Requiem for the dying souls

As TV cameras zoomed into the heap of debris of Marriot Hotel suicide blast, my thoughts took me back to the casualty of Lady Reading Hospital Peshawar, where victims of a suicide attack were being rushed for treatment some days back. As the ambulances ambulance carrying victims blast rushed in, waves of anxiety swept through the journalist corps present at the occasion; photographer’s cameras flashed, cameramen pushed one another to film a shot of the victim and reporters scribbled some words in their notebooks.

When the victims stopped to arrive at the hospital, a hush seized the journalists and they engaged in low tone exchanges. Victims’ families started to arrive at the hospital to know about the safety of their near and dear, usually weeping and crying in desperation and if they found someone of their kin soaked in blood and motionless, a strange feeling of helplessness engulfed them.

I came out of the hospital with a heavy heart. Way back to my office life in the city seemed as usual with the story to be filed on my mind. Afterwards, over a cup of tea some friends gathered and discussion turned towards the militancy, but it remained inconclusive till end and we dispersed with more questions than answers.

To quote Obaidullah Aleem:

“Who I have name for these recurring calamities

My cities are burning and people dying

None else in behind this deadly manoeuvring,

We are being killed, we are the killers.”

I had seen too much blood and gore scenes over a period of two years as a journalist covering the militancy, which has ravaged the NWFP and FATA. But most of the time the futility of violence left me gaping for breath and this feeling has dawned upon me with more force that what is the purpose of this killing and what the killers wanted to achieve.

I consider them actors in an absurdist theatre, when they say that the bloodshed in this country is against America, as how one of us could believe that killing their fellow humans could entitle them to the riches of Paradise. The people roaming around wrapping themselves in lethal explosives are to me reminiscent of the pig tailed child who heralded the end of Garcia Marquez’s city of mirrors.

The Kafkaesque manner of terrorism and the stoicism of the majority of our population often puzzles’ me as our society fiddles like Nero when the Rome was burning. The war was initially limited to Waziristan and most of us remained silent, then it spread to whole of FATA and parts of Frontier and we are still silent and one does not need to be Einstein to foresee what tomorrow has in store for us.

Faraz has put these aptly:

You keep on poking every heart with spears of bigotry.

We’re the people of love, why are you raising daggers.

Let music resonate in the city; let us live in the city.

We take care of flowers and guard fragrance

Whose blood you are here to spill, we only preach love,

What then you find in this city, when word ceases to exist.

When swords cut through gentle tanner, when lyrics leave for ever,

When melodies got killed and voices died down.

Whom you stone, when the city turns to ruins

Then this very sight of your face will haunt you in mirrors.”

Peshawar: from Kanishka to Taliban

Peshawar, sweltering with mercury soaring above 40 degrees centigrade, hours long power outages, and a new breed of marauding tribesmen called Taliban knocking at city’s gates seems to be submerged into a chaos, yet it is the same noisy and dusty city, it used to be throughout its history of more than 2000 years.

Roaming around when one reaches Qissa Khawni Bazaar (The story tellers bazaar) in the heart of the city, one could hear the Peshawarities sipping aromatic ‘Kewha’ in small china cups, and reacting anxiously to the rising militancy in surrounding areas, but most of the time, they shrug away the fear that militants could overtake the provincial metropolis, while at the same time some pessimists believe that they could.

Qissa Khawni occupies a central place in the social and cultural life of Peshawar. In the by gone days, it used to be a camping ground for the caravans from Central Asia and Povindahs or Afghan travelling merchants, and at nights storytellers recited their stories of love and war to these travellers. However, during the metamorphosis of the city, the tradition of story telling gradually became a matter of memories only, while now the harsh realities of an uncertain future lied ahead.

On a walking distance from Qissa Khawni is situated Peshawar Museum, which bears testimony to the reign of Buddhism on the vast expanses of Ghandara. There are around 74 Buddha stories carved in stone are on display in Peshawar Museum, describing all happenings in his life. Emperor Kanishka, ruled the Kushan Empire from his capital Peshawar (Purushapura) in 78 AD, and Buddhism, took a new form of Mahayana Buddhism during his rule.

In 1530, the founder of Mughal Empire in India Baber passed through Peshawar and found a town by the name of Bagram, which was later renamed as Peshawar, which means “The Place at the Frontier,” by his grandson, Akbar, the Great Mughal. The Pathan conqueror of Mughal throne, Sher Shah Suri when connected Delhi and Kabul through Grand Trunk (GT) Road, Peshawar became an important trade centre. After Suri, Mughals again captured India and also Peshawar, and transformed it into the city of flowers adding many of its finest architectural monuments including Mahabat Khan Mosque and Shahi Bagh.

In 1834, the armies of Ranjit Singh captured the city; they chopped the city gardens for the firewood and General Paolo Di Avitabile, the Italian mercenary governor of city used the mosque minarets to hang those whom he considered troublemakers. He also reconstructed the city’s old wall to guard against the attacks of unyielding and ferocious tribesmen.

The British captured Peshawar in 1848, and turned it into a garrison and later also craved a new province NWFP, and Peshawar became its provincial capital. Peshawar remained an important imperial outpost during the ‘Great Game’ days against any possible Tsarist advances on India, which ironically came about 40 years after the liquidation of British Empire.

The Russian invasion of Afghanistan in 1979 exposed the city to an influx of Afghan refugees, and it became a haven of Afghan resistance groups, fighting the Russian occupation. During this era Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), Jihadists and Pakistani military establishment formed close links to oust the ‘Godless Infidels’ from Afghanistan and a new chapter of city’s history opened, which introduced the city to Kalashnikovs, heroin and jihadists. The CIA financed Jihad led to departure of Soviets from Afghanistan, but the bad blood among jihadists led the country to strife, which ultimately paved the way for the emergence of Taliban. Taliban were ousted from Kabul in 2002 by the American for sheltering Osama Bin Laden, whom they considered responsible for the incidents of 9/11. The ouster of Taliban from Kabul with the active Pakistani support exposed the tribal areas of NWFP to a wave of militancy called Talibanistaion, which gradually spread across NWFP and now knocking at the city’s gates.

These tumultuous events and strifes’ over the centuries have shaped the psyche and cultural ethos of the people. According to the Karl Meyer’s The Dust of Empire, “Peshawar is the hub of a thriving black market in drugs and weapons, its slums and refugee camps the recruiting ground for jihadists who would happily kill every infidel anywhere.” In reality, one of greatest non-violent movements of history started in the Frontier in twentieth century and leader of Khudai Khidmatgar (Red Shirts) Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan raised a non-violent army of 100,000 men among the people, who love vendetta and guns more than anything else.

But the ongoing militancy and rumors that the city could fall to Taliban, makes citizens wish that someone like Avitabile should guard it, as he defended it by making a wall around it against the marauding tribes.

Kashmir: A forgotten tragedy

“Kashmir calls back, its pull stronger than ever, its whispers its fairy magic to the ear and its memory disturbs the mind.”

                                                   -Jawaharlal Nehru 

During Maharaja Ranjit Singh reign, three brothers, Gulab Singh, Suchet Singh and Dhian Singh acquired powerful influence at his court and Dhian Singh became his principal advisor and Sikh Durbar in Lahore rewarded them for their services to the empire. Jammu was given to Gulab Singh in 1920 as a fief (jagir); Dhian Singh was awarded with Poonch and small surrounding hilly states of Bhimber and Mirpur, as Alastair Lamb notes that the areas which fell in the Poonch state, “Coincides very closely with what in late 1947 was to become Azad Kashmir.”  

During the First Anglo-Sikh war of 1845, Gulab Singh remained neutral and later by the Treaty of Amritsar March 16, 1846; British sold Kashmir (areas to the eastward of the river Indus and westward of the river Ravi⁾ to the Maharaja Gulab Singh for around Rs 7.5 million. 

The state at that time was stretched over an area of 84,471 square miles and Gulab Singh bought it at the rate of Rs 155 per square mile while he paid seven and half rupees for every inhabitant of the state. (SHAHB NAMA) 

Gulab Singh was succeeded by his son Ranbir Singh in 1858 and Partap Singh followed him but he had no direct heir to the throne and during his last days his brother Amar Singh was serving as the chief minister while the state was under direct British supervision. 

Maharaja Partap Singh considered Jagatdev Singh, son of his great granduncle Dhian Singh, the Poonch Raja, as ‘Spiritual Heir to Kashmir,’ but his brother Amar Singh, who was his chief minister at that time with the connivance of British nominated his son Hari Singh in 1925 as the new ruler of the state. The British had once rescued Hari Singh from blackmailing when he was in Landon and according to Alastair Lamb, “Partap Singh despite the approval of Chamber of Princes was overruled by the Political Department, which thought that Hari Singh, whose disreputable background might make him easier to manipulate, would prove a more amenable Maharaja.” 

Thus began the most decisive period in the history of Indo-Pak and on October 26, 1947 Hari Singh singed the Instrument of Accession with Indian Union and on October 27, Indian troops entered Kashmir and a war broke out in 1948. The countries also fought two more wars in 1965 and 71 and a constant war posture as in 1990s the Kashmiris launched a guerilla movement to win their independence from India with Pakistan’s active backing and around 100,000 died during the resistance movement.  

The situation radically changed after the 9/11 and Pakistan started to distance her from the Jihadi groups. The Kashmir almost disappeared from the government’s agenda as Jihadis and government lost their good terms under the intense US pressure. 

Pakistan honeymoon with the Kashmiri resistance groups has ended and so the rhetoric of political and moral support for their right to self-determination. President Musharraf’s eagerness to resolve the dispute also played an important role in boosting Indian position while his defensive attitude and internal problems made the Kashmir’s issue a forgotten tragedy.

History, rulers and the Pakistani Way

“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”
George Santayana

The Pakistan’s political history is littered with blood and shameful departures of rulers. Our rulers thrive on violence; orchestrate political farces to hoodwink the masses and end up to the same shameful end.

Pakistan first premier Liaqut Ali Khan was gunned down in a Rawalpindi public meeting and his alleged killer also met the same end. The police officer investigating the case also perished in an air crash and with him also the traces that could point that who was the behind the assassination.

After Liaquat assassination, a crippled bureaucrat, Ghulam Mohammad assumed powers and is responsible for the many cancerous traditions in politics. The first dissolution of the Constituent Assembly and notorious “doctrine of necessity” are the parts of his shameful legacy. He was sent abroad during a serious illness but his legacy is still haunting us and will continue to do so in the years to come.

Another bureaucrat Skindar Mirza followed Ghulam Mohammad and brings the army in politics by admitting the Commander in Chief Mohammad Auyb Khan in his cabinet as defence minister. Later, Auyb deposed him and sent him to Britain, where the former president and his wife, when pressed by the circumstances started clerical jobs in a hotel and died and buried in that country.

Field Martial Mohammad Auyb Khan imposed the first martial law in country and abrogated the 1956 constitution in a fit of frenzy. He framed another constitution and changed the form of government to presidential and became president after a sham election. He fooled the masses for eleven years with slogans like ‘Operation Gibraltar’, ‘Basic Democracies’, ‘Green Revolution’ and the ‘Decade of Development.’ He had to step down after students’ protests in the country and to hand over power to Yahya Khan.

Gen. Yahya Khan, “drowned the two-nation theory,” and the East Pakistan in the Bay of Bengal in the Dakkha debacle of 1971 and spent rest of his days under house arrest.

Yahya handed over the reins of the country to the charismatic Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto (ZAB) after the fall of Dakkha and he became the first civil martial law administrator of the history. He introduced the slogans of ‘Islamic Socialism,’ ‘Roti, Kapra aur Makan,’ ‘1,000 years war’ and nationalization of the industries. He was put behind the bars after a coup and his dead body came out of the prison after a sham trial and was buried in the Ghari Khuda Bux cemetery under the shadow of bayonets in the darkness of night.

Ziaul Haq hanged ZAB and ruled the country for nearly 11 years on the name of Islam and flogging. His Islamisation and Afghan jihad backfired and resulted into the sectarianism, heroin and kalashinkove culture in the country. He perished along with his coterie in a mysterious plane crash on August 17, 1988.

Benazir Bhutto followed Zia and was sworn in as the first female head of the state of an Islamic country. Her first government was discharged on the charges of corruption. Her husband earned notoriety for corruption and was branded as the Mr. Ten Percent and her only brother Mir was gunned down in an encounter with police and later her government was dissolved for second time. She spent nearly seven years in exile and back in the country now and also survived a deadly suicide attack aimed at her.

Nawaz Sharif was a product of Zia tyranny and a general arranged his entry into politics. His first government was dissolved when differences arose between the president and him. The Supreme Court later reinstated his government but the army had to intervene to break the deadlock and both the president and the premier had to pack up. He clashed with the judiciary and sent anther president home after axing his powers. Later, an airborne general put him behind bars when he tried to remove him. He spent nearly 18 months in a prison and was exiled to Saudi Arabia he also tried to make a comeback but again sent on exile forcibly but he is finally back in the country after an eight years gap.

At present we are living in the reign of ‘enlightened despot’ Gen Pervez Musharraf and he had imposed two martial laws during his eight-year rule. Recently he had crushed a rebellion from the judiciary and thanks his all out support for the War on Terror, Taliban- the once blue-eyed boys of establishment, are roaming in the streets wrapping themselves in lethal explosives. Some days ago he had doffed off his military uniform, which he was used to say his second skin and also announced elections in the country.

‘A mortal is God in all his might, This I will not write.’

“We had no funds, no files, no office, no dictaphone. And yet, with nothing in hand but a pencil, we wrote the most glorious chapter in the cultural renaissance of our people.”
                                      -Kirshen Chander (1966)

Media has a strong tradition of resistance in the Indo-Pak subcontinent. From the refusal of the father of Indian journalism James Augusts Hickey to bow before the British raj during the formative period of Indian journalism to the Karachi journalists’ arrests after the imposition of emergency in the country, media has been the custodian of a great tradition of resistance in this part of the world.

The journalists like Faiz Ahmed Faiz have always bear the burnt for saying nay to the unconstitutional steps of the dictators taken for their survival on the name of national interest.

Dr. Iqbal Ahmed recounts the tale of a Bosnian newspaper “Oslobodenje” in his essay, “Intellectuals Role in Society,” which is similar to the present ordeal being faced by the Pakistani media.

The Oslobodenje was the Bosnia’s largest daily; it was established during World War II as an underground paper by the partisans who fought the fascists and after the break-up of the Yugoslavia it supported the Bosnia as a country.

Dr. Iqbal writes, “ Oslobodenje practised what it preached. Its editor is Muslim, deputy editor is an incredibly brave Serb woman, the staff are mixed – Muslim Serb, and Croat. As such, the newspaper anti its staff became a target of Serb nationalists, an easy target because its offices are located in the ‘death alley’ of Sarajevo within range of Serb gunners, The newspaper and its staff sustained many miunes but did not miss a day of publication printing often a single page. Oslobodenje became a symbol of Bosnian resolve, Sarajevans’ will to live and, above all, of Serb failure to destroy the values for which Bosnia stood. “Why don’t you move the paper out of Sarajevo?” I asked Editor KemaI Kurspahic soon after he had survived a bomb, ‘we can’t”, he replied simply, “Oslobodenje is a lighthouse”.

The same is the condition of Pakistani media after the imposition of the emergency when the government attempted to gag the media and silence the dissent shamelessly. The president who used to brag about the exemplary media freedom closed two popular TV channels in just one go and let the other operate mutilated.

But unlike the past the lawyers and the civil society have rose and speaking the truth to the dictator hand in hand with the media as legendry Faiz puts it.

“If pen and ink are snatched from me, shall I
Who dipped my finger in my heart’s blood complain -
Or if they seal my tongue, when I have made
A mouth of every round link of my chain?”
Translated (A.W)

I know not who I am

Bulleh Shah, the greatest mystic poet of Punjab, had lived the most tumultuous period of the Sub-continent history during which Mughal dynasty jolted after Aurangezb’s death and his successors first fought each other for the Delhi’s throne and later the attack of Nadir Shah broke the back of Mughal’s rule in India. The subsequent events led to the ascendancy of the British. 

Bulleh Shah’s real name was Abdullah Shah and he was born in 1680 at the Pandoke area in Qasur, where his father Sakhi Dervish was a local prayer leader.  

He became a disciple of the Qasur’s famous teacher Hafiz Ghulam Murtaza and acquired a deep understanding of the Quran, Hadith (Traditions), Fiqh and Logic. Bulleh Shah was the disciple of the Shah Inayat Qadri Shatari who belonged to the Qadri tradition of the Sufis, which trace their origin to Syed Abdul Qadir Jilani of Baghdad. His affinity to his spiritual leader Shah Inayat grown to such an extent that the people started to taunt him saying that he is a Syed or of the Prophet’s family and Shah Inayat belongs to the Arian which is a lower caste, but he answered the rebukes and taunts of people by saying:  

“Let anyone, who calls me a Sayyiad,

Be punished with tortures of hell,

 And let him revel in the pleasures of heaven,

Who labels me an Arain” (Translation- J.R. Puri and T.R. Shangari)

 Once some action of him annoyed Shah Inayat and it left him in great distress and his poetry is replete with the pain of separation from his master. He tried his utmost to repent his indiscretion but Shah Inayat was not ready to let it go that easy and in a frantic fit Bulleh Shah dressed like a female and reached a party in which his master was also present and started to dance and sing the famous Kafi, Teray ishq nachaya kar thai-ya thai-ya’: 

Your love has made me dance all over.

Falling in love with you was supping a cup of poison.

Come, my healer, it’s my final hour.

 Your love has made me dance all over (Translation-S.K Duggal) 

When Shah Inayat learned it that Bulleh Shah was dancing, he forgave him and he was allowed to the coveted circle of his master.

In the words of K.S. Duggal,”when Aurangzeb banned singing and dancing as an un-Islamic practice, Bulleh Shah’s Master, Inayat Shah, is said to have advised him to go from village to village in the Punjab singing and dancing and thus defy the imperial injunction which Bulleh did with impunity.” He also became a part of what is called the feud between the Sufis and Orthodox Ulema and even when he died the Ulema refused to lead his funeral prayers. He ridicules the traditionalist Ulema in his poetry by saying: 

The Mullahs and Qazis show me the light

Leading to the maze of superstition.

Wicked are the ways of the world

Like laying nets for innocent birds

With religious and social taboos

They have tied my feet tight. (Translation-K.S. Duggal) 

He died in 1758 and is buried in Qasur and his Kafis are much popular across the Sub-Continent as compared to his own time and like his couplet, Bulleh Shah asan marna nahi, gor paya Koi Hor” (It is not me in the grave, it is someone else”.  

Pity the Nation

Pakistan … anything can happen here anytime. Heroes are reduced to zero in an instant; rulers are forced to pack up; suicide attackers can play havoc with people’s lives; judges are rendered non-functional; intelligence agencies could harass top judges; government servants could embezzle millions of rupees; mosques could challenge the writ of state; state kidnaps its own citizen; artists receive life threats for their art; CD shop are blamed for corrupting morality, proclaimed offenders hold public offices; political parties take whole cities hostage; political leaders change their loyalties overnight; military topples government anytime; terrorist roam around more freely than the law enforcers; journalists receive bullets for writing truth; television channels could be forced to suspend transmission; those responsible for the country’s breakup are let off, prime minister’s brother is shot dead by police in encounter ………. 

Imagine, is all this possible anywhere else in the world? 

Khalil Gibran words sound prophetic if we see them in the backdrop of the contemporary Pakistan.

Pity the Nation that is full of beliefs and empty of religion;

Pity the Nation that acclaims the bully as hero,

And that deems the glittering conqueror beautiful;

Pity the Nation that raises not its voice,

Save where it walks in a funeral,

And will rebel not save when its neck is laid;

Between the sword and the block;

Pity the Nation that whose sages are dumb with years,

And whose strong men are yet in the cradles;

Pity the Nation divided into fragments,

Each fragment deeming itself a nation. 

Troublesome Tribal

North-Western Frontier province’s tribal belt is a shadowy and mysterious land for the world, run by a blend of more than a century old colonial laws and primitive tribal traditions. Bordering south-eastern Afghanistan this area over the past few years emerged as the hotbed of Taliban militancy and has been restive since the US invasion of country.

Federally Administrated Tribal Areas or FATA consist seven semi-autonomous agencies: South Waziristan, North Waziristan. Khyber, Bajaur, Kurram, Mohmand, and Orakzai agencies and five Frontier Regions(F.Rs ) F.R Peshawar, F.R Kohat, F.R Tank, F.R Banuu and F.R D.I. Khan.

FATA is spread over an area of 27,220 square kilometers and it shares 600-km. long border with Afghanistan and has population of 3.17 million Pashtuns residing on the Pakistani side of Durand Line which was drawn by Sir. Mortimer Durand the foreign secretary of British Indian government in 1893. It was meant to create a buffer zone between British India and Afghanistan by dividing the Pastuns tribes living on the both sides of the divide.

A major part of the FATA is rugged and inaccessible mountainous terrain. FATA is geographically located in NWFP but have a different administrative setup unlike other parts of the province and is administered under the Frontier Crime Regulations (FCR) promulgated by the British Raj to rein the fierce Pashtuns in 19th century. The governor of the NWFP exercises the executive authority in FATA as the representative of the President with discretionary powers as to ensure the “peace and good governance”.

The rest is left to political agent (PA) who has sweeping powers under his belt to manage, control and administer the respective agency. PA under section 40 FCR can preventively imprison anyone up to three years. Those who are convicted under the FCR have no rights to make an appeal in a court of law in Pakistan and the revision right rests with FCR commissioner appointed by the governor NWFP or final appeal can be made to the FCR tribunal comprised of the provincial chief secretary, law secretary and home secretary. PA can punish entire tribe on the grounds of collective tribal and territorial responsibility for the crimes in their area by imposing fines, arrests and property seizures. Fines are basically heavy and are deducted from the salaries of the employees of the fined tribe. The entire agency is subject to overall economic control by the PA of the respective agency.

The area has a unique psychological profile combining the Pashtun tribal code and orthodox religion. The tribes’ acts upon the Pashtun code or Pakthunwali while settling their internal and tribal issues. Pakthunwali is an unwritten code and is a collection of traditional and customary laws which determines the form and character of the Pashtun life.

During the Afghan war the whole of the FATA was converted into a base camp of the Jihadis with active US support. Later the emergence of Taliban also played a crucial role in strengthening the radical leanings among the population. After the fall of Taliban some of the active elements passed the difficult and inaccessible mountainous terrain and took refuge in the tribal agencies. Reportedly nearly five to six hundreds foreign fighters took refuge in these areas after the Spinghar (White Mountain) operation near Tora Bora in 2001 and operation Anaconda in Paktia in 2002.

The US pressure to rein and brought to justice these elements led to the deadly encounters between the law enforcement agencies and militants since 2002. In 2004 military operation was launched in South Waziristan. On 24 April 2004 military and militants signed an agreement known as the Shakai agreement but in the following weeks the agreement broke down as the tribal failed to handover the militants. On 25 June 2006 a peace deal was signed in the North Waziristan also. The government was also near signing a deal in Bajaur Agency when a missile attack killed more than 82 people in a madrassa and more than 42 soldiers were killed in a suicide attack on military training centre in Dargai in Malakand after the madrassa bombing.

At present there are 70,000 troops are deployed on Durand line to prevent infiltration and movement across the boarder. So far more than 700 hundreds of military personnel killed in clashes with militants along unknown number of militants, civilians and damage to property.

Do you know the Pakistani National Mind?

A nation is a living entity and has a collective psyche, mind or character. Different nations and cultures behave differently according to their compositions under identical conditions. Sometimes back I came across an op-ed piece in one of our dailies where the columnist complained the lack of awareness about the national character or mind in Pakistan. Yesterday I came across a very interesting formula which the author calls “A Pseudo Scientific Formula” to know the character of a nation and here I am sharing the formula with you.

Borrowing the author words, “Let “R” stand for a sense of reality (or realism), “D” for dreams (or idealism), “H” for a sense of humor and … “S” for sensitivity.  As we can’t invent words like “humoride” or “humorate” after the fashion of Chemistry, we may put it thus: 3 grains of Realism, 2 grains of idealism, 2 grains of humor and 1 grains of sensitivity makes an Englishman.”

R3 D2 H2 S1 = the English

R2 D3 H3 S3 = the French

R3 D3 H2 S2 = the Americans

R3 D4 H1 S2 = the Germans

R2 D4 H1 S1 = the Russians

R2 D3 H1 S1 = the Japanese

R4 D1 H3 S3 = the Chinese

So what makes a Pakistani?

Note: “4” stand for abnormally high, “3” for high,”2” for fair and “1” for low.

For Singing Tomorrows

2006 is about to be a part of a vast wilderness called past. What is in the fleeting days and nights, except a creeping sensation of passing through the limits of space and time? What are the joys, tears and sorrows attached to the sandcastle called life? Every sorrow has its happiness and happiness its tears. In a nutshell happiness is all about tomorrow, whatever we do is all for the singing tomorrows. As the yesterday/past in nothing but a long trail on the desert of time we left behind while heading towards the oasis we call tomorrow or future. Every tomorrow has a message, radiance and hope about it. It calls us to let bygones be bygones and fix our gaze at the future or on the singing tomorrows.