years before her death in 2009. Chris was 88 when she departed from what she called “this vale of tears”.

The fact is that medical science boasts of its success in prolonging the age of man — life expectancy in Pakistan has grown from 45 years in 1950 to 67 today. But society and state have done precious little to improve the quality of life for their senior citizens.

Hence it gave me great satisfaction when I learned recently that in 2014 the Sindh Assembly had adopted the Senior Citizens Welfare Act (SCWA) — the first province in Pakistan to do so. Lawyers dub it as a ‘model’ law, cut and pasted from the social welfare law of a West European state but without any plan for its implementation.

By Zubeida Mustafa

Before we take up the issue of the ethical aspect of education in Pakistan a look at its legal and constitutional status itself would be in order. I shall focus on school education as it is this sector that has a pronounced human rights and ethical aspect. In 2010, the National Assembly amended the Constitution of 1973 that made education mandatory for all children. Article 25-A was adopted and according to this, “The State shall provide free and compulsory education to all children of the age of five to sixteen years in such manner as may be determined by law.”

This provision should have been a landmark step towards universalizing education which is worldwide regarded as the fundamental right of all men, women and children. It naturally has to begin from childhood. It seems unbelievable that it took Pakistan 63 years to recognize this basic fact.

But Article 25-A has failed to achieve its purpose. The enrolment ratio of school age children is barely 60 percent and over 22 million children aged 5-16 years are still believed to be out of school. The resultant inequity geographical, gender and class – has demonstrated clearly that in Pakistan education is not the equalizer it should be. If anything, it is a factor that promotes inequality.

By Zeenat Hisam

Pictures by Nudrat Kamal

Hunza valley revisited

The pandemic, the anxiety and fear of the unknown, economic downturn—national and global, lockdowns–total, partial and smart—and social distancing had worn us out by the end of September. What did provide some relief to me and my daughter, the city-dwellers, was a little refuge in nature, a reclaiming of the bond with the sky, the plants (potted) of many hues and smells, and the little flora and fauna left in Karachi.

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Exploring Hunza valley

After four nights of stay in upper Hunza, we came down to a resort in central Hunza. Central Hunza, the administrative region of the valley with capital Karimabad, is famous for Baltit and Altit Forts and the ancient settlement Ganish.

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