Women’s World Cup
FOR Pakistan, the second round of the Women’s Twenty20 World Cup is the promised land. In the last seven editions, never have they gone beyond the first round and when they kick off their campaign against arch-rivals India today, it is that obstacle they are looking to cross. Despite losing pacer Diana Baig to injury, Pakistan are hoping they will play to their full potential in the tournament in South Africa. It is the game against India though that will set the momentum for Pakistan. Nevertheless, for a team that has a poor record at the World Cup, winning just seven out of 28 games, they have beaten India twice in the tournament — in 2012, and then four years later. Winning today could see Pakistan on their way to breaking the jinx. Speaking on Captains’ Day, Pakistan’s Bismah Maroof said she wanted her players to take the India game as any other but admitted that expectations were high. The last time the two sides met was at the 2022 Commonwealth Games where Pakistan suffered defeat.
Pakistan arrive at the T20 World Cup having lost a three-match series in Australia. Australia, the defending T20 World Cup champions, won the opening two games by eight wickets before the last game of the series was washed out. Since arriving in South Africa, Pakistan have recorded a win and a loss — both by six-wicket margins — in their warm-ups. Their victory against Bangladesh saw an inspired all-round performance by Nida Dar, one of the players Pakistan will be looking to during the World Cup. In the defeat to South Africa, Aliya Riaz shone with bat and ball. The two, alongside batters Bismah and Ayesha Naseem and fast bowler Fatima Sana will be key to Pakistan’s World Cup hopes. Bismah has been vocal about how Pakistan’s players have broken barriers to get where they are. Now is the time to shatter the glass ceiling at the World Cup.
Published in Dawn, February 12th, 2023
Spring festivals
WITH the cold of winter starting to recede and the freshness of spring already in the air, it is time again for our annual literary festivals. Coinciding roughly with the season of birth and rejuvenation, these festivals have become an important feature in the calendar, bringing together curious minds from across the country and abroad for a few days of enlightening discussions, impassioned debates and thoughtful recollections. One of these, the Pakistan Literature Festival, is already underway at Lahore’s Alhamra Arts Centre. The three-day festival was billed as featuring more than 50 sessions on entertainment, comedy, music and dance, as well as book launches and discussions headlined by notable artists and intellectuals. It kicked off on Friday with a warm welcome by Lahore’s spirited locals. Today (Sunday), the Faiz Aman Mela was slated to begin in the afternoon at the Cosmo Club at Lahore’s Bagh-i-Jinnah. Attendees can expect to be treated to musical performances, poetry, political debates, theatrical performances and dance at the mela, which incorporates a call to hope, ie, ‘Umeed-i-sehar ki baat suno’. The Faiz Mela has been held each year to commemorate the birth of revolutionary poet Faiz Ahmed Faiz.
Also today, the Citizens Archive of Pakistan is holding the CAP Carnival 2023 at the Beach Luxury Hotel in Karachi, with an exhibition from its archives, a craft bazaar and other fun activities. The next weekend, the 14th Karachi Literature Festival is expected to draw literati and enthusiasts to the same venue for a three-day event centred on the theme of ‘People, Planet and Possibilities’. The weekend after, the Lahore Literary Festival will open its doors at the Alhamra Arts Centre. This is not by any means an exhaustive list of all the cultural and social events taking place across the country. There are concerts, melas and conferences, big and small, scheduled in most major cities to engage the Pakistani citizenry and indulge their varying tastes. As the country gradually shrugs off its winter stupor, what better way could there be to re-energise than to engage with each other over our shared culture and to interact with some of the brightest minds of our times through these various festivals? With the country at an unprecedented crossroads in its history, these platforms can provide spaces where we can reimagine our collective future by sharing our different perspectives and ideas.
Published in Dawn, February 12th, 2023
Ruffling political feathers
In today’s toxic political environment, words must be weighed exceptionally carefully lest they are perceived as deliberately provocative — even if uttered in passing. On Friday in the Senate, lawmakers from different parties decried remarks made by Chief Justice Umar Ata Bandial the day before during a hearing of former prime minister Imran Khan’s petition against changes to the NAB law.
The country’s top judge was reported as saying on the occasion that parliament was being kept “systematically incomplete” and that elections were the “real answer” to the country’s issues. Apparently alluding to former premier Mohammed Khan Junejo, whose government was dismissed by Gen Ziaul Haq in the 1980s, the chief justice also said that the country’s most honest PM had been sent packing by invoking a now repealed article of the Constitution.
On Friday, several senators voiced their objections to the comments as being “political” and “against parliament and the legislative process”. The strongest criticism came from PML-N’s Irfanul Haq Siddiqui who asked: “Who gave him [CJP] the privilege to declare prime ministers from Liaquat Ali Khan to Imran Khan as dishonest?” Further, he saw the CJP’s “disturbing” remarks as an attack on the prestige and sovereignty of the House which, unlike the judiciary or the armed forces, comprises the representatives of the people.
Even for a periodically unstable country, this has been a particularly extended stretch of political tumult — and there is still no end in sight. Instead of parliament being the forum to debate issues and thrash out differences, the ‘action’ has moved to the superior courts — a shift in which the PTI has belligerently led the way, though other parties have followed suit. Excessive judicialisation of politics, as is presently the case, blurs institutional boundaries. That, in turn, stunts the democratic process. The superior judiciary’s history is troubling on this count: consider how many times it has legitimised military coups and the overthrow of elected governments, not to mention sent an elected PM to the gallows.
It is true that in a transitional democracy, institutional boundaries are perpetually under pressure from one quarter or another; but it is up to each institution to fight for its space. Instead, today’s civilian leadership is willfully allowing its domain to be breached.
Meanwhile, although we have been spared the performative excesses of the likes of retired justices Iftikhar Chaudhry and Saqib Nisar, the well-publicised rifts within the superior judiciary in recent years have not redounded to its credit either. Most damaging perhaps is that the factors that gave rise to these differences convey an impression of a not entirely impartial and apolitical arbiter. That is all the more reason for even casual observations made from the bench to be anodyne and non-committal.
Published in Dawn, February 12th, 2023