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Farzana Versey
Its the typical psyche,attitude of every indian muslim. These poor blame everything to Pakistan and Jinnah for thier hardships,discrimination they are facing or faced in 60 years in India.Thanks God , Jinnah made a seperate country . I ask Farzana , If your family did not get a chance to migrate to Pakistan, in response why you start abusing Pakistan. Pakistan is not responsible for what is happening to Muslims of India. Thanks to Jinnah, atleast 17 crore Pakistanis and 18 crore Bangladeshis dont face these things which Indians Muslims are facing. I have already offered her to migrate to Lahore a year ago but Farzana is a identiless and confused personality ,hanging between Indian Nationalism, Pakistan hatred and Indian Muslim poor condition. May Allah put this in her mind that Pakistan is our land and thanks God , we are citizen of it as a free nation with all opportunities that are not available to her and others muslims in India.
December 21, 2008
REVIEWS: Tainted Love
Reviewed By Fouzia Mapara
After reading Farzana Versey’s Journey Interrupted, I often find myself looking over my shoulder in paranoia or pragmatism to check if there is an Indian journalist trailing behind me unnoticed by others because of similar language, appearance and garb.
For Versey has gone galavanting around Pakistani restaurants, parties, markets, houses, hotels, dargas and mazars; she has observed groups of people, held one on one sessions and rubbed shoulders with people from all walks of life. She has peeked inside the minds of plastic surgeons, politicians, TV stars, pilots, gay dress designers, motel owners and government employees. Hence she feels she has garnered enough information to spout long, laborious and at times boring accounts of her interaction with people in her book.
Journey Interrupted begins on an exciting note, wherein she is being deported from Pakistan due to some visa anomaly — why and how her interrupted journey became a journey repeated several times over, I have no clue. Sadly even after several visits to Karachi, Islamabad and right up to the Khyber Pass, Versey’s perspective remains indisputably Indian, biased and even defensive.
‘Pakistan is caught in this battle for Islam. The monotheism that the religion has been so proud of is in fact a fractured identity. It cannot disappoint the Saudis, it cannot disappoint the West, it cannot disappoint its Mohajirs, it cannot disappoint its large Pathan-Punjabi factions. It has to be with Iran, it has to be with Iraq and continue to admire Turkey and some modicum of peace initiatives at all times with India. The position is uncomfortable.’
Isn’t that what diplomatic relations are all about, or is the author defining terms for Pakistanis by making revelations about who they are.
She writes, ‘It is August 14. Pakistanis celebrate the occasion lustily. It truly seems like a double celebration for them — freedom from the colonisers and freedom from those who were once their own people. Everyone greets one another. I stand aside. I do not have to carry the baggage of history but the past has often appeared wearing different Halloween masks.’
At a cyber café in Islamabad, she confesses to have ‘scrolled the ‘history’ of web pages visited. ‘There were Pakistani chat rooms and several porn sites. The names were self-evident. Speaking to teenager in Karachi I had bluntly asked him why he visited such sites.’ Why does anyone visit such sites? Will a Pakistani teenager’s reply be any different from a teenager living in any other part of the world?
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The relentless questions in Versey’s mind reflect her confused identity as an Indian Muslim woman who is adamant about writing a book without anything poignant to touch upon. Where she thinks she has made an impressive observation, it really is nothing to write home about. The rambling is essentially bedtime reading, designed to quickly put you to sleep.
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Many times while reading the book, you sense her own confusion about her own identity as an Indian Muslim and the fact that the majority of Pakistanis are Muslims too. ‘And when I was in the land of pure, my impurity struck me. I was the emotional mulatto. The intellectual eunuch. The fence-sitter. The one who could not make up her mind. But when did I have a choice?’
More inane ideas and opinions follow about the perceived difference between Indian Muslims and Pakistanis: ‘Pakistan has adopted this unique form of farewell replacing Khuda with Allah because is not religion specific and is a Persian word that was the prevalent usage in South Asia as well. Allah is Arabic and most definitely about a Muslim God.’
She brutally slices up Pakistani society as though none of what is happening on this side of the border exists in India and if it does, she claims to be stunned that that is the case. Her delineation of Indians and Pakistanis soon becomes meaningless, leaving the reader feeling quite cheated after the first 30 pages or so.
‘Being Indian in Pakistan’ is after all the subtitle of the book; it is what it is supposed to be about. Pakistanis generally tend to go overboard in their hospitality, that they can abandon their own comfort to make a guest happy, especially one from India, because if nothing else our common denominator is history.
We would beg, borrow and even steal to indulge our guest but not let the guest suffer on any account. As the recipient of some of that cordial generosity, Versey was all over the place either flaunting her identity or camouflaging it when it served her interest. Knowing she is an Indian writer, and also Muslim, people would open up to her and share personal details.
Yet Versey feels, ‘The geographical partition that took place has been replaced by a psychological partition. Those torn apart by bloodshed had their purging experience — death, destruction, homelessness, helplessness.’
Her impressions of our cities include the following: ‘Every few years, Pakistan writes a new fiction. Islamabad does not suffer from the stench of power. Unlike Lahore, it is not the city of real and fake intellectuals and unlike Karachi, it does not seek to spreads its wings.’
Versey finds that the lobby of the Hotel Serena in Islamabad has too much steel, and that Lahore has neatly stuffed the past into a treasure chest that has mere decorative value. She considers the Minar-i-Pakistan to be an unhandsome structure from afar that stands out like a cold mercenary. In fact everything about Lahore leaves her untouched.
In Karachi she deems the three swords monument to be a phallic symbol and thinks of the city as an equal opportunity killer. Oh, and she considers Bundu Khan to be an overrated restaurant.
After reading so many sweeping statements throughout the book, the author’s admiration for Allama Iqbal comes as a complete surprise. Until it becomes obvious that she does not consider him Pakistani: ‘I admit to a deep feeling of sadness seeing his memory consecrated here. What made him leave his beloved Hindustan? When did the poet become a politician? Sir Muhammed Iqbal is an enigma. His best known work is sung in India and is a paean to it.’
Interestingly enough, she meets a large variety of people including a lesbian, an aging actress and an hoodwinking pir, as well as famous people such as Najam Sethi, Jugnu Mohsin, Khalid Ahmed, the late Ahmed Faraz, Enver Sajjad, Ardeshir Cowasjee, Pervez Hoodbhoy and Sheema Kirmani. According to her they all vented their spleen and experienced a collective catharsis by giving ‘chip on the shoulder’ accounts of how twisted Pakistani culture is and how they survive the lack of freedom of expression in Pakistani society.
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After reading so many sweeping statements throughout the book, the author’s admiration for Allama Iqbal comes as a complete surprise. Until it becomes obvious that she does not consider him Pakistani.
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Versey enjoyed milking the details, but unfortunately, despite the supposed wealth of information, she is not always able to sustain the reader’s interest. As a result the narrative becomes an endless series of interviews dissolving into somewhat judgemental or defensive analysis.
The relentless questions in Versey’s mind reflect her confused identity as an Indian Muslim woman who is adamant to write a book without anything poignant to touch upon. Where she thinks she has made an impressive observation, it really is nothing to write home about.
The rambling is essentially bedtime reading, designed to quickly put you to sleep.
After four trips to Pakistan in a span of six years, Versey writes, ‘I have something more to taint me now. A passport with Pakistani visas.’ She admits coming to Pakistan to understand the hurt. The hurt? She might have satiated the average Indian reader, the Indian nationalist or her own urge to write a book on Pakistan, she has nothing new to tell Pakistanis and endorses the view that not every Indian writer is a Vikram Sethi, Shobha De or an Arundhati Roy.
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A Journey Interrupted
By Farzana Versey
Harper Collins, India
ISBN 978-81-7223-755-4
279pp. Indian Rs295
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"Kitney sheeriN haiN terey lab ay raqueeb
Galiyan khaa kay bhi bay-mazzaa na hua"
AUTHOR: Fateh Muhammad Malik: Passion and duty
By Nuzhat Rahman
“Teaching is my profession. Nourishing and serving Urdu literature is my passion. The gradual decline of the Urdu language, our writers’ insensitivity, and our governments’ apathy towards literature have prompted me to fight for the survival and revival of our literature and language,� says Professor Fateh Muhammad Malik. His tone is soft but there is determination in his voice.
Professor Malik is an acclaimed critic of Urdu literature, a reputed teacher and a renowned scholar of Pakistan Studies and Islam. He has written several books, articles and research papers in Urdu as well as in English on Iqbaliat, Islam, Pakistani culture and Urdu literature, which have been recognized at national and international levels.
With nearly 40 years of teaching and research experience at the postgraduate level, Professor Fateh Muhammad Malik is currently the chairman of the Muqtadara Qaumi Zaban (National Language Authority), an autonomous body established in 1979 by the government of Pakistan to formulate recommendations for the formal adoption of Urdu as the national and official language.
Although Professor Malik retired in 1996 as director of the National Institute of Pakistan Studies, Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad, he still takes classes twice a week.
Commonly described as an ‘ideologized literary critic’ by his friends and all those who have seen his work, Fateh Malik is a critic of integrity. His evaluation of the creative works of others is not determined by his personal likes and dislikes. Holding Iqbal’s writings as the epitome of the ideological reference in Pakistan, he uses them as the yardstick for evaluating and analyzing the works of modern writers in his book Ta’assubat. His main concern has been to see progressive nationalism finding expression in Pakistani literature.
With a brilliance of perception, style and understanding, he has never upheld the dictum of literature for the sake of literature. According to him a writer’s work must have a purpose behind it.
Ahmad Nadeem Qasmi and Faiz Ahmad Faiz are his favourite writers. Professor Malik regards their work as a sensible expression of the concerns of their times. Describing Faiz as a “sufi and a socialist�, he admired him for his capacity to ignore his critics. Faiz never felt constrained to prove his patriotism. In his book Faiz: Sha’iri aur Siyasat, Professor Malik writes about Faiz’s poetry and politics with sympathy, coherence and perception to undo the damage done to the poet by the rightists in the establishment.
In an article Malik wrote about Faiz, he defended the poet’s diction and style in these words, “The melody in Faiz’s poetry is not only the melody of Urdu poetry but the very music of our time.� This was a rejoinder to Anis Nagi who had launched a scathing attack on Faiz, describing him as an “old-timer with an out-moded vocabulary�.
Since Malik is not influenced by the literary and social prejudices of our time, he has not been afraid to express views which are not traditional or conformist. He dedicated his collection of essays Tahseen-o-Tardeed to Qurratul Ain Haider at a time when she was under attack from most literary stalwarts in Pakistan for her ‘secular’ stance in her widely-acclaimed novel Aag ka Darya. In his article on her, he praised her for her sense of history and for “rejuvenating our collective thoughts�.
In Malik’s view, the quality of Urdu writing has declined and most of our writers look at the west for inspiration and innovation, which itself is lacking in ideas today. In his opinion, our writers need to know more about contemporary Arabic, Chinese and African literature, because these are the regions where the struggle for survival is taking place. That provides the impetus for good literary writings.
Despite the paucity of material in Urdu on the subject, the veteran critic has managed to compile two books on the burning issues of Palestine and Kashmir, Falastin Urdu Adab Mein and Tehrik-i-Azadi-i-Kashmir Urdu Adab Kay Ainay Mein. In these books he has painstakingly collected several items by Pakistani and Indian writers on the two subjects. The book on Palestine includes short stories, which reflect the sympathy felt by the Muslims of the subcontinent for the people of the Middle East and is a tribute to the victims of western imperialism and the treachery of the Arab rulers. The book on Kashmir is a compilation of poems and short stories written on the Kashmir tragedy by some Pakistani writers and a few courageous Indian writers as well.
His biggest concern at the moment is the absence of the ideological and the socio-political context in the modern Pakistani writers’ works. “Our writers have severed their links with life and society. They are living in ivory towers; oblivious to our dilemmas, our concerns and our national sufferings. They exist in a vacuum. They are only concerned about the awards they seek, book launching ceremonies and, if possible, some trips abroad at the expense of others.
“We hardly come across a book highlighting any national issue of socio-political or cultural significance, which could bring the country in the international spotlight, as Arundhati Roy’s works have done in India. Our litterateurs have even failed to play an active role in our national politics. We do have some journalists today writing objectively and highlighting national issues and our ideology, but, these writings are no substitute for literary works or creative writing. This has prompted me to write articles and books on political issues, setting aside literary criticism for the time being.�
Professor Fateh Muhammad Malik holds our bureaucracy responsible for not promoting Pakistan’s image, and projecting the Urdu language and its cultural heritage at international level. Professor Malik has been to Germany twice to hold the Iqbal Chair at Heidelberg University in 1984-88 and in 1992-96. He has many nostalgic and fond memories of the place when he could introduce Pakistan and Urdu in Germany. He, however, feels resentful of the Pakistan embassy’s couldn’t-care-less attitude towards the language and literature.
At the Muqtadara, Professor Malik is busy getting an Urdu software developed for which the Ministry of Science and Technology has provided financial help. It has already supplied an Urdu keyboard to Unicode of which the Muqtadara is a member.
To integrate Urdu with other local languages of Pakistan, the Muqtadara has a programme of publishing Sindhi-Urdu, Dari-Urdu and Balti-Urdu dictionaries. It has recently published a comprehensive Qanuni Angrezi Lughat in two parts, Darsi Urdu Lughat, Islami Qanuni Lughat, Urdu-Uzbek Lughat and many more important books on various subjects.
Speaking about his future plans, Professor Malik says, “I want to write a book on the intellectual history of Pakistan — its rise and fall. It will be a history of the Pakistani phase of the Progressive Writers Movement — from 1948 to 1954.� It was the phase when writers were active and progressivism and nationalism provided common ground for writers holding diverse views. Reminiscing about his colleagues of that era Professor Malik narrated a verse by Hasan Abidi:
Kuch ajab bu’e nafas aati hai deevaron se
Haa’e kiya log thay zindan men bhi ham se pahlay
Fateh Mohammad Malik: profile
Born in village Tehi (Tala Gang) in 1936
Education: primary schooling in Tehi, high school education in Tala Gang, college education at Campbellpur 1952-1956. Masters in Urdu from Punjab University in 1959.
Professional life: Worked part time as sub-editor in daily Tamir while teaching at Gordon College. Started writing for Radio Pakistan in 1959. Worked as lecturer of Urdu at Government College Rawalpindi, 1961-1972. Was Deputy Director Lahore Curriculum Research and Development Centre. Joined Quaid-i-Azam University in 1974. Was chairman of the Department of Pakistan Studies 1975-1978. Senior Research Fellow, Southern Asian Institute, Columbia University, New York in 1975. Served as Director National Institute of Pakistan Studies, at Quaid-i-Azam University 1983-1984, 1988-1996. Was visiting professor (Iqbal Chair), Heidelberg University (Germany) in 1984-88 and 1992-96.
Publications: Taassubat (1973), Andaz-i-Nazar (1979), Tahsin-o-Tardeed (1984), Iqbal: Fikr-o-Amal (1985), Faiz: Sha’iri aur Siyasat (1988), Punjabi Identity (1989), Iqbal aur Afghanistan (1989), Ahmad Nadeem Qasimi: Sha’ir aur Afsananigar (1992), Islam and the West (1999), Apni aag ki talash (1999), Kashmir Kahani (2001), Fikri Tangdasti (2001), Iqbal Faramoshi (2002), Ghulamon ki Ghulami (2002), Islam versus Islam in Pakistan (under publication)
Edited: Muntakhab Afsane (1980, 1981, 1982), Falasteen Urdu Adab ke Aaine Mein (1983), Tehrik-i-Azadi-i-Kashmir, Urdu Adab ke Aaine Mein (2001), Has also written several research articles and has contributed chapters to various books.
http://www.dawn.com/weekly/books/archive/030406/books7.htm
By Rauf Parekh
After the independence in 1947, Gandhi sent to the Quaid-i-Azam a draft that said the two countries should issue a joint declaration that the purpose of the two-nation theory was the creation of Pakistan and since Pakistan had been created, the theory was no longer alive. Gandhi thought that with the pronouncement of the two-nation theory’s death the riots raging throughout the subcontinent would cease, says Prof Fateh Muhammad Malik in his latest book Fitna-i-Inkaar-i-Pakistan while quoting from Chaudhry Khaleeq-uz-Zaman’s book Pathway to Pakistan. According to Prof Malik, the Quaid-i-Azam refused to sign the statement saying that the two-nation theory was relevant and would remain so forever.
Pakistan was created on the basis of the two-nation theory, as we all know. The theory, initiated by Sir Syed Ahmed Khan in 1867 in the aftermath of the Hindi-Urdu controversy and enunciated later by other Muslim leaders such as Allama Iqbal and the Quaid-i-Azam, says that the Hindus and the Muslims are two separate and distinct nations with their own religions, traditions, social orders and cultural ways. Prof Fateh Muhammad Malik, in his article ‘Two-nation theory is alive’ included in the book, says that the basic facts pointed out by Allama Iqbal in his 1930 presidential address at Allahabad were:
1. The Muslims of the Indo-Pak subcontinent are not a minority but a separate nation unto themselves.
2. As per the right of self-determination, this separate nation has a right to create free and independent states in the regions where it has a majority.
And about 25 per cent of the Muslims who did not agree to the theory and believed in a common Indian nation instead, live in India today as a minority.
Some of us may feel that with the creation of Bangladesh in 1971, the two-nation theory had died and is no more relevant today. But Prof Fateh Muhammad Malik, a staunch supporter of the two-nation theory and a firm believer in the federation of Pakistan, thinks otherwise. He says the Pakistani and the Bangladeshi Muslims are living a life of independence in their own, separate and free countries as a majority. The Muslim Bengal and the Hindu Bengal live as two separate nations. The Muslim Bengal is a free and an independent state while the Hindu Bengal is a tiny part of the state of India. The existence of Pakistan and Bangladesh as independent, free and separate entities is a miracle created by the two-nation theory. The proclamation of the two-nation theory’s death is not only more than half a century old, it is false, too.
Prof Malik writes that we must not forget that the two-nation theory was born out of eternal truths and essential realities and denying it means accepting the so-called common Indian nation. He firmly believes that Pakistan’s geographical existence makes sense only in tandem with its ideological existence and after Pakistan’s ideological murder its geographical disintegration and merger with an integer (or ‘akhand’) India would be inevitable.
Author of many books, Prof Fateh Muhammad Malik is a critic, researcher and an intellectual and has for long been associated with the teaching of Urdu and Pakistan studies at the university level in Pakistan and abroad. He has also held many important posts such as heading the Pakistan Academy of Letters and the National Language Authority.
He finds the roots and the evolution of the two-nation theory in history as back as in the reign of Mughal emperors Akbar and Jahangir and feels that there have been three vital and developmental phases of the theory: first, it was Hazrat Mujaddid Alf-i-Sani who, during the reigns of Akbar and Jahangir, stood against the attempts of the unscrupulous elements that were trying to forge a common Hindu-Muslim religion and culture and the Mujaddid had to fight for the ideology of a separate Muslim religious identity. Then it was Sir Syed Ahmed Khan who, after failing to unite the Hindus and the Muslims of India, declared that these were two separate nations and warned the Muslims of India to steer clear of the All India National Congress. Then came Iqbal who reminded the Muslims of their one common identity that transcends geographical boundaries: Islam.
Published by Lahore’s Sang-i-Meel Publications, the book consists of articles published earlier in an Urdu daily and critically evaluates the notions and analyses of some of the American think-tanks and Indian and American intellectuals and writers. Prof Malik especially takes to task Stephen Cohen, the author of The idea of Pakistan and other books, and Aisha Jalal for their views on Pakistan and the two-nation theory. He has severely criticised those intellectuals, whether Indian or Pakistani, who favour Indian hegemony and formulating Pakistan’s policies so as to suit Indian and American designs meant to divide Pakistan. Another lot disliked by him are the Pakistani politicians who play to the Indian tune.
Prof Malik believes that the two-nation theory is still very much relevant as it is based on historical realities and the fall of Dhaka did not make any dent in it. You may or may not agree with him, but you have to admit that he does have a point and presents it quite forcefully.
drraufparekh@yahoo.com
http://www.dawn.com/2008/08/15/fea.htm# 1
When a death happens generaly no body is really responsible .Those who blame the victim to break free of responsibility ....When the father dies its the responsibility of sons to look after the family .Problem is not for the son to take care of himself or get cared by others FOR himself
While all the best for 'lucky '17+18 crores
its just the way iife is for 15 crores indian muslims.No use crying over spilt milk
dawa-i-dil
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