Dinshaw Avari- Trying my Hand at Blogging!

March 1, 2020     The “ills” of our times date back to the 1700’s East India Company! In yesterday afternoon’s fascinating book launch “ The Anarchy: The Relentless Rise of the East India Company ” at the Karachi Literature Festival, William Dalrymple identifies the source of global corporate corruption and rot in society … The East India Company. Darlymple’s style of delivery is OUTSTANDING!  He’s humorous, easy to listen to, succinct and energetic.  It was a pleasure to hear his two presentations yesterday and I hope we have the opportunity to hear more from him in future.  For a Saturday morning session, he  had an excellent turnout.   “ Forgotten Masters - Indian Painting For The East India Company ”  Starting from “… a five room office, smaller than the Beach Luxury Hotel…” and 3% of global trade, the East India Company grew to cover almost 40% of global trade.  It was, pure and simple, in the business to make a p...

February 29, 2020 This morning’s session at the KLF with Dr Asad Sayeed, Ghazi Salahuddin and Dr Huma Baqai (moderated very capably by Yasir Qazi), like a lot of discussions on Pakistan’s civil (and social) direction, was pessimistic … unfortunately and, I believe, rightly.                Several questions emerged from this discussion – i)                     Where is the Pakistani civil voice? ii)                    Who is the cause of the destruction/silencing of this civil voice? iii)                  Why does the middle class - the backbone of any society – stay silent [numb] over atrocities that are committed in society over and ove...

March 4, 2019 So, the 10 th Karachi Literature Festival (#KHILF) ended happily & successfully in spite of border tensions, transport disruptions and stoppages. I found this event quite different from the previous eight KLFs I’ve been to (these last seven at Beach Luxury Hotel @beach_luxury itself) – it truly was targeting the “younger” literary mind!   You could tell with this by quality of the audiences – while I met so many of the associates and friends I have made over these eight years - there were newer & younger faces too.   Also, the authors who were presenting various topics and book launches were a younger lot.   I enjoyed Haris Khalique’s book launch on his poems - I never thought I would actually like poetry or prose but there were short poems aimed towards the humanitarian crisis around the world. The Chief Minister of Sindh, Murad Ali Shah’s, presence (alongwith Dr Shamshad Ahmed) for Dr Ishrat’s Hussain’s book launch on the...