Every crisis presents an opportunity. It is a test of your wisdom to spot it in time. A few days ago, a corps commanders meeting concluded without any press note. Remember, issuing…
Imran Khan — signal and noise
How do you write a piece on the reasons behind Imran Khan’s meteoric rise when he has been pushed out of power, launched an agitational march which seems doomed to fail, and…
The Hindutva consolidation
Rome was not burnt in a day. Many thought they could stop it. But not our Nero. His fiddle is a metaphor for an unparalleled wild abandon and perhaps a tortured form…
What’s eating Gwadar
‘Dream big. But keep it simple,’ instructed Art Williams’ aspirational audio back in the 1990s. For those who don’t know, Arthur L Williams Jr is a school football coach turned insurance executive…
Nightmares never end
Something needs to be said about one specific aspect of the human condition. A fear that refuses to go away no matter what you try. The fear of a sudden crash, a…
Leaking
The priorities of a nation define its future. Let’s consider ours. The country’s poor people are telling you they are sunk, and if the flood were not enough, shrinking purchasing power would…
Put mud?
Back in school, a classmate asked a substitute teacher to translate the Punjabi phrase, mitti pao. If you are really interested in the expression, idiomatically, it will translate into something like: bury it,…
The happiness ceiling
It is not the first time I have asked you to pay some attention to the metaphor of man’s expulsion from heaven. Nor will it be the last. What does it tell…
The empathy bridge
The question was chiefly about the west’s moral imperative to take responsibility for climate change and freak disasters like the flash floods that have inundated one-third of Pakistan this year. But in…
Circle of abuse
One step forward, three hundred yards back. Notice even in these desolate times, I have not lost my sense of proportion. For instance, I could have said one foot forward three lightyears…
Dogma and policy
To the reading world, Karen Armstrong needs no introduction. She is best known for her seminal works in the field of comparative religions like ‘A History of God’, ‘The Battle for God’,…
Don’t look down!
The title of this article is a play on the name of a famous apocalyptic Hollywood black comedy and political satire called Don’t Look Up. I have mentioned the film before and this…
The problem with narratives
Power trips of political triumphalism can be more potent than any intoxicant. You do not want to stop when you think you are winning. Notice the emphasis on thinking. If perception and…
UnSTEMmed
Many video streaming services have invested heavily in original South Asian content. Consequently, it is hard to open such an app and not find it overflowing with Indian content. Here and there,…
A word to the gatekeepers
They say divine providence granted a man two wishes as a reward for an act of selfless heroism. He wished for a tour of paradise, a wish that was instantly granted. He…
Ancient sky, death spirals and pyrrhic victories
What is common between James Webb Space Telescope and former Trump NSA John Bolton? Nothing, to be honest. The first unlocks ancient mysteries without drawing too much attention to itself. The second,…
Talking to the Taliban
A week before the fall of Kabul, my piece titled ‘Behold the wooden horse’ appeared in this space on August 7, 2021. Bear with me as I quote from the article to…
Kobayashi Maru
As the tale goes, once upon a time in a kingdom far, far away there lived two unemployed brothers called Modified and Modied. One day the older brother Modified (let’s call him…
Proof of synthetic sentience
Since AlphaGo defeated a human player some eleven years ago, the field of Artificial Intelligence or synthetic sentience development has covered the evolution of centuries. This is how it is supposed to…
Seduced by the right
Conjure the image of Oscar Wilde’s Happy Prince in your mind with a few amendments. Our version of the statue is privileged, unpopular, high-strung, feckless, jaded and mostly fatigued. And in this…
Between 2 Bushes
Two fundamental observations at the start. Human beings by nature are basically a decent bunch. That is to say that if there is no earth shaking crisis in someone’s origin story you…
Slow cancellation of the future
At the outset, you will have to forgive this writer for a few underlying assumptions. The first assumption is that you are equally shocked by the developments of the previous decade. The…
The problem of incompetence
As the media struggled to cover the ongoing economic crisis, an interview with the MCB chairman Mian Mohammad Mansha stuck out like a sore thumb. Although he offered views on many policy…
Article 15 — fend for yourself!
In their wholly remarkable book The narrow corridor, Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson bring up a Congolese joke. It is said that since its independence from Belgium Congo has had six constitutions. But…
Mystical art of not dying of shame
It is a useful art. Contrition, guilt, loss, grief, and shame are all silent killers. This art is important right now because smoke is billowing from our federal capital. I believe it…
Legends of our fall
What do you do with a government that wouldn’t take yes for an answer? Its governing partners gave it carte blanche to effect the much-needed if painful reforms by removing unaffordable fuel…
The election announcement cliffhanger
The first commodity you will need in abundance if asked to put together a fantasy league of Pakistani politicians is imagination. While the new federal cabinet seems to have come into existence…
Stop whining and innovate
We live in a fascinating age. Technology is quietly re-sketching the contours of our lives. And yet we only quibble about the old things. Only a little over a month ago a…
Celebrities, politics and outrage
The quarter of a century spent writing opinion pieces has taught me a few things in life. The first one is frustrating. The herd instinct. As opinion writers most of us obsess…
What profits a man?
“For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world andforfeits his soul?” — Mark 8:36 Two weeks ago I wrote about the American political sitcom Veep and what a perfect…