Author: Kabir

I am Pakistani-American. I am a Hindustani classical vocalist and ethnomusicologist. I hold a B.A from George Washington University (Dramatic Literature, Western Music) and an M.Mus (Ethnomusicology) from SOAS, University of London. My dissertation “A New Explanation for the Decline of Hindustani Music in Pakistan” has recently been published by Aks Publications (Lahore 2024). Samples of my singing can be heard on Spotify https://open.spotify.com/artist/0Le1RnQQJUeKkkXj5UCKfB

Doctor Walter (Translation from the Urdu)

Kabir · May 16, 2026 · No comments

I’m sharing an excerpt of a translation from Bilal Hasan Minto’s collection Model Town. This story focuses on the discrimination faced by minorities in Pakistan (in this case Christians). This particular excerpt focuses on appropriate dress for women–something that we have been talking about recently at BP. Sometimes fiction brings societal dynamics to life in a way that non-fiction cannot.

When the Walters’ house was under construction, General Zia’s “Bakistan” had yet to come into being, and all sorts of new prescriptions had not been written to preserve the purity and piety of women. Even at that time most Pakistani women wore the regular shalwar-kameez. Fashion advancements consisted merely of lengthening the kameez or narrowing the shalwar cuffs a bit. Nothing more than that. It was another matter if someone’s dress was a different type for a special reason, but even then it was expected to conform to the style of some other part of the subcontinent or Arabia — meaning it had to be in keeping with the mores of decency, modesty, and other such things. It couldn’t happen, either then or now, that women from Model Town or Sukkur or Chakwal or any other part of “Bakistan” could say that since this June sun is on fire let’s wear shorts and undershirts or put on swimsuits and jump into the pond or canal and emerge only when needed, to cook food or wash clothes. That way we will not die from sunstroke, nor neglect serving our husbands — the task for which we have been created.

Continue reading Doctor Walter (Translation from the Urdu)

Apprehension (translation from the Urdu)

Kabir · May 14, 2026 · 1 comment

Sharing an excerpt from a translation of another short story by Bilal Hasan Minto. The whole story can be read here.

Farhat Auntie’s apprehension had been lingering for many years. She once told Ammi she suspected Fizzu Uncle didn’t believe in Allah and had perhaps become a Hindu. Farhat Auntie’s suspicion was aroused when Fizzu Uncle obtained the Hindus’ thick religious book, the Gita, from somewhere and began reading it with concentration. When Ammi heard this, she bit her nails and agreed with Farhat Auntie that her husband had always reeked of idolatry. She added without thinking that she was sure he had always been an idolater and had tricked Farhat Auntie into marriage by passing himself off as a Muslim. Ammi also expressed the opinion that one didn’t become a Muslim simply by having the azaan recited in one’s ear. Faith was the real thing.

Farhat Auntie took this to heart. When she reached home that day, she told Fizzu Uncle bluntly he would have to own up to his religion. Had he become a Hindu or some other type of unbeliever? Had he always been like this and married her deceitfully or had he only recently become a non-Muslim?

Uncle replied that he hadn’t deceived her because she had never asked his religion. Farhat Auntie was stunned. She said everyone was Muslim and if he wasn’t he should have let her know. He lied to her. Fizzu Uncle was surprised to hear that everyone was Muslim, but remained quiet at the time. Farhat Auntie started screaming that he shouldn’t sit calmly and think she would put up with this. She would seek a divorce if she had to. Fizzu Uncle reminded her there wouldn’t be need for that; he had already conceded her the right in the marriage contract, precisely so that if one day she no longer wanted to live with him, she wouldn’t have to run around the courts getting him to divorce her. Continue reading Apprehension (translation from the Urdu)

REPOST: Sphygmomanometer (Translation from the Urdu)

Kabir · May 13, 2026 · No comments

This translation was originally published in The Peshawar Review in January 2026. I am sharing it here because it provides some insight into Pakistan at the beginning of the General Zia era. Fiction also makes a nice change from the usual topics on this blog. The entire story can be read here.

One day, Naveed Bhai hadn’t returned from college by five o’clock. Usually, this wouldn’t have been cause for concern — a slight delay in returning home. But, over the past few days, Naveed Bhai had been behaving in a way that caused Abba to worry that he might be getting involved in something that would land him in trouble with the government of the cartoonish General Zia. Sitting at the dining table one day, Naveed Bhai had said angrily, through clenched teeth, that “we should teach these ignorant student union thugs a lesson.” On hearing this, Abba stared at him and said they had sent him there to study, not to get involved in useless things. Naveed Bhai should go straight to college and come right back. He shouldn’t even think about getting involved in union affairs and getting mixed up with dangerous people. Instead of being quiet after this reprimand, Naveed Bhai started speaking even more loudly:

Continue reading REPOST: Sphygmomanometer (Translation from the Urdu)

Some Thoughts on BP

Kabir · May 12, 2026 · 7 comments

I just want to briefly offer some thoughts since it’s now been a year since I have been active in this latest iteration of BP.

Over the past year on this forum, I have seen many members of the “Saffroniate” who seem to have no agenda except to disparage Pakistan. BB is chief among them but there are others who share essentially the same views but hide behind a tone of neutrality that allows them to claim the moral high ground. BB is the most open about his views. No other member of the “Saffroniate” has threatened to “infiltrate” Pakistan and make a Pakistani Muslim say “Bharat Mata ki Jai” at gunpoint. Such an egregious comment had obvious consequences–as it should have. While others have not crossed this line, it doesn’t mean that their anti-Pakistan attitude and Islamophobia is not obvious. The word “taqqiya” has been used in reference to me. Using this word for a Muslim is Islamophobic and completely unforgivable. I find it deeply ironic that those who are the first to complain about Hinduphobia have no problem resorting to obvious Islamophobic tropes.

While Indians have legitimate grievances with Pakistanis (as Pakistanis do with Indians), the way to generate a productive dialogue is not to use triggering language like “apartheid”, “kleptocracy” etc. This only causes the other side to double down on their own position and for people to talk past each other.

I also want to address the passive aggressive complaints that I have banned certain people from my threads. It is a settled principle on BP that authors have the right to manage their threads the way they like. This is a principle that has been hard fought for. I have made my red lines clear. I will not tolerate anti-Pakistan commentary or people taking a hostile and combative tone with me. If you can express your POV in a civilized manner while staying within these guidelines, then I will allow your comment to stand–no matter how much I may disagree with it. If not, it will be summarily deleted.

What’s ironic is that some of those who complain the most about this actually have author status and are able to create their own threads on whatever topic they wish. That they don’t use this status is their choice and not a reflection on me. It’s of course much easier to complain than it is to actually write your own posts. To his credit, BB actually uses his author status to make his own arguments. When he returns from his “vanvaas”, I hope he will contribute posts about Indian movies and TV shows. This would add to the varied mix of topics on this forum.

Lastly, I want to welcome the members of the “Cresenciate”. I hope, with time, one of them will graduate from commenter to author. It is important to have more Pakistani representation on this forum. This doesn’t mean that I always agree with them but it is good that all the work of countering the “Saffroniate” doesn’t fall on me.

It would be remiss of me not to mention those Indians who are not really part of the “Saffroniate” such as Gaurav and girmit who always contribute thoughtful points–though again I may vehemently disagree at times.

P.S. I was speaking with a new friend of mine from Hyderabad Deccan recently. He noted that the toxic obsession with Pakistan is a North Indian thing and that South Indians really don’t care all that much. This intuitively makes sense since of course the worst Partition atrocities occurred in Punjab and Bengal.

Footnotes|Bollywood, Hindu Nationalism & the Erasure of Muslims in India (Kabir’s Open Thread)

Kabir · May 11, 2026 · 43 comments

When does cinema stop being entertainment and become propaganda? Hindi film has long romanticised the nation, but what’s happening now is something else entirely. In the latest Himal Footnotes, associate editor Nayantara Narayanan sits down with film critic Anna MM Vetticad and journalist Raza Rumi to talk about how Bollywood has become a vehicle for Hindutva ideology by manufacturing mythic pasts, normalising anti-Muslim violence and lending cinematic glamour to the BJP’s political project. Using the Dhurandhar franchise as a case study, they ask harder questions about the industry: How does propaganda disguise itself as entertainment? What happens when the line between fiction and political fact-making is deliberately blurred? And what has been lost from the Hindi cinema that once held space for a more plural, secular India?

Disclosure: I know Raza Rumi and have worked with him when he was at “The Friday Times”. I was mostly doing editorial work during what was essentially a summer internship. He has written a book about his experiences traveling in Delhi (where I believe his family was from). The book is called Delhi By Heart: Impressions of a Pakistani Traveller.

2) Returns on multipolarity

By Umair Javed

At this admittedly early stage of a changing world order, multipolarity is cementing domestic tendencies that already prevail. The status quo, along with the economic interests aligned with it, will continue to navigate geopolitics in ways that serve regime consolidation rather than broad-based development. For that calculus to change, the three issues/ contradictions identified above would need to become the organising basis of a political challenge capable of compelling a renegotiation of state-society relations. That is a high bar. But it is the only honest answer to the question of what multipolarity can offer a country like Pakistan. The world can change its architecture without changing who benefits inside Pakistan’s borders. That part remains entirely a domestic problem and a domestic responsibility.

3) Nothing can stop the breakup of Britain. Even Farage is powerless.

By Aris Roussinos

A follow up on Women’s Rights in Pakistan

Kabir · May 9, 2026 · 4 comments

Since we have been having quite an impassioned debate about gender relations in Pakistan (as an aside that thread has close to 300 comments and has become unwieldy to navigate), I thought I would briefly follow up on a few points here.

Firstly, I want to state up front that I do not agree with Q’s repeated invocations of “Onlyfans”. Yes, he is technically on my team (the “Crescentiate”) but I am able to call him out when it is necessary. I would expect the other team (the “Saffroniate”) to also be able to call each other out when it is justified (as for example in the case of one of their members making a direct threat of violence). BP would be a much nicer place if some of the really egregious trolling (mostly by BB) is brought under control.

Q is of course entitled to his views and I suppose that our views differ mostly because I was raised almost entirely in the US. I was also not raised in a particularly conservative family. As an anecdote, my mother has never covered her head. When I was a young adolescent and had a bit of religious fervor and asked her to do so, I was given the firm response that I was living in her house and she would do exactly as she pleased. The conversation obviously came to an end there.

Back to “OnlyFans”: I believe in the right of consenting adults to do whatever they want with their own bodies. This doesn’t mean that I wouldn’t negatively judge someone who chose to start an OnlyFans. It is, after all, a kind of sex work and I don’t really understand why someone with education and opportunities would choose to get into this line of work. That said, it is of course the individual’s choice.

Q is correct that Pakistan is a conservative society and that the normative expectation is that women are kept out of the public sphere. The woman’s domain is seen to be the home. “Chador aur char divari” (I would translate this as the veil and the four walls) is an important concept in Pakistani interpretations of Islam.

Some links of relevance:

1) Sindh govt issues Aurat March NOC with conditions for participants’ clothing, slogans

According to the NOC, Aurat March organisers are “bound to comply with all laws in force” and shall be responsible for the “internal cordon security of the participants”.

It further stated that “all participants/organisers shall ensure peaceful conduct” during the march.

The NOC prohibited “anti-state slogans, banners, speeches or activities”, as well as “anti-religion slogans, placards or objectionable remarks”. It also ordered that “no hateful, provocative, unethical or anti-social content shall be displayed on charts, banners or flexes”.

“Participation, support or representation by any banned outfit /proscribed organisation such as BYC (Baloch Yakjehti Committee), JQSM (Jeay Sindh Qaumi Mahaz) shall strictly not be allowed,” the NOC read.

The district administration also ordered participants not to “wear objectionable clothing” or carry out “promotion for the LGBTQ” community, which includes transgender persons.

The “Aurat March” participants have also been told that they cannot make speeches against the “ideology of Pakistan” or speak against the armed forces.

For the record, I am against this decision that the participants cannot promote the rights of the “LGBTQ” community. This is homophobic and transphobic.

2) Review: Kafeel Offers A Rare Glimpse Into How Trauma Travels Between Generations

3)India refuses to criminalize marital rape. This new series shines a light on it

(Hat tip to Nivedita for mentioning this series “Chiraiya”. Incidentally, this word is usually spelled “Chiriya” in Urdu).

The BBC article notes:

Some 6.1% of Indian women who have ever been married women have experienced sexual violence, according to government data. But despite years of campaigning by activists, India remains among three dozen countries – along with Pakistan, Afghanistan and Saudi Arabia – where marital rape is not outlawed.

Activists have filed a number of petitions in recent years in the Supreme Court calling for marital rape to be criminalised. But the government, religious groups and men’s rights activists oppose any plans to amend the Colonial-era law, which exempts a man for having forced sex with his wife if she is not a minor.

On marital rape, I just want to mention that even in the UK, this was only criminalized as late as 1991, which is surprisingly late. As I mentioned in my review of John Galsworthy’s The Forsyte Saga, marital rape plays a major role in the plot of this novel and was not at all considered a crime during the Edwardian era (the time period in which the novel is set).

The case for peace

Kabir · May 8, 2026 · No comments

Recently, BB said that there are no leftists in Pakistan. May I introduce Aasim Sajjad Akhtar (Pervez Hoodbhoy’s son-in-law)? Aasim is the deputy general secretary of the Awami Workers Party. AWP is a progressive and democratic socialist party.

Aasim writes in today’s DAWN:

India is a much bigger country than Pakistan. The Modi regime and the militant Hindu right have created massive troll armies to fan hate, a lot of it against Pakistan. It has also weaponised religion against Muslims, Scheduled Castes and other oppressed groups in India. The BJP’s most recent victory in what was once the communist stronghold of West Bengal confirms just how deep Hindutva’s tentacles have spread.

Meanwhile, generations of young people in Pakistan have been bred on a militaristic ideology that depicts India as the arch-enemy. This has been the primary justification for diverting public resources away from the welfare of working people towards the establishment.

This is not about who blinks first. It is about the consciousness and well-being of most of this region’s people. The tidal waves of hate will eventually engulf us all.

Indians and Pakistani dramas

Kabir · May 7, 2026 · 29 comments

Recently, BB made a comment claiming that Indians don’t watch Pakistani dramas while Pakistanis are very familiar with Bollywood. While it is certainly true that Indian media has greater penetration in Pakistan than Pakistani media does in India–which is only to be expected since Bollywood is a much larger industry– it is also a fact that there are many fans of Pakistani dramas in India. As I pointed out in a comment, Fawad Khan and Mahira Khan became well-known in India after the success of Humsafar. Sanam Saeed also became well-known after Zindagi Gulzar Hai (in which she starred opposite Fawad Khan) aired on Indian TV. While the film industry in Pakistan has struggled for many reasons, our drama industry is going strong. One point to note is that unlike Indian soap operas, Pakistani dramas generally come to an end after twenty five or thirty episodes. This means that there is no need to keep a story going by having people return from the dead etc–this is not specific to Indian soaps since American soaps are also like this.

I personally don’t watch Pakistani dramas (I don’t really watch TV and what media I do consume tends to be Western). I think the last Pakistani drama I watched was Barzakh which also starred Fawad and Sanam and was coincidentally made for an Indian streaming service (ZEE Zindagi).

Anyway, I came across this reel today on IG which is called “Indians after watching a Pakistani drama” and I thought I’d share it here. This is basically light entertainment but it does prove that there is an audience in India for Pakistani content. Presumably, the user didn’t make this video just for the Pakistani audience.

I am of the opinion that art transcends national borders so there is nothing wrong with this. Just as Pakistanis are fans of Lata Mangeskhar, Asha Bhosle and Muhammad Rafi, Indians are fans of Mehdi Hassan, Ghulam Ali, Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan etc. Though the two countries obviously have political tensions–both see each other as hostile states– we do share a common culture and there is nothing wrong in acknowledging that fact.

Courtesan Culture

Kabir · May 7, 2026 · 26 comments

There has been some discussion of courtesan culture on X.T.M’s recent thread.

While BB is probably trolling, I am using the opportunity to provide links to some pieces that I have written discussing courtesan culture. These pieces can be read by anyone who is interested in an informed discussion of the topic.

I will briefly quote from my essay Thumri and Social Change (originally written as part of my Masters coursework):

Thumri was traditionally associated with tawayafs, a Persian word which appears in Hindi/Urdu around the middle of the 19th century. Although currently associated with prostitution, the word originally denoted high class courtesans who were highly-skilled singers and dancers trained in the arts of poetry and conversation. Aristocrats would send their sons to tawayafs to be trained in manners and etiquette (Du Perron 2007: 1-2). Prior to colonial rule, courtesans were associated with royal courts. With the decline of these courts, courtesans increasingly began to entertain in their own private salons. They were often wealthy and, because of their unmarried status, were able to move around freely (2). Thumri was one of the principal genres of courtesan performance. The texts often express female desire, usually in the form of love-in-separation (viraha). The heroine either curses the day her lover left her or pleads with him not to abandon her. These themes made thumri ideal for courtesan performance as the performer could act out the anguish and desire experienced by the song’s heroine (3).

Asides from the above piece, some further relevant links are:

Review: Siren Song: Understanding Pakistan Through Its Women Singers by Fawzia Afzal-Khan

Review: Umrao Jan Ada by Mirza Ruswa (translated by Khushwant Singh and M.A. Husaini)

Review: Tawaifnama by Saba Dewan

The Black Album: Between Liberalism and Fundamentalism

Kabir · May 7, 2026 · No comments

In the context of the recent debate about feminism and liberalism in Pakistan, I am taking the liberty of excerpting from an essay I wrote about Hanif Kureishi’s novel The Black Album. This novel remains relevant many years after it was initially published.

Living in Pakistan post September 11^th, it is impossible to get away from debates about the increasing “Talibanization” of society. The comment sections of online English-language newspapers are filled with what passes for discussion among those who advocate for the secularization of society and those who advocate for a return to “Islamic values”. This “discussion” usually consists of nothing more than one side calling the other “liberal fascists” and the other side responding by calling their opponents “Taliban apologists”. The same “discussions” occur on social media such as Facebook. Pakistani novelists too have attempted to tackle the issue of Pakistan’s involvement in the US-led “global war on terror” and the increasing religiosity of urban middle-class “educated” youth. For example, this theme forms much of the narrative of Mohsin Hamid’s 2007 bestseller The Reluctant Fundamentalist, recently made into a film. However, in my opinion, the best novel to examine the dialectic between liberalism and fundamentalism and the struggle in one man’s soul between these two polar opposites, was actually written long before 9/11. This novel, published in 1995, is Hanif Kureishi’s The Black Album.

And:

As a novel of ideas, The Black Album is a fascinating study of the struggle in one British Pakistani young man’s heart between loyalty to his “culture” (as defined by Islam) versus loyalty to the ideals of his adopted homeland. Though much of the novel is specifically about the Rushdie affair, the debates about free expression and whether it should be limited or not—and if so, how much—are still current around the world. The book burning protest against The Satanic Verses can be compared to the violent protests against the recent YouTube film Innocence of Muslims and the riots that occurred on “Love the Prophet (PBUH) Day” in Pakistan on September 21^st 2012. It is the strength of Literature that it enables us to see events, through the experiences and dilemmas of individuals, in a way that journalism or current affairs pieces don’t allow us to. No recent novel about fundamentalism has been able to capture the struggle that takes place in the hearts and minds of many Muslim adolescents as effectively as Kureishi was able to do in The Black Album.

The whole essay can be read here