My opinion piece in 'The News'

https://www.thenews.com.pk/print/1128744-the-job-begins-with-measurement

Smart Phones are changing us

I had disappeared from these pages because my job in field as Assistant Commissioner kept me really busy. I had continued voicing my inner demons in my personal diary which I kept writing whenever the noise inside my head was too loud. These days, though, I am on Eid break and don't have much to do so during my routine walk in the evening, I thought back to this space. I recalled how it was almost a decade ago that I had started writing here. Since then of course the digital landscape has 'metamorphosed' or 'metastasized' (take your pick) into something else. My page was a personal cathartic space which is also why I had never advertised it and most of my entries were personal and not some pontification or analysis on social, political issues. 

Today, I have returned to my page after a long time. Now when I think about it, I guess this is so because I wanted a 'digital' escape from the social media frenzy. Smart technology is doing something to us and we don't realise it. Somebody needs to work on this. This is truly a momentous event in the history of mankind. These smartphones in our hands which moonlight as high-power cameras have truly been habit-forming inventions and how they are changing human behaviours is something we need a thorough study on. My hunch is that this smart little device has far reaching implications and I am not just talking about the usual overused buzzwords such as 'Communication Revolution' or 'Information Age'. I am not even talking about the contradiction of 'loneliness & depression' in the increasingly wired world which is a very serious implication in itself. I think I am referring to something even deeper. It is doing something to human behaviour at a profound level. It is changing our concept of time. It is certainly changing our conception of knowledge. It is changing who we are and what we become. I don't want this to come off as apocalyptic because I don't really know for sure what all it implies. But again, my hunch is that all is not well and we need rigorous scientific studies and research papers on this. I am sure they exist to some extent somewhere. I haven't been able to find them as yet. Be that as it may, we need to take notice of what is happening to us and study this phenomenon in a rigorous scientific manner. 

Initial impressions in the field

I used to think I would write my diary of Field training days. I have not been able to do that. But since I have started blogging again, I might as well put down some of my observations here before I forget them. My initial impressions after a few months in the field are quite sobering. The reality of governance is far more complicated than what the textbooks would have us believe. Every thing takes place in a particular political context. Also, there is only so much that a "one good man" can achieve since the issues are systemic and the response has to be institutional. Even the best of minds would find themselves constrained in this environment. And trust me, I have seen some brilliant minds in the public sector but they seem to have been held back by the inertia in the system. Yes I know all the lofty talk about how great enterprising minds carry the capacity to break the inertia and shake up things a little but it isn't all that easy. There is no time, no time in the field at least, for any of that. So much is happening so fast that all one ends up doing is 'fire-fighting' and not much thought is given to any substantial reengineering of the processes. Hence, the vicious cycle.

P.S. Some housing societies here in Gujranwala do not pay tax/duty on internal transfers of property. When the administration presses them, ironically that's when our sub-registrars get their transfer orders. Thank you ! 

Back to blogging ?

Ok so where to begin !

I have been away for a long, long time. I cannot pick up the thread from where I left because so much has happened in the meantime. So quick update : Circuit House Gujranwala is my new abode because yours truly is Assistant Commissioner (Under Trainee) here.  To be honest, I missed you. Those were simpler times when I would blog away my angst and insecurities. Every once in a while, I would review a book I had read. But then life happened and somehow, I stopped finding time for blogging. I was busy writing script of my own life or so I would like to believe. In the past four years that I have been away from blogging, I read less and wrote even lesser. I clearly seem to have lost the knack of writing. So forgive my broken disjointed lines today. My field training has given me the foretaste of what my job entails. It means less and less time for reading and writing. It means wading knee-deep(even neck-deep) through the muck of slow-moving government machinery. It also means putting in long hours of hard work trying to somehow strike balance between high expectations and low resources and even lower autonomy.Wait a minute ! Hold on ! Why is this beginning to sound like a complaint letter of a dissatisfied employee. This was my "dream-job" and it has not even started and I am just anticipating and I should not be so impatient. But you cannot blame me entirely. It has not been a good start. Just a couple of months into field training and I lost my first boss to very tragic circumstances of suicide. And then there is also this initial rude awakening after seeing the gap between theory of our youthful idealism and the complexities of everyday practical realities. I am ending this blog abruptly because I am finally feeling somewhat drowsy. This seems to work. Every time I cannot sleep, I will take to blogging.

Good Night 

P.S. Did I mention that these District Utships tend to be quite a lonely experience even if you are not in a distant district and even if you are not alone.  

To 'THE SILVER LINING' 2014

PIONEERING 'THE SILVER LINING'

“A small group of thoughtful people could change the world.                                             

 Indeed, it's the only thing that ever has.” - Margaret Mead

Our world in those days was NED.  More precisely, it was Civil Engineering Department. We owned it and wanted to make it a better place. We were young. We were crazy. We were restless. We had infinite energy and exuberance. We had obstinate optimism. We had fresh ideas. We had all of it and much more. But what we did not have was time. We were in our final year and the clock was ticking on it. It was then that we first had an inkling of a possibility of pioneering an exclusive magazine of Civil Engineering Department. Other departments had their own and were quite boastful about it. And it of course tickled our youthful pride. “How could our department, our world, lag behind?” asked our collective angst. However, it wasn’t just blind rage or the hurt pride alone. The idea to launch a magazine was also the product in part of a particular wave of nostalgia that sweeps over a final year student. The season of farewell in the final year brings with itself the matters of legacy and longing. In establishing the magazine we also saw an opportunity to not only relive and recapitulate the time spent at campus but also to etch our cries and murmurs and our hopes and aspirations forever into history.  

Hence, this idea was born around mid May, 2009, during casual discussion among our group of friends inside the classroom of B.E, Section-B.  We were a group of seven friends who initially mused about it. However, since it was an idea whose time had come, we soon had the entire department behind us. And thus began the hectic, at times hysteric, preparation of the first ever magazine. It is not easy to end the inertia and blaze a trail. It is one thing to envisage an idea and quite another to materialize it. Practical issues like finding sponsors amidst the milieu of recession and quality content amidst the tons of submitted articles were only a few of the many challenges we faced. The endless hours spent in front of a computer screen dealing with the minutiae of graphic design and the frequent visits to publisher made sure that we got as little time to give to our studies as possible. Nonetheless, we were driven by a strange youthful faith in the possibility of whatever we dream. There is something about the years at university which makes you a ‘yea-sayer’ as opposed to naysayer. And this is why we named our magazine ‘The Silver Living’ with the subtitle of ‘Building Hope’.

Nothing gives us more pleasure than knowing that the seed we planted many years ago has now grown into a beautiful tree, watered over the years by those who came after us. The tradition has been continued with the same vitality. All of us who have ever been part of ‘The Silver Lining’ since its inception in 2009 are bound together by that same spirit underlying the original idea. And I can assure you that this mix of a little craziness and confidence, defiance and diligence is going to take you places and you are going to do great things in life.

But remember to keep the flame of ‘The Silver Lining’ burning. Don’t let it be snuffed out, ever.

  

It begins to shed...

 

And it begins to shed.

Everything;

Exuberance, Idealism, self-assuredness, and even hair.

And you realize that it is that time in your life,

when;

You are neither too old nor too young,

Neither a failure nor a success,

Neither inspiring nor inspired.

And it continues to shed.

Everything;

Patience, anticipation, self-esteem and even hair.

And you realize that it is that time in your life,

When;

Promises have already come apart,

Metaphors have lost all meaning,

Spring is just a season,

Dawn is the name of newspaper only,

And when the wait is over and the ‘Godot’ didn’t arrive.

27th

So it was my 27th birthday yesterday. I mark my birthday by writing a blog about it. I have been doing it since past few years so it has become kind of a tradition.  Last year, my 27th, has easily been the liveliest and the busiest for me. It brought an end to the prolonged fossilization. It opened a window into a different world, accompanied by a welter of experiences. Yet, I am not going to write much about it. Do not feel like it. Yesterday, on my birthday that is, I finished reading a book by voltaire. It is his classic 'Candide'. Its message, moral, can be summed up in its character Martin's following lines: 

"We must work without arguing. That is the only way to make life bearable."

These lines ring very true at this point in time in my life. Thus, on my 27th birthday, I adopt these lines as my motto and move forward.