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Showing posts from March 10, 2012

Mohen Jo Daro

Moen Jo Daro (dead men's mountain)

Rani Kot in Sindh. One of the largest fort in the world

Rani Kot in Sindh. One of the largest fort in the world

سندہ کے ہندو، تبدیلی مذہب اور بھرچونڈی- حسن مجتبیٰ

حسن مجتبی  سندہ کے ہندو، تبدیلیء مذہب  اور بھرچونڈی ”وہ اللہ اکبر کے نعرے لگاتے، لائین لگائے ،اپنی شلواروں کے ڈھیر ایک طرف رکھ کر،  اپنی باری  آنے کے انتظار میں تھے۔ ادا (بھائي) یہ لوگ ادی (بہن) کے ساتھ کیا کر رہے ہیں؟ میرے چھوٹے بھائی گوتم نے مجھ سے پوچھا۔ وہ ادی کو مسلمان بنا رہے ہیں۔ میں نے کہا۔“  یہ ہیں وہ الفاظ جو سندھی زبان کے بڑے افسانہ نگار امرجلیل کے ایک عظ؛م افسانے “سر لاش جو سفر (سرد لاش کا سفر ) میں ہیں  ہیں جو افسانہ انہوں نے دسمبر انیس  سو باہتر میں کندھ کوٹ میں ہندوئوں کے گھروں ، جانوں، عزتوں، املاک  و عبادتگاہوں پر حملوں کے پس منظر میں لکھا گیا تھا۔  لیکن آجکل پاکستان میں عام طور اور سندہ میں خاص طور ہندو برادری کے لوگ اسی افسانے کی حقیقی شکل بنے ہوئے ہیں۔ ہندو لڑکیوں اورر خواتین کی زبردستی تبدیلیء مذہب، پانچ سالہ چھوٹے بچوں سے لیکر ساٹھ پینسٹھ سال کی عمر کے ہندو  شہریوں کے اغوا برائے تاوان، املاک او رعبادتگاہوں پر حملے اور قتل، خوش شکل اور امیر خاندانوں کے لڑکوں سے زیادتیاں کر کر انکی برہنہ تصوی...

China's social networks hit by censorship, says study

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China's social networks hit by censorship, says study   China steps up censorship of banned terms in regions where unrest was high Chinese censors are actively targeting social media to quash discussion of banned topics, suggests research. The US study gives the most in-depth look at the extent of China's policing of discussions on microblogging sites. Analysis of almost 60 million messages from China's equivalent of Twitter suggested which topics were banned. It also revealed that China tuned its censoring activity to be more aggressive in places where political unrest was high. Word search The study, reported in New Scientist, by David Bamman, Brendan O'Connor and Prof Noah Smith from the Language Technologies Institute at Carnegie Mellon analysed short messages sent via the Sina Weibo service. The public programming interface to the Sina site let the trio grab 57 million messages sent between June 27 and September 30, 2011. Three mon...

Author SJ Watson talks about long-term memory loss

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Author SJ Watson talks about long-term memory loss By Philippa Roxby Health reporter, BBC News   Author SJ Watson created the character of Christine after reading about people with long-term memory loss "As I sleep, my mind will erase everything I did today. I will wake up tomorrow as I did this morning. Thinking I'm still a child. Thinking I have a whole lifetime of choice ahead of me." These are the thoughts of Christine, the main character and narrator in SJ Watson's current, best-selling debut novel, Before I Go To Sleep. She has recurrent memory loss, losing all knowledge of her past from one day to the next. As a result, she wakes each day not knowing where she is or how she got there. Or that the man lying next to her in bed is her husband of more than 20 years. But does this form of memory loss actually exist? "I thought I'd made it up," says the author Steven Watson. "But...

Italy's women still wait for change under Mario Monti

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Italy's women still wait for change under Mario Monti By Mark Duff BBC News, Milan Silvio Berlusconi, may be gone, but Italian women still face an uphill battle for respect in the face of what some commentators describe as a "damagingly" sexist media. Just over a year ago, one million women took to the streets and piazzas of towns and cities across Italy. They were angry at their portrayal on television and in the press as little more than the playthings of rich and powerful old men, and at the tawdry revelations of then Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's shenanigans. This week, as Italian men handed out sprigs of fragrant yellow mimosa to mark the Festa della Donna (Women's Day), much on the surface may appear to have changed. Mr Berlusconi has gone, and the new technocratic government presents a very different picture of the role of women at the highest level of politics. Included in t...