If Pakistan continues on its present suicidal path, there will be no escape from a downward spiral of hate and spite, rage and self-pity, poverty and oppression, culminating sooner or later in the country’s disintegration. But even today, despite the murder and mayhem, not all in Pakistan seem convinced that confronting the jihadist movement is an urgent need for Pakistan’s survival as a democratic country....

.....Arab world had used for decades to maintain docile populations in corrupted, mismanaged and under-achieving states. More significantly, it now seems, more and more Arab citizens are challenging the very legitimacy of the autocratic ruling authorities, and in fact going a step further and claiming that true sovereignty rests in the hands of the citizens....

Sayyid Abul A'ala Maududi, the founder of the organisation, was dismissive of the idea of Pakistan because of his belief that such a state, if cobbled into being, would only leave the Muslims of the subcontinent even weaker than they would be in a united India. But Maududi and his party clearly were unable to withstand the Jinnah tidal storm....

These talk about an ideological, sectarian and ‘geopolitical’ proxy war between countries like Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Oman and Kuwait on the one side against the non-Arab and Shia Iran on the other. Also in the mix are the US, China and, of course, India. All are explained to have been using Pakistani agencies, governments, terror outfits and most of all, Pakistani territory to fight these proxy wars.........

Dr Siddiqa’s 2007 masterpiece Military Inc: Inside Pakistan’s Military Economy clearly did not win her any friends amongst Lieven’s friends There is no indication that the dark night of Takfiri terrorism is about to lift its heinous shadow from Quetta’s Shia Hazara. Are 40 days enough of a respite for the Hazara to be digging mass graves for their loved ones again? The terrorists of Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ) appear to think so.....

History cannot be undone but it’s time to move on. Bangladesh is right in demanding an apology from Pakistan — one which we have so far refused to give. Let us do so now and start a new chapter in the relationship between our two states. If we have the honesty and courage to take this step, as a bonus, the problem of Balochistan might become a tad easier to understand — and perhaps, solve.....

Radically expanding that "diminutive political space", the Egyptian revolution will go down in history as the paramount occasion when the public sphere became the transformative location where Muslims began wresting Islam from Islamists and thereby reclaimed their religion beyond any such false and falsifying divide....

As soon as a tribunal prosecuting war criminals of the liberation struggle of Bangladesh pronounced a life sentence on Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) leader Abdul Quader Mollah, hundreds of thousands of citizens spontaneously jammed the streets demanding death penalty for a man notorious as “Mirpurer kosai” or “The Butcher of Mirpur”. Mollah was found guilty of killing 381 civilians as a member of the dreaded Razakar militia unleashed by the Pakistan Army in 1971 to suppress Bangladesh’s freedom struggle....

Yemeni security forces claimed that more than 40 AQAP and Ansar al-Shari’a militants were killed in the fighting, which ceased two days after the tribal leaders mediated a ceasefire between the Army and the militants to allow the resumption of negotiations .....

Pakistan came into being to suit the exigencies of the British rulers and their manufactured elite, which thought it could serve Britain better if they had the status of a country attached to their picket or garrison outpost. When demands for India’s independence gained strength, the British realised that with independent-minded politicians holding sway, their interests in the Gulf, especially their oil interests, which were of primary importance to the industrialised world, would irreparably suffer....

Tahirul Qadri’s Canadian nationality has recently been a subject of intense debate. While our firebrand Sheikh-ul-Islam was stating that he was ready to sacrifice his life for his cause, curiously he did not really commit to renunciating his Canadian nationality. Ironically, Sheikhs, Imams and Maulanas always seem to set sail to infidel lands every time they have to serve Islam....

Such ideas have been spewed every now and then by armchair cynics whose antipathy to democratic governance is incurable. Of late, however, they have been gaining currency in quarters that enjoy a certain credit for seriousness. And, of course, there are quite a few jaded actors who are always keen to assume the role of counsel to the luckless people of this country.....

Pakistanis have always found ingenious and enterprising ways of getting the banned material into the comforts of their homes. Mainly because there is something not very right about parliamentarians, military hunks and animated preachers with questionable ethics, and closets packed with all kinds of skeletons, behaving as the moral compasses of the nation....

India Ink interviewed Akhtarul Wasey, a professor and director of the Zakir Husain Institute of Islamic Studies at Jamia Millia Islamia University, in New Delhi, about the topic on Tuesday.

Universally, societies are embarked upon a journey towards enlightenment, social advancement and embracing liberal values. Gender roles are redefined and accepted worldwide, and societies strengthen their foundations laid on liberal-democratic principles for peaceful coexistence. On the contrary, our society is on the notion of reverse development and continues to uphold conservative values regarding the role and status of women...