Crow's Nest...

Aisha Siddiqua tells us about the approximate net worth of the dictator cum tyrant who recently left one of the posts that he was so hanging on to. It makes an interesting read as she tells us that the net worth of the plots that he owns is around 440 million to 500 million Rupees. His pension is around 45,000 to 50,000 a month and he is eligible for three to four servants all expenses paid courtesy of the Govt. of Pakistan. He is at the same time allowed to import one luxury car from anywhere in the world and is eligible for a home anywhere in Pakistan. All this money is what he gets free and fair from the Govt. of Pakistan. The money that he must have usurped during eight years of his rule through corruption must be 100 times more than his stated worth. Read the article on BBC Urdu .

Iranian President Mehmoud Ahmadinejad speaks in Columbia University. I was looking for this video for a long time but my bandwidth back in my home country didn't allow me to view the video. Here i am in the land of the free viewing the hospitality that the president of the university had to offer to the guest that his own school had invited to lecture in the university. What a shame!

Shall we remind ourselves of that beautiful day?

The suicide bombings in Rawalpindi are testament to the fact that the imposition of emergency was a farce enacted by the dictator to subdue political, judicial and media activism in this country. The threat of bombing is as real as ever. And if we are to believe FIA then India has a major role in destabilising our situation through playing an active role in these suicide bombings. The recent attacks on the ISI offices seem like a counter attack by Indian intelligence for the attacks on the courts in Indian cities. India should refrain from meddling in the politics of Pakistan. Nawaz Sharif has struck a convenient deal with the tyrant and once again betrayed his nation. This attitude is so typical of our political leaders both BB and Nawaz.

BBC Urdu has a beautiful article on the way Musharraf has hijacked the country of 160 million souls. I advise everyone to give it a read. But my topic of concern is not the judges or the present combination of them that we call supreme court. I am concerned with the media. One by one the news channels are coming back on air. Almost all the TV channels have bowed down to the pressure. The last one to fall was ARY Oneworld that appeared back on air yesterday. Aaj was already on air and so were a plethora of other non consequential channels that abound on our cable networks. It makes me wonder whether these channels are really fighting for freedom of media or just have a different higher price tag attached to them. Almost all the channels that have come back on air have lost their crunch programmes from the lineup. but still they say they have fought for their freedom and have not bowed down to the dictator's pressure. The famous Luqman of Luqman.com on Business plus has ac...

I always thought of Imran Khan as more of a social worker than a political leader or a political worker. In this documentary, which has been anchored by Imran Khan himself, he proves my point to the hilt. He just seems like looking for question like all of us Pakistanis. His search for questions takes him across Pakistan and he talks to many Pakistanis across the strata.

Does our dictator want to subject us to this , "Widow of slain Pakistani reporter killed in blast ISLAMABAD, Nov 17 (Reuters): The widow of a Pakistani journalist, shot dead last year after reporting that an Al-Qaeda leader was killed by a U.S. missile, was killed in a bomb blast on Saturday. The bomb planted outside the family house in Mir Ali town, in North Waziristan near the Afghan border, went off early in the morning, killing Mehr-un-Nisa, on the spot. “All her five children who slept in the same room survived miraculously,” said her brother-in-law, Ihsanullah Khan. Mehr's husband, Hayatullah Khan, was found dead in June 2006 nearly seven months after he was abducted shortly after reporting on an explosion in a militant hideout near the Afghan border that killed Abu Hamza Rabia. Hayatullah who reported for various publications, was the first journalist to photograph fragments found at the scene that appeared to be from a U.S. missile. (Posted @ 10:40 PST)"

The major Pakistani news channels, Geo News and ARY One world have been blocked from Dubai after the dictator reportedly personally exerted his pressure in internatinal circles. This means that i will not be able to listen to any proper and true news story coming out of Pakistan in US. The extent to which this dictator has gone in curbing freedom of speech is both unprecedented and point to his loosing battle against the will of the people of Pakistan. His days are numbered and he knows that too, all very well. He is therefore shooting in the dark and everywhere he can point his two cent gun. But on a very sad note i can notice a certain rift between major media stake holders in Pakistan. Aaj TV and Dawn News channels are back on air after they struck a compromise deal with the Govt. and temporarily suspended their crunch news programmes. The sad thing is that i was going through the website of Aaj TV and there was no mention of the extended media curbs on Geo TV and ARY One world...

It is time that i shifted gears and moved on to a different highway of life. I am in the process of doing exactly that these days. My work here at PIMS is finished and the experience, which was initially miserable, turned into quite the opposite once i found my niche with some great people in the hospital. I will be flying to the US on 15th of this month. Before i take the plane i have to go back and touch base for miscellaneous chores. Its been six long months since i got a chance to sit with my parents and enjoy a moment of candid talk. I have three days to do that and i will make sure that i certainly do that. There have been absolutely no rains in this city for the past 3 months and the atmosphere is full of dist and in dire need of a face lift. Let us hope that this score is also settled soon. My country is in turmoil and there is a lot of desperation. I feel the need to do something towards lending a helping hand but unless i can think of doing something concrete beyond m...

Man has earned his right to live in this world through evolution over a million years. The bacteria, the viruses and the fungi that inhabit this planet in numbers far exceeding ours have had to give us this right to co-inhabit this planet with them. They have allowed us the so called piece of the cake. But all this has not come easily to the human race. As H G Wells so beautifully expresses in his book 'War of the Worlds', we have had to earn this status through natural selection and constant struggle. But sometimes our defences do fail us and we fall victim to slimiest of creatures that live around us. Maggots form just one part of this spectrum of dread. Just the other day i Saw a patient with pyogenic meningitis who was carrying truck load of these worms in her facial sinuses. The patient had ended up in my ward because her lumber puncture revealed a grim picture of pyogenic meningitis and she was very sick. Initially my efforts circled around getting her out of imme...