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PkColumnist.com

1500 + Latest Pakistani Urdu and English Articles, Features and Columns from Pakistani Writers

Things categorized as 'Irfan Husain'

Morality and atheism

February 17th by Irfan Husain.
Consider this demographic projection for the UK, and ponder its implications for a moment: within five years, the majority of babies will be born to unmarried parents. However, before you put ...

Power and prejudice

September 26th by Irfan Husain.
Just when we thought the United States had moved into a post-racism phase with the election of Barack Obama, Jimmy Carter reminded us that this odious colour prejudice still lingers ...

Conspiracies, plots and myths

September 5th by Irfan Husain.
UNWITTINGLY, our private TV channels provide us with more entertainment than they know. The other day, I was sent a link to a recent debate between that hardy perennial, Mustafa ...

Proud of being Pakistani?

August 8th by Irfan Husain.
OVER the last few days, the Pakistani media has been full of reports about the mob violence that took seven innocent Christian lives in Gojra. Given the revulsion all decent people ...

The great burqa debate

July 1st by Irfan Husain.
For the first time in my life, I put on a burqa this morning. Not because I have suddenly become a cross-dresser, but just to undergo the experience millions of ...

The search for security

June 6th by Irfan Husain.
CLEARLY demarcated and internationally recognised borders certainly enhance a nation’s security. Crossing one is like jumping across a neighbour’s boundary wall: the cops will view it as a criminal act. ...

Little time and few choices

May 30th by Irfan Husain.
AS Lahore reels from the shock and horror of yet another vicious attack, Pakistan has to brace for more such violence from the likes of Baitullah Mehsud. He and his ...

Sri Lanka’s lesson for Pakistan

April 8th by Irfan Husain.
I was trying to work out how big an area seven square miles is. This is what is left of the state the LTTE wanted to create in the north ...

Living with Bhutto’s ghost

April 4th by Irfan Husain.
EXACTLY 30 years ago today, I was driving back with friends from a weeklong fishing trip in Azad Kashmir. We did not have much luck with the fish: locals told ...

A presidential ‘Punga’

March 15th by Irfan Husain.
STOP me if you’ve heard this one: a Sikh was on a flight, with a parrot on the other side of the aisle. He noticed that every time a certain ...

A Fragmented Polity

February 17th by Irfan Husain.
Growing up in Karachi in the 1950s and 1960s, a common phrase I heard was that Pakistan was still in its infancy. And one common headline in those days was: ...

Peace in our time? [English]

October 20th by Irfan Husain.
WHILE we in Pakistan are focused on the violence in our tribal areas, as well as on the suicide attacks in our cities, it has been a long, hot summer ...

Wedding traditions at home and abroad [English]

October 15th by Irfan Husain.
I must confess that being forced to attend weddings is among my least favourite activities. I have been known to leave town to escape this social obligation, but there are ...

Show me the colour of money [English]

October 2nd by Irfan Husain.
As I was marking some sections from Richard Dawkins’ book ‘The God delusion’ for the column I planned to write about the decline of faith in England, I made the ...

Time for a reality check [English]

September 22nd by Irfan Husain. %
ACCORDING to a press release, Gen Ashfaq Kayani has declared the army’s intention to fight any intrusion across our borders at “any cost”, and “against all odds”. This should reassure ...

The politics of Vengeance [English]

September 16th by Irfan Husain.
PAKISTAN may or may not be the world’s most dangerous country, but it is certainly the most difficult one to govern. Considering its many problems, it is a source of ...

The children of 9/11 [English]

September 12th by Irfan Husain.
Another terrorist group tried and sentenced in Britain; another link with Pakistan as the training centre for terrorists established. This time, the group of eight accused of trying to blow ...

Those without voices [English]

September 9th by Irfan Husain.
THE day this article appears in this newspaper, the country’s legislators will be voting for the next president of Pakistan. This is our highest constitutional position, and the incumbent represents the ...

Chatter from cyberspace [English]

September 4th by Irfan Husain.
AS I watch the glitz and the glamour of the Democratic convention, and listen to the inspirational speeches made in Denver over the last few days, I compare them with ...

Balance sheet of a dictatorship [English]

August 25th by Irfan Husain.
IN a sense, I have been writing this article in my head for well over a year. At the height of the lawyers’ movement to restore the suspended chief justice ...

Migration and identity [English]

August 20th by Irfan Husain.
YOU don’t realise how dependent you are on something until you are deprived of it. I am writing this from a cottage on a lovely bay between the Nova Scotia ...

Politics as reality TV [English]

August 18th by Irfan Husain.
BEING a Pakistani and therefore paranoid, I am convinced that our endless political convolutions are being secretly scripted by some media mogul. This master manipulator is pulling the strings to increase ...

Good guys finish last [English]

August 14th by Irfan Husain.
WHEN I was studying economics at university more years ago than I care to remember, we were taught that consumers made rational choices in the market place. Thus, everything else ...

A world without joy

July 19th by Irfan Husain.
IMAGINE a world without joy: a world in which music, dancing and art are prohibited; where women have been declared nonpersons and banished from public view; and where games and ...