After looking at fiasco that happened at Marriott Hotel of Islamabad, I am seriously concerned to know the current state of Emergency Response Services in Lahore. Are we ready? I am trying my best not to sound cynical but it is the reality of modern civic life that there will be natural of man made disasters.

These days, terrorism is a reality. Unfortunately, we will have to live with it for a considerable period of time. But as citizens of Lahore, we have to keep an eye on the civic services that are being made available to us by our govt. After all we pay all those taxes and its our right to demand a better civic life from them.

First Aid Kit

It was a pity to see the Marriott Guard trying to extinguish an explosive chemical fire with a CO2 fire Extinguisher. It was even more disturbing to see firefighters trying to throw water from ground to 4th Floor. What is this? 1920’s…. Millions of taxpayer Rupees have been spent on services like 1122 and CDA’s Disaster Management Cell & all we got was broken pumps and dead batteries. Read more

Courts are empty, boycott from today.

A bomb scare at Beaconhouse Defence. Correction; a possible explosion averted as the bomb was actually found IN the office block of the school.

A lot of people will blame it all on one government, or even worse, one man. Some would, in a bid to sound more believable, blame perhaps two or more governments, or men. None of that truly matters. What we are going to do about it is what matters. We do not know the problem even, so that is as far away from the solution as possible.

It is said that a burqa-clad person (possibly a woman) delivered a letter to the guard to give to the school principal. The letter said that the principal’s office is set to explode. They evacuated and the bomb squad actually diffused the bomb.

My source for the above is a friend whose sister is enrolled in the school. All we could say was ” “, i.e. nothing. Who is to blame? What’s the use of that; what do we do now? How do we come out of this mess that is all around us?

Pray & play hard friends, pray and play hard.

People from different walks of life gathered at the site near GPO Chowk on the Mall where ‘the blast’ killed at least 20 policemen last week. Words of remembrance were noted down while candles of hope were lit as evening chill started to take charge.

Everyone paid tribute to the brave policemen, and colleagues presented a Guard of Honor in their memory.

Let’s wish better times are not too far away…

I wasn’t near a city with a population in excess of 200,000 when tragedy struck and we all saw ‘Daughter of the East’ so brutally murdered in Rawalpindi on December 27, 2007. Still, I’m witness to the uncertain law and order situation, widespread across cities and even smaller towns of Punjab at that time.

December 29, 2007 was the night when we, as a family, decided to head back to Lahore from the Southern part of Punjab province where we all had spent the last couple of days in reunion fun and Eid happiness.

The plan was to leave after sunset for a seven hour journey that was to take us through several important settlements and cities including Multan, Khanewal, Sahiwal, Okara and finally to Thokar Niaz Beg at Lahore.

With news of total chaos and violence taking place in many parts of the country, especially in Sindh and Karachi, we were quite expecting live accounts of damaged infrastructure, burnt banks, ransacked offices and unlawful crowds roaming the streets and that obviously added to our fear of safety.

We started moving on the Grand Trunk Road - N5, country’s main logistics artery running from Karachi to Peshawar, 1,819 KM in one stretch, in the direction of our destination quite late in the evening.

Our vehicles proceeded without any extended stay except for a break of about two hours at a relative’s house in the middle way. The N5 gave quite a deserted look, the first time I saw it so clear, except obviously in Ramadan during the Iftaar (fast breaking) timing when almost every moving thing abandons roads for at least 15-30 minutes.

Silence and darkness was all that was to be seen throughout the journey which made me feel at that time, how attractive and significant was NHA’s motto of ‘Friendly Highways’.

Despite all fears and apprehensions, we, thankfully, did not encounter a single damaged thing and reached Lahore in the late hours of the night between 29th & 30th of December. And Lahore at that time was no different with now the usual scene of all gas and petrol stations cordoned and closed in fear of getting burnt or end gutted.

All we could relish was refueling our tanks at the Shell Station - Thokar Niaz Beg opposite Toyota Ravi Motors, which probably seemed to be the only operational station in this part of Lahore and that too under armed police guard.

God was to be thanked for making us feel relieved after getting home safely and securely for I have never traveled to my city in so much fear!

Four panicked Post-graduate students, One fast-approaching research paper deadline, Trillions of drizzling droplets of rain, and what do you get? A memorable trip down to Lahore’s Quaid-E-Azam Library, situated smack dab in the middle of Bagh-e-Jinnah, in pursuit of Library membership.
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Quite a few years back, one of fellows from my college was a member of some Musical Society (I forgot the name as usual), and she used to brag about the musical events in Alhamra a lot. I saw this ad in the newspaper and I thought to give it a try as I heard so much about this ghazal evening at Alhamra. I have never been to such an event, I like ghazals and I thought that there would be people sitting on the floor on white chandani and you know how one can imagine about an event like that (but of course, it was not the case).

Let me tell you some details, this was a three-day festival on 15th, 16th and 17th, today is the last day. The ghazal singers for first day were Saima Jahan, Sameena Iqbal, Riaz Ali, Habib Ali, Jamshaid Chishti and Saaria Zafar. Second-day singers were, Saira Naseem, Nida Faiz, Fida Hussain, Abdul Raof, Saira Tahir and Shakeel Basheer.
Today, the talented Hamid Ali Khan is going to perform along with Suryya Khanum, Aqeel Manzor, Sana Noor, Sara Raza Khan and Muzzafar Chauhdary, and the time is 7:30 PM.

On the first day of festival, I was there at sharp 7:30 and no rush? yes, not much crowd was there, but people kept on popping up till 8:00 PM or so and I heard someone saying, that it is going to be rush around 8:30. Mostly the crowd was lower middle class, who definitely always look for affordable entertainment (good for them, haan?). There were free passes available for entering the hall, and if you are with your family, no one would ask you for the pass. When I stepped into the hall, to my surprise, Ali Zafar welcomed me….(sounds like exaggeration?) ok, his voice welcomed me, the DJ was playing Sun Re Sajanyaa, while the stage was going through some settlements. On the entrance, I asked the guard, “time par shuro hota hai na?” and he said, Ji…unfortunately I believed him, because it never happened in a Lahoree function (am I right?).

Though, most of them were local and unknown faces to me, they were greatly applauded by the audience. Events like these for general public should be appreciated and I must not forget to admire the efforts put forth by Alhamra Arts Council to carrying out the cultural activities in Lahore to a greater extent. They are also playing Sa’adat Hasan Munto’s Toba Taik Singh today and tomorrow by Ajoka. I hope one day, i will catch up with Ajoka too :)

Question: Out of the ongoing security situation in the country, who has become the most tempting and the most vulnerable target of terrorists these days?

Answer: A Policeman on the streets

I would quote one, Imaan Nazir from Islamabad who wrote a comment to the editorial titled, ‘True Heroes’ in Thursday’s The News.

When risking your life is your everyday job for a situation that you cannot even control or prevent, you deserve sincere gratitude. I am referring to our very brave police force. They are criticized, called corrupt and accused of everything and anything, when the truth of the matter is that they are risking their lives by just standing out of the safety of their homes to try and protect us against terrorism, especially suicide bombings. They cannot prevent them and they cannot control them, they are just being told to do their job which is to give away their lives for nothing. I just really would like to thank our police for doing a great job, honestly. They are giving their lives away trying to protect us. They are truly heroes who deserve sincere thanks.

On Thursday, a suicide bomber broke into the Police Training School in Sargodha after shooting a police guard on the entrance and injuring another. His immediate target were the 900 or so police recruits who were taking morning exercises before starting the day. Fortunately, the person in charge of the drill cancelled it just a few minutes earlier and the bomber was shot dead by a constable on duty. Grenades, a pistol and a suicide belt were recovered from the bomber’s body.

In another incident, A small explosion caused by a planted bomb near Traffic Police Centre in Gujranwala, another city in Central Punjab, left 5 policemen injured. details here.

It’s the first time attacks on the police or any other security forces have occured in the Punjab. Authorities in Lahore are on red-alert as is evident from high security arrangements at public places like the Railway Station, Airport, city markets, Hotels, Malls, police stations and public offices.

Every citizen is requested to please remain vigilant of one’s surroundings and report any suspicion immediately to the nearest police station or just call 15.

Guest Post by Zainub from Karachi Metblogs

The Internet is such diverse and easy to use medium it expands our horizons for communication like few other mediums in the history of mankind have. The effect this has had on the publication industry in particular is worth looking at. While on one hand it has given every and anybody a means to become a publisher (it takes less then five minutes to start your own blog), on the other hand, this mass ameuterization of publishing has virtually opened the floodgates for one of the industry’s biggest evils - plagiarism. A few days back here at the Karachi Metroblog it self we joyfully disclosed the newest edition of WeCite, a fairly new and on the face exciting ezine (online magazine for those who’re not familiar with the term), that represented to us, the changing face of journalism. The rise of “new media” as its called. But alas, things weren’t to be this rosy.
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“Madina Heights” is holding a Musical Bhangra Night Show in front of it’s under construction tower at Shaukat Ali Road to publicize its tower.

A local musical group, named Jutt Brothers, is called to perform on the stage in front of the general public in a free and open air environment and are scheduled to perform on 4th, 5th n 6th of May here at the venue..

The chief guest was Syed Raza Gillani, who is the Provincial Housing Minister of Punjab.

The performance was based on many different themes like Drama Performance, Dance, Comedy, and Magical Show etc…

The drama performance was extracted form the years old “Ainak Waala Jinn”, which was the most popular drama for children and used to be aired on PTV; and I myself was a great fan of it [still remember my childhood :)].

I still remember those funny dialogues like; (read the dialogues in punjabi)

Ooloo ooloo hello..
Ooloo ooloo hello..
assi 420 (chaar so vee)..
tussi 420 (chaar so vee)..
assi tussi 420 (chaar so vee)..
.. by Hamoon Jadugar.

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