THE GHAZI SAGA on December 3, 2020“Each year he grows more restless, the salt flows through his veins/ But the depths are for the young, not the old with many pains.” – Soul of a Submariner by John Chaffey,The above couplet sums up the self-immolating temerity of those silent prowlers who risk death and discomfort by moving intrepidly across the ocean […]
Constitutional Reforms for Gilgit-Baltistan on October 20, 2020The areas that constitute Gilgit-Baltistan were part of Gilgit Agency as well as Gilgit Wazarat of pre-independence era. The lease of Gilgit Agency of British era was abolished by the British in July 1947 and the areas that constituted the Agency were returned to the Maharaja. The people spontaneously rose in rebellion against the Dogra […]
India-The Afghan peace spoiler on September 28, 2020What is the Indian Good Samaritan doing in Afghanistan? Indians have entered the Afghan fray not to help but to damage. If the above fact is correctly understood then all pieces of jigsaw puzzle fall in place. Indians had cultivated past few Afghan governments post 2001 US invasion in a bid to destabilize Pakistan’s restive […]
Pakistan’s FATA reforms-A game changer on September 24, 2020“The Pashtun tribes are always engaged in private or public war. Every man is a warrior, a politician and a theologian. Every large house is a real feudal fortress….Every family cultivates its vendetta; every clan, its feud…. Nothing is ever forgotten and very few debts are left unpaid.” (Winston Churchill) The romance of the Wild […]
Kashmir — the way ahead on August 25, 2020Kashmir issue has again been brought to the centre stage by the tyranny of majoritarianism exercised by Modi-led BJP government under the diktat of its ideological driving force i.e the rabidly extremist Hindutva creed of RSS. Kashmir is a bleeding wound that needs to be patched up if any semblance of normalcy is desired in […]
A tale of two cities on August 5, 2020The winter of 1944 in Berlin was full of gloomy portents. The darkening penumbra of sepulchral gloom in the chronicle of a city’s foretold death was so thick it could have been cut clean with a knife. The war was already lost; only the last rites had to be carried out. The Nazi terror having […]
The evil that men do on July 14, 2020“The evil that men do lives after them; The good is oft interred with their bones.” (William Shakespeare in Julius Caesar) The above quote by the master bard captures the anguish and pathos of the war-weary paradise on earth, known as Kashmir. All known legal canons and normative behaviours have been bludgeoned into nothingness in […]
Indian military spending on February 19, 2020What is India upto lately on defence spending front? The feverish Indian spending on defence without a clear and present danger to its security is indicative of its regional megalomania and global narcissism. Mired in poverty and internal conflict in several states the Indian government has displayed a strange proclivity to genuflect to Durga and […]
Kashmir bleeds on February 9, 2020“Dil nyith ratytham goshe Vwolo mayani poshe madano You stole my heart and stole away Come back, my lover of flowers (Habba Khatoon) The fairy tale of Kashmir is harking back to its empyrean peace but is not getting back its lovers of flowers. Habba Khatoon’s above lament straddles centuries but captures well the anguish […]
Reforms in Judiciary on November 24, 2019Democracy is about checks and balances. All organs of the state i.e Parliament, Executive, and Judiciary are meant to keep a healthy and effective check upon each other. In simple terms democracy is about the people’s choice. When the people’s choice does not get reflected in the quality of services provided by the state for […]