Business Recorder Column November 30, 2021

Asma Jahangir Conference 2021 – II

 

Rashed Rahman

 

After the first day’s explosive inaugural session on the judiciary’s role, past and present, the run of sessions of the Asma Jahangir Conference 2021 (AJC21) on The Right to Dissent (practiced in the breach in our polity), The Afghan Crisis and its Impact, Violence Against Women, Rights of the Child, Accountability or Victimisation? (Moderated by this writer), and a whole host of subjects (21 sessions in all) related to human, legal and constitutional rights comprehensively covered the concerns that Asma Jahangir would have had today had she not left us in untimely fashion. The entire gamut of discussions reflected the legacy bequeathed to us by Asma Jahangir, that indefatigable fighter for truth, justice, and against oppression of all kinds.

However, the proceedings ended on a note that left the participants and the public musing on how things stand and are handled in our country. The AJC21 organisers had invited former prime minister Nawaz Sharif to address via an online link. They had also invited Federal Information Minister Fawad Chaudhry to address the same final session. However, the worthy minister cancelled his appearance when he learnt that Nawaz Sharif would be addressing the conference. Lo and behold, soon after the address by Nawaz Sharif started, the conference’s internet connection was severed by cutting the necessary cables. Munizae Jahangir, the daughter of Asma Jahangir and one of the main organisers, ascribed this development to the habits of ‘rats’, i.e. chewing through cables and such stuff. However, later it was revealed that the ‘rats’ in question were ‘official’ ones. That left no choice but to take Nawaz Sharif’s speech on the telephone, without the aid of any video or picture being available.

Did Nawaz Sharif say anything new or different from his narrative since being removed from office by the superior judiciary and disqualified for holding an iqama(residence and employment permit) that did not involve any monetary gain? Not really, nor was this anticipated. However, the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaaf (PTI) government was so rattled by Nawaz Sharif being allowed to address the conference that everyone from Prime Minister (PM) Imran Khan to his ministers and spokespeople went to town in condemning AJC21’s invitation to the deposed PM. Imran Khan thought it inappropriate that a convicted absconder had been allowed to address a conference where the Chief Justice of Pakistan Gulzar Ahmad also spoke. The fact, however, is that the conviction by the Supreme Court is certainly questionable on the grounds of judicial and legal appropriateness (even if appeal against it is not available) and the ‘absconder’ was allowed by Imran Khan’s government itself to proceed to London for medical treatment. Therefore if there is any angst in government circles about Nawaz Sharif now being beyond their reach, they have only themselves to blame (and kick).

The AJC21 organisers have defended their decision to invite Nawaz Sharif to address the closing session, citing their past precedent of inviting opposition (and government) leaders to address it. They have denied the charge of any partisan agenda, arguing they offer a platform for all shades of opinion to speak openly on issues impacting the rule of law and protection of fundamental freedoms. They also pointed out that the Pakistan Electronic Media Authority (PEMRA) had banned certain categories of individuals from being broadcast on television, but no such prohibition applied to addressing public gatherings. In fact Nawaz Sharif had addressed such gatherings previously without any objection from the authorities.

Why then, in spite of all these obvious but seemingly once again necessary to reiterate facts, has the government taken such umbrage at Nawaz Sharif’s address that they tried to stop but failed? The real reason is the current looming political crisis in the country and Nawaz Sharif’s position. Nawaz Sharif may have been a product of the military establishment, which manoeuvred to bring him to power on the argument that Pakistan’s history was replete with leaders from all other provinces, but not Punjab. Since the establishment felt confident of its political and social base in Punjab, the thinking was that a leader from Punjab, suitably groomed to do the establishment’s bidding and follow its directives, would be a very important departure from the past of Urdu-speaking, Bengali, Sindhi and Pashtun leaders.

However, in their shortsighted manipulative approach, the worthies of the establishment failed to take note of, or understand, the dynamic of power. Having been elected PM three times, Nawaz Sharif’s desire to be vested with the authority that should accompany the highest elected office brought him again and again into conflict with the establishment, with the military at its heart. The core issue on which the two sides fell apart again and again was Nawaz Sharif, as a capitalist entrepreneur, seeing the interests of the country being better served by a rapprochement with India that would soften the Line of Control and international borders to allow the Kashmiri people to be relieved of the extreme repression by the Indian state, while opening up the enormous potential for trade and investment across the borders to the mutual benefit of both traditionally hostile neighbours.

Was this desire for normalisation and economic cooperation with India sufficient irritation for the establishment to conspire to throw him out of office thrice and convict, disqualify and imprison him? It would appear so. The core reason for this perception may be the implications of peace and normalisation with India. Such a development would inevitably, sooner or later, call into question the need for such a large army, on which the country spends an enormous budget out of defence and security concerns. A leaner, meaner army could then be considered better, without sacrificing the ability of the country to defend itself and deal with internal security threats such as terrorism. But a paring of the army (and consequently its budget) would not sit well with the perception of the military establishment that it is the guarantor not only of external defence, but also the internal system of governance to be imposed according to the establishment’s wisdom.

The fact that none of the interventions by the military establishment in the politics of the country have ended well suggests that Nawaz Sharif, despite his failings, has landed currently on the right side of history.

 

(Concluded)

 

 

 

 

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Business Recorder Column November 23, 2021

Asma Jahangir Conference 2021 – I

 

Rashed Rahman

 

After a hiatus of two years brought on by the Covid pandemic that forced postponement last year, the Asma Jahangir Conference 2021 (AJC21) was held in Lahore on November 20-21, 2021. The Asma Jahangir Conference has become an eagerly awaited event in a milieu in which free expression is conspicuous by its absence in an incrementally worsening manner. Over two days, the speakers and audience were regaled with views that otherwise have become virtually non-existent in our polity. There were so many sessions packed into these two days, some held simultaneously, that space constraints make mention of, let alone doing justice to, the valuable contributions to the discussions difficult. For this lapse, apologies to those not considered or adequately dealt with in these lines, without meaning in any way to depreciate their invaluable input.

Day one of the AJC21 saw more than its fair share of fireworks. The first, inaugural session was on “The Role of Judiciary in Protecting Human Rights and Strengthening Democracy”, with a whole galaxy of the country’s top legal minds in attendance. The panel of speakers boasted the Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Gulzar Ahmed, Supreme Court (SC) and high court judges, the Bar, diplomats, etc. The tone was set by a fiery speech by former president of the Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA) and a leading figure in the 2007 lawyers’ movement in support of the judiciary against military dictator General Pervez Musharraf’s attack on the venerable institution, Ali Ahmad Kurd. The bee in Mr Kurd’s bonnet seemed to reflect his disappointment and anger at the dashing of the hopes accompanying the restoration of the judiciary in 2008 amidst Musharraf’s ignominious departure from power that the appropriate lessons had been learnt by the superior judiciary from the 2007 events as much as the past controversial role of the judiciary vis-à-vis military dictatorships and the people’s constitutional and human rights. Expressing his deep seated anger during his speech, Mr Kurd did not spare anyone. The AJC21 organisers were taken to task for the very title of the session and its implications. “What judiciary are you talking about?” Kurd challenged the organisers. He then went on to assail the judiciary for the state of affairs in our judicial system. He claimed our judiciary was on the lowest in world rankings because of its controversial functioning. He further claimed a division within the judiciary (without explicating the basis of this division). Disparagingly, he said one army General was superior to the 220 million citizens of the country, contributing thereby to the perceived lack of credibility of our judiciary in the world rankings.

Kurd’s uninhibited lambasting caused unease amongst the organisers, not the least because CJP Gulzar Ahmad was in attendance as the chief guest and keynote speaker for the session, but also because Kurd’s fiery rhetoric evoked constant sloganeering from the audience, particularly its younger component and students. It was left to SCBA current president Ahsan Bhoon (recently elected to his post) to intervene and ask the participants to show respect and maintain the decorum of the event.

Amongst the other speeches in this session, there were two that stood out in stark contrast. Islamabad High Court (IHC) Chief Justice (CJ) Athar Minallah (also a former heavyweight of the lawyers’ movement) threw away his prepared speech in favour of addressing impromptu the criticism levelled by Kurd. To his credit, despite being one of the top judges of the present judicial structure, CJ Minallah struck an honest note in arguing that the judiciary could not refuse to accept its mistakes. As examples of such mistakes, he quoted the Nusrat Bhutto and Zafar Ali Shah verdicts of the SC (the first was the controversial trial and hanging of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto). Had he wished to, CJ Minallah could have found many other examples stemming from the Doctrine of Necessity that provided justification for military coups, martial laws and military dictatorships in our troubled history. Perhaps CJ Minallah exercised deliberate restraint despite his exemplary honesty. Following on at the end of the session, CJP Gulzar Ahmad attempted to defend his institution by dismissing the overly broad and generalised critique of the judicial system implied in Kurd’s remarks. He then turned the argument towards his own and his fellow judges of the superior judiciary’s mode of dispensing justice without fear or favour or accepting any pressure or dictation. While it is possible to agree with CJP Gulzar Ahmad’s assertions, he chose to ignore the elephant in the room from the past to which CJ Minallah had (partially) pointed.

While discussing the judiciary and its mistakes and failings in our history, CJP Gulzar Ahmad’s desire not to throw the baby out with the bath water, thereby preserving the respect and credibility of the institution, is perfectly understandable. However, this may not satisfy the trenchant critics of the judiciary’s history like Ali Ahmad Kurd. Only a reckoning with the past, and efforts not to repeat previous mistakes can restore and even enhance the respect, dignity and credibility of our judicial institutions.

 

(To be continued)

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Business Recorder Column November 16, 2021

 Let the people speak

 

Rashed Rahman

 

The situation in the country can only be described as the fortunes of the imposed government of the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaaf (PTI) increasingly dwindling, with the beleaguered incumbents increasingly feeling the invisible noose tightening around their necks. A quick survey of the present scenario is troubling, to say the least. The PTI government’s negotiations with the terrorist Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), brokered by the Afghan Taliban government after its refusal of Pakistan’s request to either take action against the TTP ensconced on Afghan soil or expel it, have yielded contrasting demands from either side, according to news reports. For example, while the TTP insists on demands like the implementation of sharia, the PTI government insists the TTP must lay down its arms to be granted amnesty. These positions are so diametrically apart as to cast grave doubts on the efficacy of the TTP offer of a one-month ceasefire (the offer has yet to be implemented, since cross-border and in-country attacks by the TTP have yet to end).

Meanwhile the Tehreek-i-Labaiq Pakistan (TLP) has been forgiven for its use of egregious violence that led to the deaths of at least seven policemen. Not only that the leadership and incarcerated supporters of the TLP are in the process of being released without any action against them, the process of mainstreaming and legitimising the TLP is moving forward. Critics are wary of the possibility that behind the ‘rehabilitation’ of the TLP lies another establishment gambit to position the TLP as a fallback option, either in coalition with the ruling PTI for the 2023 general elections, or on its own as the reportedly fourth largest party in the country. What effect this will have on the polity can be gauged from the track record of religion’s rise in our political affairs since General Ziaul Haq’s regime.

The people are groaning under galloping inflation traceable to the inept handling of the economy by the PTI government. The virtually daily dose of price rises for food, gas, electricity, petrol and everything else you can think of has broken the back of the poor and put immense pressure on all other classes’ purse. Apart from foolish moves such as first resisting but eventually accepting the new DG ISI incumbent, removing a retired General as Ambassador to Saudi Arabia just months after his appointment, the appalling record of the PTI government on the economic front have all seemingly converged to cast a shadow on the ‘same page’ mantra. That is why the speculation about the TLP’s future role in politics gathers more gravitas than usual.

Meanwhile an opposition rejuvenated by the government’s failures is gearing up for a renewed series of protests leading to the by now almost inevitable long march on Islamabad. The fractured opposition has mended some fences, allowing it to put up a united, and therefore effective, resistance to the bulldozing tactics of the government in parliament. The miffed Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) and the opposition Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) seem poised on the cusp of a reconciliation, if not a return of the PPP to the PDM ranks. As one more example of this government’s brutish attitudes, federal Minister for Planning Asad Umar’s threat to use the danda(knout) against the opposition if it marches on Islamabad included the same treatment to journalists since the media is allegedly in cahoots with the opposition! Needless to say, the Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists (PFUJ) has roundly condemned the Minister’s statement as undemocratic, fascist, and aimed at suppressing a free media and dissident voices.

The change in direction of the wind is indicated by the PTI government’s allies such as the Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid (PML-Q) and the Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P) distancing themselves from the incumbent government. This could reflect the disquiet in the establishment regarding the fumbling PTI government, but also points to the allies’ fears about their fate in the next general elections. It needs to be remembered that without these allies, the PTI government does not have a majority in the National Assembly. These developments have strengthened the case of the PPP for attempting an incremental in-house change or defeat of the government through a no-confidence strategy. Shahbaz Sharif, the Leader of the Opposition, seems of late to have veered towards the PPP point of view in this regard.

As if all this were not considerable food for thought, Prime Minister (PM) Imran Khan was summoned by the Supreme Court (SC) and a barrage of questions and comments thrown at him regarding the failure of the government (and arguably the state) to bring those responsible for the security lapses that resulted in the Army Public School Peshawar massacre in 2014 despite the passage of seven years. What was left unsaid by the honourable SC and the PM in this one-sided ‘exchange’ was the difficulty in bringing the high and mighty named as responsible for the tragedy to accountability and justice.

But this was not the only shocking development on the judicial front. The former Chief Justice (CJ) of Gilgit-Baltistan, Justice Rana M Shamim has sworn an affidavit on November 10, 2021 claiming that he was a witness to the then Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Saqib Nisar’s ‘order’ on the telephone to a high court judge (who remains unnamed so far) not to release Nawaz Sharif and Maryam Nawaz on bail at any cost before the 2018 general elections. Although former CJP Saqib Nisar, whose tenure gave birth to many controversies about his overstepping judicial limits, has denied the report, the proverbial sh** has hit the fan. The electronic media has gone virtually berserk on the issue, and the print media must be gearing up to follow suit in depth since the odd report on this conundrum will not suffice.

The above brief survey of happenings and emerging trends points in only one direction. The days of the PTI government seem numbered. How it will fall, and who will be the authors of the final push out of the corridors of power attracts as many theories as the growing numbers of inveighed commentators. This juncture must be worrying the government’s establishment backers, who logically must be burning some midnight oil in their war games rooms to plan ahead for the seemingly looming transition. If they have the capacity to learn from past experience, in the long term interests of the country, they should take their foot off the political accelerator and allow the people to speak through a fair and free election as a minimum demand. Establishment interference in, and domination of, the democratic political process has spawned nothing but crises. Each one gets worse with time. Only a consistent, genuine, permanent adherence to the people’s will can save Pakistan from a fate worse than death: perpetual crises, instability and mayhem, which must inevitably one day engender an irretrievable disaster.

 

 

 

 

 

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Business Recorder Column November 9, 2021

Lull before fresh storms

 

Rashed Rahman

 

The Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaaf (PTI) government is increasingly hemmed in by problems and issues, all crises largely of its own making. The ‘ban’ on the Tehreek-i-Labaiq Pakistan (TLP) has been revoked just six months after it was imposed by a federal cabinet decision that reports say elicited strong dissent from some ministers. Such disquiet over the end outcome of the government’s bluster, climb down and final surrender are understandable since such agreements in the past have not produced the desired results because such militant outfits soon go back to their violent confrontationist ways. This time, the TLP claimed at least seven police scalps in an unprecedentedly violent series of mass protests. It is said the establishment is behind the agreement whose details have been kept secret, with critical observers wondering whether this reversal of its proscription and mainstreaming of TLP means the establishment has some political purpose in its bag of tricks to use this militant outfit to control the national narrative, confine it within religious parameters, and use the TLP against the mainstream opposition. As in the past, there are few who do not believe that the government will soon rue its abject surrender.

If there are innocent souls who believe the government’s rhetoric that the agreement with the TLP was necessary under the circumstances, in the greater national interest and for the sake of peace, let them chew on the news that the same government is in talks with the even more ferocious Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) for an agreement to halt its attacks from across the Afghan border and its actions by its cells within Pakistan. Reportedly, it is the Afghan Taliban who have brokered these talks. The terms so far available are that the TTP is dangling a one-month ceasefire before the government in exchange for the release of its incarcerated cadres. Severe objections to such a course have come from the parents of the slain schoolchildren in the Army Public School, Peshawar massacre by the TTP, as well as the families of other victims of the TTP’s bloody terrorist campaign. Even if this agreement comes through, what is the guarantee the TTP will not revert to its customary terrorist violence once its workers are set free? This has been the trajectory of every agreement with the TTP since 2004.

These are not the only issues portending an even more difficult time for this government. The opposition Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) is gearing up for another series of protests leading up to a long march on Islamabad despite the falling out with the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) and divisions within the main PDM component, the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N). The PPP and PDM seem inclined to consider a rapprochement while the internal rift of the PML-N remains, but under wraps.

Meanwhile its opponents have much material to lambast the PTI government with. The Election Commission of Pakistan’s (ECP’s) report on the Daska by-election reads like an indictment of the government for trying to rig the election. Considering the manipulation by the establishment of the 2018 general elections that brought the PTI to power, it is worth considering whether the ubiquitous establishment adopted a ‘hands off’ policy vis-à-vis the Daska by-polls. The establishment may not be happy with the PTI government’s, and particularly Prime Minister (PM) Imran Khan’s attempt to challenge the appointment of the new Director General Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI). Although the PM finally succumbed to the establishment’s wishes in this respect, the military brass may feel offended at his ‘courage’. The ECP report seems to have put paid to the credibility of the PTI government’s tall talk about electoral reforms and using electronic voting machines, issues on which the opposition and the ECP both had reservations.

Then there is the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) Ordinance. This has effectively reduced the Chairman NAB to an office in which the incumbent serves at the executive’s pleasure, i.e. the PM can remove him and the President is bound to obey the PM’s advice. Previously, the power of removal of the NAB Chairman lay with the Supreme Judicial Council. The Supreme Court Bar Association and other lawyers’ bodies have already declared they will challenge the Ordinance in the Supreme Court. One wonders whether the PTI government in its wisdom has taken this step to pre-empt the possibility that the by now controversial NAB anti-corruption campaign aimed so far at the opposition may turn against it or at least some sitting ministers. Were this to happen, it could be another signal of the establishment’s unhappiness with the incumbent government.

The economic management of the PTI government is another case in point of self-inflicted wounds. The price of sugar has increased 200 percent in the last three years of the PTI government and the commodity still faces consumers with availability issues. The Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) repeated fiascos also point to the sheer incompetence of PM Imran Khan and his team.

Had the establishment not foolishly thrown all its eggs in Imran Khan’s basket, they would have been spared their current blushes. Having relegated the opposition to the margins through an anti-corruption crusade that despite the tall claims of recoveries by NAB turns out to be peanuts, the establishment’s embarrassment at the arguably most incompetent government in Pakistan’s history would be turning many a face red. Currently, the establishment is stuck on the horns of a dilemma. If they stick with Imran Khan and company, they risk having the blemishes of this government tarnishing their reputation too. If they abandon him, now or after two years, they could also come in for some stick at the bar of public opinion. This now is a classic case of damned if you, damned if you don’t.

What our establishment needs to learn, and there is more than enough experience in our past for this purpose, is that every manipulation of the political scene engenders a bigger crisis tomorrow. The establishment may be able to ride such crises out, but the damage to the country returning to square one again and again is simply incalculable. Pakistan desperately needs, at least as a minimum, a credible, democratic system. This actually poses little or no threat to the dominance of the establishment. It does, however, promise the evolution of a consensual system that lays down the rules of the political game through reliance on the will of the people, not elevated non-elected individuals or institutions.

 

 

 

 

 

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Business Recorder column November 2, 2021

The wages of appeasement

 

Rashed Rahman

 

Once again, the Tehreek-i-Labaiq Pakistan (TLP) has wrested a ‘compromise’ agreement from the sitting government after a violent protest movement bolstered by its repeatedly demonstrated street power. This time, though, the level of TLP violence against the police reached new heights, including the use of deadly weapons. As on previous such occasions, the details of the agreement have not been made public. Mufti Muneebur Rehman, one of the leading ulema of the Barelvi sect that TLP belongs to and who was inducted along with other Barelvi ulema to help conduct negotiations with the TLP, said the details would be revealed at an ‘appropriate time’.

From sketchy reports, it appears that the agreement is an attempted halfway house (again) that attempts to persuade the TLP to give up its long march on Islamabad in return for the release of its leader Saad Rizvi and hundreds of his supporters arrested during the two-week confrontation. The TLP’s long march to Islamabad remains encamped at Wazirabad, although the protestors are packing up while awaiting instructions from their leadership. The government has set up a committee to oversee the implementation of the agreement.

Chances are the TLP demand for expulsion of the French Ambassador if not cutting off diplomatic relations with France over the repeated publication of blasphemous caricatures will be defused by reference to parliament, as an earlier agreement had promised. The French Ambassador is no longer in the country and reports say the former incumbent has been posted as French Ambassador to Egypt.

Since its formation in 2015 by the late Khadim Hussain Rizvi, the TLP has conducted seven violent protests, causing economic losses of some Rs 35 billion, apart from paralysing cities and their functioning. Each time, the government of the day has attempted compromise agreements to defuse the protests, which keep springing back time and time again on the grounds that the terms of the accord have not been met. Informed observers view the emergence of the TLP as apiece with the establishment’s unreconstructed habit of playing with the fire of extremist religious groups for one purpose or another, with the by now almost inevitable result of these establishment proxies slipping off the leash as their strength and power increases. Then follow the mixed messages (and actions) of repression, retreat, compromise, soon to be followed by the by now familiar pattern of return to challenges to the writ of the state.

This pattern is discernible in the reliance in the past on the Deobandi sect for so-called jihad in Afghanistan, a venture that gave birth to the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), with tragic and bloody consequences. Some analysts read the emergence and attempted mainstreaming of the TLP as reliance on the dominantly majority Barelvi sect to offset Deobandi extremism through recourse to the Barelvis’ adherence historically to Sufi Islam. However, the brew has boiled over to make the erstwhile peaceful Barelvis another militant religious outfit in the avatar of the TLP.

Playing with religious groups of one denomination or another is the favourite ploy of the establishment to control the national narrative and meet critical, especially progressive voices’ challenge through recourse to a religious narrative. In the process, the multiplying threats to the security of the state and (flawed) democratic system have failed to teach any lessons to our stubborn and shirt-sighted establishment, which seems unable to learn from this accumulated experience.

Playing on the religious turf has proved a swampy terrain. Opening the gate to religiously inspired extremist narratives only works briefly, soon to be overtaken by the autonomy acquired and claimed by such groups from the control of the establishment. It also carries the added burden of rendering even our less than credible democratic ‘system’ a victim of extremist religious pressure from the street or even the barrel of a gun.

The present TLP-government agreement could perhaps have not been possible if the military establishment had not applied its shoulder to the wheel on the side of the government. This has been confirmed by one of the Barelvi ulema negotiating with the TLP. COAS General Qamar Jawed Bajwa has been cited as the main figure in this outcome.

Pakistan has been rendered infructuous as a credible, functional state by the establishment’s games to preserve its hegemony. In the process, the slow and difficult process of allowing a genuine democratic system to take root finally, with all its admittedly attendant difficulties given our fraught history, has taken a fatal hit. This manipulation of the polity has prevented Pakistan from acquiring the legitimacy and credibility of a modern, democratic state internationally. Perused with a critical lens, Pakistan has been incrementally reduced to isolation because of its policies regionally and domestically, currently rendering it, partly because of US estrangement over Afghanistan, into a dependent but pariah status.

Perhaps it is time for the ubiquitous establishment to return to the drawing board and examine what the wages of creating, encouraging, and later appeasement of religious fanatics has wrought. Time for some fresh thinking gentlemen, particularly in the light of the impasse the establishment has landed itself in by putting all its eggs in Imran Khan’s basket, a venture on which the people, sans leadership, are nevertheless pronouncing daily.

 

 

 

 

 

rashed.rahman1@gmail.com

rashed-rahman.blogspot.com

The November 2021 issue of Pakistan Monthly Review (PMR) is out

 The November 2021 issue of Pakistan Monthly Review (PMR) is out (link: pakistanmonthlyreview.com)

Contents:

1. Rashed Rahman: The National Question in Marxism – IV.

2. Jamison C Heinkel and Richard deVillafranca: Baluchistan's Insurgency: implications for Pakistan, the region.

3. Albert Einstein: Why Socialism?

Rashed Rahman

Editor, Pakistan Monthly Review (PMR) (link: pakistanmonthlyreview.com)

Director, Research and Publication Centre (RPC)