We are friends

We are friends

We are friends forever

In the days when we were not clever

In the times when we need favor

We were together

Sang songs,

Dance to the beats

Life was lighter than a feather

That joy and happiness I can never gather

Coming life will witness

The bond we share

Because we are friends

We are friends forever

HOPE By MUHAMMAD AIZZAN MALIK

Is there hope enough to live off?

Is it enough to fill your lungs from?

Is it enough to say I care?

Is it enough to make you bear?

Can it make you to pass through the bridges that never existed?

Can it save you from the fall that was destined?

Yes it can said the old wise man murmuring

It is hope that made you to hear 

There is hope enough for all of us to share

NATIONAL CHRACTER

We are a spineless nation; a nation that lacks courage and a nation that can even sell their mothers for dollars. This is what the world thinks of us but unfortunately this is what we also think of ourselves. We do not need any foreign media to malign us we ourselves can do it effectively and in a better manner. There is a common belief here that we lack national character and some even go further and say we even lack a nation. But our history contradicts whenever resilience and unity is required of this nation they have delivered it but unfortunately we failed to carry on the momentum. Our history is full of instances from natural disasters to foreign invasions and from national tragedies to political turmoil; the people of this land have proved their mettle and has shown character which collectively is our national character. What this country really needs is good leadership and the confidence that they really are a nation. 

BREAKING NEWS…….

Government of Pakistan has taken serious notice of the allegations leveled by former Pakistani pacer Shoaib Akhtar in an interview in India. A cricketing emergency has been imposed by the government. The offices of cricket board and its associations are being sealed and raided by the special FIA teams formed on the instructions of Minister for Interior Ch. Nisar on the premise of producing fake captains. All the former Pakistan cricket team captains are on the run except one who says he is not a captain but a Kaptaan. Inzimam-ul-Haq (a former captain) has voluntarily given in because we all know that running has never been his forte.  Current Pakistan cricket team has been disbanded and a team comprising of PM Nawaz, his ministers and some of his old friends from Gawalmandi will play the rest of the series against Zimbabwe. The matches are shifted from Gaddafi Stadium, Lahore to Bagh-e-Jinnah, Lahore so, that the home team can take maximum home advantage.  PM Nawaz Shareef will lead the team like he leads the military offensive against the terrorists in the North-West. However, the banned terrorist outfit TTP has claimed the responsibility for the PCB scandal.

P.S: Those of you who do not know what Shoaib Akhtar has said, here is a URL:

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x2rniyy

A letter to all APS attack survivors

Dear All APS attack survivors,

May this letter of mine may find you and your families in the best of health and spirits. I am not writing you this letter to condole with you or to tell you that what hell you all went through on the Godforsaken day of 16^th December, 2014. You all know that better than me, you lived through it. In simpler words, you have been to hell and back. I am also not writing to you to tell you that how great was the sacrifice of those 144 innocent souls who lost their lives in the APS massacre because we all already know all this. They all will live on in our thoughts and prayers forever. I am only writing to you to tell you that please, do not become a prisoner to the misery you all went through. Do remember that coming back to school was the first step in that direction. Allah has given us all some virtues, some talent, that talent is our gift, which separate us all from the rest of the world. Find your gift and then fulfill it to the fullest and one more piece of advice dream big and long and never give up on them. I salute you all. Stay happy and strong.

Your faithful brother,

Muhammad Aizzan Malik.

India-at the crossroads of history

It was the January of 1999 and I was ten years old then. Pakistan cricket team was about to tour India when Shiv Sena activists digged up the pitch of the Feroze Shah Kotla cricket stadium in Delhi and my reaction to it was that I was “happy” but today I am ashamed of my feelings then came Gujrat, this time I was a bit worried as the object of these riots were my Muslim brothers and sisters but deep inside I was pleased to see that the real Indian face has been exposed, it was the face which we were taught about in our curriculum. However, for the last decade or so things in Pakistan have changed, we have experienced outcome of violence and extremism first hand and today after losing more than fifty thousand of our own countrymen, no country in the world is better equipped than Pakistan to advice India that this path of violence and extremism will take them to destruction only.  

            For some it is something (The rise of extremism in India) that has just happened but India was always this much violent and extremist. Gandhi, the founder of India, was also killed by a RSS worker “Nathuram Godsay” and subsequently RSS was banned in India but some years later the ban was lifted by the government due to some electoral/political compulsions. The truth of the matter is that India always had these radical elements like any country of this world. It was like that India was sitting on a ticking time bomb and it was meant to explode any time and when year and a half ago Modi assumed power, his government only made the ticking quicker.

Some are calling this current extremist wave in India just an anti-Pakistan sentiment, but by doing this they are undermining the magnitude of the problem at hand as it will not stop here and if they (The extremist elements) succeed in damaging Pakistan-India relations then they will start to interfere in other state matters; the black ink that is today thrown on Sudheendra Kulkarni (the organizer of Khursheed Mahmud Kasuri’s book launch) and Engineer Rasheed (member of Indian held Kashmir parliament) can also be thrown on the participants of Jaipur literature festival or on any member parliament having a point of view that does not comply with ideology of the extremist elements.

Pakistan cannot afford another Afghanistan on her eastern borders. Even though a lot of actions in India will give “I told you that” moments to Indian haters in Pakistan but Pakistan should continue to support moderate and secular forces in India because if those forces fail today we will return to the times of “Hindu paani (water) and Muslim paani” but only this time it is going to be “Hindu bomb and Muslim bomb”. The example of “Sahitya Akademy” has shown that the Intellectual and moderate forces of India are pretty much aware of the grave dangers that are threatening the very national fiber of India. Pakistan should forward moral support to all such forces.

Nevertheless the buck stops at Mr. Modi. Modi can turn himself to be a blessing in disguise by playing the role of a bridge between the Hindu nationalists and Secular and moderate forces. It is up to him that how he wants the history to remember him. He has the political power as well as the governmental power, he is the prime minister of India and he should start acting like one. He should show his acumen and prove that he is not a mere poster boy of Hindu nationalism but a leader of national and international stature. Today India stands at the crossroads of history and there are only two roads to take, one takes her to the greatness and the other to destruction but unfortunately at the moment India is on the road to destruction.          

Spell of the year

When it comes to Pakistan, cricket is not mere a game but it is a way of life. We love the game, we love everything that is attached to it; from feisty spells to mercurial batting, we love everything about the game which gives us the adrenaline rush or at times heart attacks. This is our brand of cricket; this is what defines the Pakistani flavor of cricket. In short, we live the game of cricket.
The year 2015 saw some great moments when it comes to One day cricket; Australia once again lifted the world cup (this is as regular a cricketing occurrence as the top order failure of Pakistan's batting), Gayle & Guptill scored double centuries, AB literally playing all over the ground, Mitchell Starc bowling those beautiful yorkers, Bangladesh finally shedding the minnows tag and many more. However my moment of the year 2015 came in the Pakistan vs. Australia World cup, 2015 semi-final played at the Adelaide Oval.          

Wahab's spell at the Adelaide to Shane Watson is a classic example of fast bowling. I choose this not because Wahab and I share the same nationality or that spell is the only thing to talk about from this year's Pakistan's one day performances. Although this year saw many great spells but the uniqueness that was about Wahab's spell and something that made the spell what it becomes finally was the way he dominated Watson. However the spell was triggered by one of Watson's comments on the field but I am sure that now he must be repenting on uttering those words. He now knows that how a scorned fast bowler looks like. Today's cricket is dominated by the batters, bowlers have a very little room with all these fielding restrictions, free-hits, work load, 15 degrees, and bats weighing more than the weight of Inzimam and Arjuna combine so, this is why his spell was even more special and more than anything it proved us that fast bowling is not a dying art. One other factor that made me to rate his spell over other performances of the year was that all of us who grew in the 90's were habitual of watching spell like these when the likes of Donald, Wasim, Mcgrath, Waqar, Walsh, Ambrose, and Shoaib use to bowl. The spell reminded me of the cricket of my childhood when the game was dominated by the fast bowlers. I hope it made others nostalgic too. More speed to the fast.    

We own Nothing by Aizzan Malik

The doors we slammed
The games we played
The life which we owned
That was once ours
Things that just belonged to us
Now just a pile of memories
As we grow
As the time crawls
You get to know that you own nothing
Not even those who were once only yours
The thought that gives shivers
May be the thought is yours
But the cause is someone else's property
Good bye
Good bye
You and i own nothing

A league of our own

Cricket saw its inception in the 16^th century but was officially played for the first time in 1877 between England and Australia. Many of the British colonies joined later on, like South Africa (1889), West Indies (1928), New Zealand (1928) and India (1932). Pakistan joined in 1952, when they toured India. The game which started as a Five day affair called test, was shortened to one day and thus was conveniently called one day internationals. It was the advent of one day internationals that gave boost to the popularity of the game and it was further triggered by the Kerry Packer led world cricket series. The World Series not only brought money to the game but it also brought with it new phenomenon such as day and night cricket and colored kits for the players. The evolutionary process did not stopped here; it gave birth to a new form of cricket, now we all know as the T20’s.

T20 has revolutionized the game, it has not only won new fans for the games but it has made the game more competitive, innovative and financially viable for the sports administrators and above all for the players. At the moment every cricket board has developed their own cricket leagues; most famous among them are IPL (Indian Cricket League), Big Bash (Australian T20 league), Ram Slam (South African cricket competition) and CPL (Caribbean Premiere League). These leagues are mutually beneficial for the local and international players as the local players get a chance to compete at the highest level and also get the opportunity to share the dressing room with the best in the world while the international players get a chance to play in different conditions which help them to hone their cricketing skills. These leagues have played a great role in polishing the local talent and preparing them for the international arena.

Pakistan is one of the biggest names of international cricket circuit. Over the years Pakistan has produced players which with their skills and natural talent has changed the face of the game and literally ruled the game. It was Pakistan that made this game human, they added spices like unpredictability, raw talent and mercurial individual performers to the game, without Pakistan this game would have been a complete bore. However, now Pakistan is about to launch her own T20 league namely Pakistan Super League, which will be played in the UAE due to the law and order situation back home. PSL will comprise of five teams Islamabad United, Lahore Qalandars, Karachi Kings, Peshawar Zalmi and Quetta Gladiators. On paper PSL is just another T20 league but due to the current situation of Pakistan’s cricket, its importance and significance are manifolds. Pakistan today has no home cricket; Pakistan plays her home series in UAE. Having no home series have caused multiple difficulties as board does not earn as much as it used to, Pakistan is not getting the A-tours as regularly as they should mainly because they cannot have teams in Pakistan and hosting any team outside Pakistan is an expensive affair and this has negatively affected Pakistan’s bench strength, and above all it has negatively affected the performance of the team which was once the best team in the world- her ODI ranking is now below Bangladesh. Other than this Pakistan’s domestic structure does not gives a player enough money to live on and many of the Pakistani domestic players are looking for opportunities outside Pakistan.

Although PSL will be played in UAE, but will comprise of many international and Domestic players, this will give an opportunity to future Pakistani probables to observe how international cricket is like, what is required to succeed at the international level, what is the “new” in the game, what they could do to improve their fitness level, by sharing the dressing room with the greats of the game will help them to learn from their experiences and they will also get paid handsomely which will enable them to sustain in the game for a bit longer period of time.

PSL is also a learning curve for Pakistani cricket administrators. They should work towards turning this event into a world marvel. It is very important that the league is played in a fair and corruption free environment. Lately with all the fixing scandals in the IPL and BPL, the reputations of these leagues have dented. PSL cannot afford such bad publicity. All the revenues that will be generated from PSL should be directed towards the construction of cricketing infrastructure in the country, improvement of the existing one and most importantly towards the overhauling of domestic cricket in Pakistan which requires a lot of fixing. It is also imperative that the league should be shifted to Pakistan as soon as Pakistan is fit to host it.

I will conclude with the hope and prayers that the league flourishes and achieves whatever is expected of it. The fact that it is a Pakistani product makes it superior from all its rivals and all of us should take the ownership of this league.