Freedom of Press

Pakistan is home to hundreds of news publications that publish articles in English, Urdu and an of regional languages. Several dozen television channel broadcast from outside the country as well. The range of FM channels we have today are more than ever. With the combination of TV channels, news has become an important and very useful part of our life. How we perceive the world, our point of views, our perception of other countries and race, is only influenced by the news.

Our media today is vibrant and dynamic. It sensationalizes every news and no news is hidden from the eye of the public be it good or bad.

But it wasn’t always like this, Pakistani press and media have struggled for decades to reach where they are today.The era for development can divided under different regimes.

General Ayub’s regime introduced Press and Publication Order 1963  law to control the  freedom of press media. According to this Ordinance , the magistrate’s  had the authority to cancel the Subscription of any newspaper or printing house at any time.

What followed was Zia’s regime which proved to be even worse.Under his leadership he began hunting down media houses after he felt that newspapers were gaining too much liberty and freedom to the extent that they begun criticizing Zia and his government. This led tougher relationships with journalists, poets and the media houses.
A renowned  poet “Habib Jalib” was sent to jail for writing his poem “Larkane Chalo Warna Thane Chalo”.

 

Moreover, Zia Shahid who was the editor of Khabrain Group was also sent to jail after criticizing the Bhutto Govt.
The Zia era  can be easily referred as the most oppressive era  not only for the journalists, but also for the general public and other politicians. Whoever dared to speak against him and his party PPP, was tortured publicly with lashes, imprisoned and fined by the Govt. No one was allowed to speak against the military, Govt, establishment and against the local Govt.

Poets, journalist, politicians did not have any freedom during this time.

Musharraf’s regime like the past regimes, also made an effort to keep the media under control. For this purpose he replaced the  Press and Publication Ordinance of Ayub and revised it.  Musharraf also established the Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (PEMRA)  to RESTRICT the freedom of the media.

It is true that our media houses are strong and bold but this isn’t due to the leniency adopted by the present government, (if any) but mainly due to the 50-year-long struggle for press freedom and evolution by the journalist community.

However, It can not be ignored that in the past, several  of offices of private TV channels were attacked, trashed and hundreds of reporters were beaten and arrested and their equipment were sealed and broken on numerous occasions. Even today, while the rate of media workers’ killings have declined, the number of threats directed at journalists from various independent people and organizations keep on occurring.

 Whats more disappointing is that Pakistan was ranked 157 out of 167 nations in terms of freedom of the press in the country.

All we demand is the Freedom of press in terms  of :

• concept of free media throughout the nation
• no oppression towards media members
• blockage, bans, threats towards press should have serious reprucussions

 

 

Evolution

I am 20 years old, life is good and yes, i have evolved. I am not an optimist or a pessimist, i am a realist. I used to be an optimist but after sometime that option did not seem real enough so i evolved and became a realist, things are easy when you do not over do it or under do it you just “do it”.

I like football but there was a time when i used to love it and would be waking up at 3 in the morning to watch football matches and i would be glued to the screen no matter what for those 90 minutes. I still watch football but i have evolved and if there is something else important to do i will do it rather than watch the match.

I am from Lahore and i consider this a blessing because i have been to every city in Pakistan and Lahore is second to none. I permanently shifted to Lahore 3 years back because my father was in the army and we were always moving. We were posted to one city for 3 years maximum and every time we were located to some other place i evolved.

I used to be a grumpy kid, i was grumpy even in the freshmen year of my university. I said things to people that i would regret later but now i am quite calm it is not because the level of toxins in my body has increased during my university life but because i have evolved. It does not mean that i have no fight left in me but that i would direct that energy in something that can benefit me.

My education portfolio has evolved a lot, i started from doing my matriculation in computer science to doing FSC in  pre engineering and in the middle of my FSC i thought engineering would not cut, so i decided that i would opt for Accounting and Finance. In university when i had to choose i went for Marketing and Media because i thought ACF  would be very tough and mostly i am very competent but studies are an exception.

I have been taught from the beginning that what you do has to be in accordance with your culture and in our culture we do not party. I came to the university with the same mind set and one semester later it was party, eat, sleep and repeat. It does not mean that the university morally corrupted me or i do not have principles but that i have evolved and i perceive things differently now.

Everything a part i still love cookies and brownies and still forget my things everywhere and i am very irresponsible. The people around me are brilliant, i have great friends and an extraordinary family and there is no evolution that can replace them, they are to be constant.