Mohammad Shehzad

Coverage of national politics in Urdu print media is a testimony to the fact that the discourse in our vernacular media suffers from an uninformed worldview and at times displays a shocking level of ignorance. A large number of widely read columnists, instead of informing the public, spread such ignorance with pride. Take the case […]

Unlike Phoolan Devi, Ehsanullah Ehsan was not a victim of social injustice that could have pushed him to join Tehrik Taliban Pakistan (TTP) as its ‘spin doctor’. He was not a peasant farmer exacting revenge on the Armed Forces to reclaim his land in Okara. He was not a freedom fighter forced to wage an […]

Mashal’s incident is the first time that our rulers have mustered up the courage to condemn mob violence in the name of religion. Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif was shocked and saddened. The Balochistan Assembly and the National Assembly unanimously declared his murder as ‘barbaric’ and ‘cold-blooded’. Sardar Abdul Rehman Kethran declared him a martyr. The […]

If laughter is a medicine for the mind, its cheapest brand has to be the coverage of national politics our Urdu language media. Consider the statements made in the media by our state minister for water and power, Abid Sher Ali, who can outperform any number of entertainers. In a statement covered by Jang newspaper […]

Your house catches fire. You must be rescued immediately. You have neighbours all around your place but you have been at loggerheads with all of them. Miles away, you have a couple of friends. By the time you may get some help from them, the fire would have already reduced everything to ashes. However, you […]

Few practitioners of classical music can expand the ascending and descending scales of ragas in a systematic way without boring the listeners with repetition. Such artistes can be counted on fingers. Many such maestros are witnessing their sunset. Some have already gone to meet their maker. The grand Kishori Amonkar left this world on April […]

Pakistan’s vibrant media has expanded in the last decade. Dozens of television channels and newspapers are in place to inform public opinion. Most of the time, however, they either misinform or reinforce existing prejudices. I always took Orya Maqbool Jan as an authority on religious issues. But his knowledge about prostitution in India appears rather […]

A ‘sham-e-ghariban’ has befallen on our jihadis, fasadis and Islamists with the anointment of Ajay Singh Bisht as Utter Pradesh’s (UP) chief minister. Like our Tahirul Qadri, who started his journey as a ‘maulvi’ and showed great progress by soon becoming a ‘maulana’, then a ‘professor’ and now an ‘allama’, fortune has always been his […]

We are blessed with many brothers. They come in different sizes, shapes, forms and statures. Among all, the Arabs are the elder brothers, but Saudi Arabia is the big brother. Not because it has a big pocket (every brother must have a big pocket), but becauseit is the custodian of Kaaba — the holiest place […]