The Moment Time Stops

 “The pain of a missing father is thousand times more painful than all the blisters in the world and it was for him that I was walking and am ready to accept all the pain that comes my way in efforts for recovery for him.”

Mir Mohammad Ali Talpur

How does one measure time? I suppose the criterion varies from individual to individual, from situation to situation and this means that time is and can be measured in different ways. True, some may measure it nonchalantly in their life of opulence and ease while some may measure it as a tedious exercise in their abject poverty.

The different attitude to measuring time is dependent on the usual circumstances that human live and survive in but how does one measure time in extraordinary and abnormal circumstances for then the measurement requires completely different parameters.

Literature map of the world

One of the things that make books so powerful is that they can let you sample other cultures and experiences you’ll never get to have in your own life.

With that in mind, do you want to expand your reading world a bit?

Well, here is an utterly brilliant literature map of the world

Courtesy: Backforward24

Khair Bakhsh Marri

He said the the hand of so called friendship being extended to us has the blood of Bengalis on it. The massacre in Bengal is too fresh to be forgotten. He said what’s the guarantee that the same hand will not shed our ( Baloch/Pashtun) blood?

Afrasiab Khattak

In the general elections of 1970 my organization, Pashtun Students Federation supported National Awami Party (NAP), a party of progressive and nationalist political forces with a strong base in Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan. It was at this stage that I came to know about the main leaders of the Party. Khair Bakhsh Mari (or KB as his close friends called him) emerged as one of the top leaders of the party in Balochistan. To many, this powerful chieftain or nawab of Mari Baloch tribe with an impressive personality, remained a mystery as despite being a member of an established sociopolitical elite he maintained a consistent and active interest in theory and practice of Marxism. He also gradually came to be known for his straight talk on the national question. Like many young activists I also developed interest in knowing about his ideas. I followed his speeches in public meetings and media.

Fallen Defenders of Balochistan

Siddique Eido and Yousaf Nazar

28 April 2011

Thousands of defenders of Baloch nation have perished in Pakistan’s dirty war in Balochistan. Thousands killed and their body dumped, thousands more still suffer in torture cells of Pakistan. Villages bombed and burned their inhabitant forced into becoming internal displaced person (IDP), cities turned into fortress with many check posts surrounding them all this to isolate the Baloch freedom fighters in the mountains.

Activists living in cities of Balochistan are most vulnerable, after the Murgaap incident, in April of 2009, when Pakistani intelligence agency picked up three prominent Baloch leaders Ghulam Mohammed Baloch, Lala Muneer and Sher Mohammed Baloch from their lawyers chamber in Turbat and within days killed them in custody and dumped their bodies in Murgaap it became clear that Baloch activists are not even save within the boundaries of a Pakistani court.

Enforced Disappearances and Balochistan

Importantly those responsible for the disappearances are named and punished the scourge of enforced disappearances will continue unabated

Mir Mohammad Ali Talpur

The scourge of enforced disappearances in Pakistan has severely eroded the foundations of society’s conscience and confidence. This crime against humanity has been going on for so long and so systematically in Balochistan that it has come to be considered a normal state of affairs. But a vast majority remain unperturbed by the atrocity inflicted on the victims and all those connected to them.

Bertolt Bretcht in his 1935 poem “When evil-doing comes like falling rain” has put this attitude very poignantly: “The first time it was reported that our friends were being butchered there was a cry of horror. Then a hundred were butchered. But when a thousand were butchered and there was no end to the butchery, a blanket of silence spread. When evil-doing comes like falling rain, no body calls out “stop!” When crimes begin to pile up, they become invisible. When sufferings become unendurable the cries are no longer heard. The cries, too, fall like rain in summer.”

Baloch Journalist Sajid Hussain

Baloch Women and Aurat March

The battle for women’s rights cannot be fought separately from the battles for other rights because all rights are intrinsically interconnected and will have to be fought simultaneously

Mir Mohammad Ali Talpur

The ‘Aurat March’ here on the 8th of March coincides with the ‘International Women’s Day’ which is observed as a Civil awareness day for Women and girls and also as Anti-sexism day and Anti-Discrimination Day. Celebrating such ideals should not have been a source of threat and annoyance to anyone of course except to those who have an inborn insecurity about women having a say over their lives; for unfortunately lives of women have been decided by and dictated by the patriarchy which prevails in most societies for long and these insecure ones feel threatened and imperiled by the freedom that women may succeed in securing by expressing their resentment and defiance at the male dominated homes, societies and states.

Baloch Culture Day

Looking like a Baloch on ‘culture day’ may be expensive in terms of money but being a Baloch by conduct as per history and historical responsibility comes at a price which probably not many of us are ready to pay

‘Am I Baloch because of my Paag?
“Resistance Day or Cultural Day”

Mir Mohammad Ali Talpur

I am posing a question and will then try to answer it; in my answer I will express my views on something which has quite recently become a fad and fashion with zero returns either politically, culturally, socially or economically.

Does the Paag, Sadri and Chawat or Pashk and Sarri define a person or his/her Balochiyat or is it the character and deeds of that person which truly define his/her Balochiyat and love for Balochistan?

کیا میں اپنے پاگ ( پگڑٰی )کی وجہ سے بلوچ ہوں؟

کیا میں اپنے پاگ ( پگڑٰی )کی وجہ سے بلوچ ہوں؟

‘کلچر ڈے’ کے موقع پر ایک بلوچ کی طرح دیکھنا پیسوں کے معاملے میں مہنگا پڑ سکتا ہے لیکن تاریخ اور تاریخی ذمہ داری کے مطابق طرز عمل کے مطابق ایک بلوچ ہونے کی قیمت اس قیمت پر آتی ہے جو شاید ہم میں سے بہت سے ادا کرنے کو تیار نہیں ہیں

انگلش: میر محمد علی تالپور

اردو ترجمعہ: لالا فہیم بلوچ

میں ایک سوال کھڑا کر رہا ہوں اور پھر اس کا جواب دینے کی کوشش کروں گا۔ میرے جواب میں کسی ایسی چیز پر اپنے خیالات کا اظہار کروں گا جو حال ہی میں سیاسی ، ثقافتی ، معاشرتی یا معاشی طور پر صفر کی واپسی کے ساتھ ایک فیشن اور فیشن بن گیا ہے۔

کیا پاگ ، سدری اور چاوٹ )( جوتے )یا پشک قمیض اور سری کسی شخص یا اس کے بلوچیات کی تعریف کرتے ہیں یا یہ اس شخص کا کردار اور کام ہے جو واقعی اس کی بلوچیات اور بلوچستان سے محبت کی تعریف کرتا ہے؟

Baloch Culture Day

Remembering the Kahudai Family of Pidarak, Balochistan

Balochistan is a vast underdeveloped region that comprises almost half of the land mass of Pakistan with 600 miles of coastline along the Arabian Sea. The port town of Gwadar has gained much international media attention recently because of its central role in the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) and geopolitical importance vis-a-vis Iran and the oil-rich Arab Kingdoms of the Arabian Gulf.

In the backdrop of international conflicts and trade wars lies a forgotten piece of history and land called Balochistan, rapidly becoming the centre of a storm brewing for the last seventy years with the potential to change the political map and the course of history. This is the story of one Baloch family, their heroic resistance to military occupation and their death in defending their land.