PUNCHLINE It Takes Courage: Standing for truth is all that matters By Z. G. Muhammad Sometimes, some news stories published on the inner pages because of their imminent political fallout are more significant than those that for their immediate news value make the lead stories. On Saturday, a four column news story published on page seven of the newspaper caught my attention more than the two BJP ministers resigning at the insistence of the party high command. It was … Read entire article »

    Nostalgia Haji’s Bazar By ZGM    It was no ordinary day for them; it was a dream come true. On leaving the customs clearance hall, walking on the dockyard, looking at the vastness of the sea they saw their lifelong supplications granted. Unmindful of the frenetic activity on the dockyard, with eyes fixed on the ornately festooned ship Akbari, even those in very ripe age, walked very fast. Hardly, any one of the pilgrims had an experience of … Read entire article »

  Punchline Misplaced Optimism By Z.G. Muhammad     The past Monday, when my column, ‘Geelani Release- A Way Forward,’ appeared in this newspaper, I felt remorseful of having written something outlandish- far fetched from the ground reality. It was flagrantly in contradiction with the black bordered banner lead stories, ‘Bloody Sunday: 20 Killed’ in all the newspapers. The blood curdling details of blood bath enacted in wee morning hours of Sunday in a couple of villages in Shopian district of … Read entire article »

Nostalgia Sea Haj Pilgrims in Bombay By ZGM It was like Alice, that little girl in Carol Lewis’ novel falling down a rabbit hole to discover a wonderland and seeing an attractive garden. That is how the Haj pilgrims felt on their arrival at the Bombay Central Railway Station.  Sitting, atop their tin trunks and luggage in the old terrain military trucks perhaps of second world war times,  on their way to Saboo Siddique Musafirkhana at the … Read entire article »

Punchline Geelani Release- A Way Forward By Z.G. Muhammad It might have been festive day for nonagenarian Syed Ali Shah Geelani, when he offered congregational Friday prayers, obligatory on all Muslims at the Jamia Masjid, Hyderpora, some two hundred yards from his residence. For about, three thousands days, five times a day Muezzin had been calling on him from the Masjid in his neighborhood to join the congregational prayers, but for his house detention, he could not respond to … Read entire article »

  Nostalgia Bonds of Fraternity ZGM “City life is millions of people being lonesome together,” this quote by famed American essayist and poet Henry David Thoreau aptly summed up life in Bombay for me.  This metropolitan, where streams of humanity glided like inanimate logs in the river Jhelum in our childhood was a big a contrast to the downtown Srinagar- my birth place; where swallows flying across traffic less roads with loops and rolls like sabrejets, provided companionship … Read entire article »

  PUNCHLINE Syed Ali Geelani- Baton Not Passed On     By Z. G. Muhammad   Some days back, Syed Ali Shah Geelani, decided to step aside and passed on the baton of the Tahreek Hurriyat Jammu and Kashmir to his second in command Muhammad Ashraf Sehrai.  On the expected lines, the decision taken at a Shoora meeting of the Tahreek Hurriyat made it to headlines in the newspapers across the sub-continent. The decision caused some columns and news analysis … Read entire article »