Javed Shaheen, an excellent poet and an even better human being, passed away recently. I had always been a great admirer of his poetry, though I never got a chance to interview him or review any of his collections of poetry. Deep down, I also had the urge to translate some of his Urdu poems into English. However, the only thing I ever managed to write on Javed Shaheen was a review of his autobiography titled Meray Mah O Saal (Yadashtain). The review, published in the January 1998 issue of Herald under the title of 'Bitterly Yours', was one of the most critical pieces I have ever written; in fact, it was so bitter that I did not dare use my full name and let it go with only my initials.

Despite the fact that Javed Shaheen was the closest of my father's friends for more than four decades and despite all my respect for him as a poet, I contemptuously dismissed Meray Mah O Saal (Yadashtain) on the grounds that it lacked the sensitivity that was the hallmark of his poetry. I genuinely felt that Javed Shaheen should have withheld this autobiographical work for a few years to spare embarrassment to the people, in particular Kishwar Naheed, whom he had 'exposed' by mentioning the most intimate details of their lives.

When I next met Javed Shaheen, barely a few days after the publication of the piece, he was all 'praise' for the reviewer who had tried to "settle some old score with me". A carefree soul who was not in the habit of mincing words, he sounded even more bitter than the autobiography that had created all the controversy. It should suffice to say that he used Punjabi profusely and the target of his verbal onslaught was none other than the reviewer of his autobiography.

Now I could not have been put in a more embarrassing situation, especially when Javed Shaheeen started comparing the reviewer with young journalists like me who "at least know a thing or two about literature". I was left with no option but to keep quiet, and wait for the right opportunity to explain the whole thing to him and apologise. I felt extremely sad because I did not want to break the heart of someone as sensitive as Javed Shaheen. Surprisingly, however, I did not regret doing the review even after this incident. In fact, I felt a certain sort of pleasure that I had fulfilled my foremost responsibility as a journalist by trying to be 'objective'.

Before I could get a chance to offer any clarification, Javed Shaheen had managed to find out the reality. However, he was gracious enough not to bring up the issue. Not only did our association grow stronger after this incident, I also started respecting him more, both as a poet and a human being. When I came to know about his death almost a decade later, the first thought that crossed my mind was that I should not have written such an adverse review of his autobiography. After all, it is not that important for a journalist to strive at 'objectivity', especially when it entails hurting people like Javed Shaheen.

It was raining and so dark I could not see anything. I could only hear the auto rickshaw and its loud sound in its first gear as it was pulled on the road leading to Sukkur Barrage. I was a bit scared. It was two in the dead of the night, and the only question I could ask the rickshaw driver was if the place had dacoits. His affirmation added to my horror. It was summer but I was shivering. I was wet in the cold rainy night.

Eleven years ago, in the year 1997, this was my first assignment. I was sent to Sukkur to cover a seminar on food security. As time was short, I had to board a Karachi-bound train from Lahore and disembark at Rohri where the train's toilet tanks are refilled. I had to do this as the fast track train that covered the Lahore-Karachi track overnight does not stop at Rohri. The tickets for this train were only sold in Lahore or Karachi. But I was so excited to get a job that I did not think about the return journey.

It was my first time in interior Sindh. At the hotel I could not find any room so I had to share one with a couple of local, prone-to-snoring musicians to spend the latter part of the night. During the two-day discourse, the speakers from the local civil society outlined the number of grievances against the establishment.

The real meaning of the word 'establishment' was explained to me by a leader of Siraiki belt who defined it as 'GT road establishment' by saying that the people living in the Lahore-Rawalpindi stretch of Grand Trunk road actually rule Pakistan. Therefore, he pleaded that the Saraiki belt should be an almost autonomous entity where the centre should have limited subjects such as currency, foreign policy and defence. The cotton rich Sariaki belt could take care of its own finances.

The leader was addressing a Punjabi journalist till then. When I told him that my forefathers were from Sargodha, to my astonishment he said that Sargodha was also part of the Saraiki province. So I was also a Saraiki.

During a visit to the complex of Sateen Jo Aastan -- a folklore goes that seven virgin female friends veiled themselves from males but disappearance in a cave for fear of a tyrannical raja on Indus river bank -- the burial place of a former ruler Mir Abu Al-Qasim Namkeen, the Keeper of the tomb complex told me that in 1965 war the Indian warplane reached the barrage but the nature darkened the area with clouds and they could not see it.

On my return journey, in the early hours of the night, I boarded the Lahore-bound train with the permission of the ticket checker, without the ticket. The train was overcrowded because a large number of people mostly university students were travelling to Multan to participate in a religious congregation. I was stranded in the doorway near the toilets separated by the door of an AC compartment.

Two young men studying medical and engineering befriended me but after an hour or so left me without offering me any place on their couch to sit. This gave me the impression that the followers of Zia ul Haq's religious renaissance prefer rituals over morality.

I had to stand in that cabin the whole night and got a seat about an hour before reaching Lahore. The moment I was seated, the ticket checker appeared from somewhere. I tried to blackmail him by flaunting my status as a journalist but he was not impressed. I had to pay him Rs 500. Finally, he gave me a ticket. A befitting end of my first assignment. The most interesting part is that the story was never published.

It was Saturday, five O'clock in the evening, and our weekly editorial meeting had just finished. I would have left in another five minutes but I received a call from the taxi driver who picks and drops my children to school. He was at the reception of my office downstairs and wanted to see me. Next minute he was there before me, but with three other people -- a middle-aged woman and two men.

"Baji, this is my cousin. Her 25 years old son has been murdered. She has come from Faisalabad. This news must be published."

I looked for the crime reporters both at The News and Jang but they were not yet there in the office. I had no choice but to listen to what these people had to say, particularly when the mother herself had come to our office and that, too, from another city. She was a widow whose eldest son had been killed. He was poisoned by her late husband's best friend, she insisted. The boy was a business partner of his late father's best friend and was murdered in Jauharabad. All evidence went against the accused.

It was a heart-rending story and the mother's voice broke several times as she talked to me. The accused had a very good impression on the boy's mother who thought her son was at home away from home. All she wanted now was punishment of the murderer. Her other two sons who were accompanying her said little.

The story went on for three hours. I had to listen to her patiently and ask all the necessary questions in order to report correctly. She left only when one of her sons reminded her that they will miss the train and that if there are any questions they can be answered on phone. I could not sit to write straightaway because I had to talk to the investigation officer and the doctor who received the body and the doctor who prepared the postmortem report. All these people were in Jauharabad so I had to phone them to get their version.

By the time I submitted the story to the newsdesk it was 11pm. But something was weighing heavy on my heart. Normally, I feel relieved after filing a story. The mother had underlined the importance of postmortem which she insisted was conducted twice but both reports were 'fabricated'. As long as the postmortem report is not true the crime cannot be established, she had said again and again.

I left the office with a heavy heart, took a rickshaw to Lakhsmi Chowk from where I could get a wagon to take me straight home. I was waiting for the wagon when a woman called me from behind. "Are you a working woman?" I turned around and found an aged woman who herself seemed to be a working woman. I said, "Yes. Do you work as well?" She extended her hand to shake with mine and introduced herself, "I am Shahida, postmortem officer."

For sometime, I was awestruck -- at the way God connects people.

She had retired from her job though. I took her phone number and forwarded it to the aggrieved mother. Whether the postmortem officer was ever contacted or not, I did not follow. The mother did try many avenues. I later came to know from a crime reporter that the culprit got arrested.

Excitement begins as soon as you leave the desk

By Farah Zia

Working for a weekly magazine has its advantages. You can have one foot behind the desk and another in the field. Well, to be honest, you have both your feet behind the desk most of the time, but you do get a chance to get out, depending of course on the respective proportion of sloth and adrenaline in your system.

Generally, the thankless job of a desk editor is not without its share of memorable moments. For instance, when writers -- not the most brilliant ones, obviously -- call in to announce how you ruined their piece and how upset they were. On the bright side, some of them declare they would never write for your pages again, not quite knowing how comforting the words may sound.

The truth is that the bad copies always outnumber the clean ones. Often, you are tempted to let a bad piece go as it is and let the reader 'discover' the great writer. But then you decide otherwise. Because, you tell yourself, isn't this a job that you are paid for? If the world of journalism was all about good, perfect writing, where would you be, idiot?

That placates the rebel within, even if temporarily. Because a thankless job is still better than no job at all. As for the sub/assistant editor's memorable encounters with the unprintable but complaining writers, they become a routine after a while. The excitement begins as soon as you leave the desk.

Frankly, now that I am supposed to recall my 'worth-recalling' experiences, I can't think of many. In old age, they say, distant memory becomes sharper, so all I can remember are instances that are, well, not so recent.

Quite early in my career as a journalist, I became fascinated with the idea of doing interviews with 'great' people. Now, great people, since they happen to be great, can push you whichever way they like. I still remember that a long time back, Malika Pukhraj, the great singer who I went to interview, refused to answer any of my prepared questions. Instead, in the hour or so that I spent with her, she showed me her garden, her embroideries, both a labour of love for her. She fed me some nice snacks -- all cooked by herself in desi ghee.

Back home, I switched on the recorder to find only four minutes of conversation on the tape -- because she spoke for only this much length of time. As for me, I had to fill up one page of a tabloid-sized magazine, which meant at least 1200 words.

Since I was taught that journalism was "the art of filling space", I guess I did fine by writing a profile of hers. The best part was that in those four minutes I managed to extract from her what she thought of her daughter as a singer; words that may not have pleased Tahira Syed a lot.

Back in the early nineties, we ran a column, 'Leisure Time', in our magazine which was about how celebrities liked to spend their spare time. Celebrities on our list included noted journalists and intellectuals. So after we had interviewed Muzaffar Ali Syed, we went to ace journalist Nisar Osmani. As it turned out, the copy-paster forgot to remove the photograph of Syed and replace it with that of Osmani whose column was then printed with Syed's photo. Now journalism may well be about making mistakes, but this one was unforgivable.

That very week, Nisar Osmani passed away. The copy-paster, a thick-skinned though witty chap, was quick to put the blame on me.

Many of those great people have now crossed over to 'the other side'. I remember interviewing Mirza Ibrahim in Lahore's Railway Colony, not knowing my way and asking people who took me straight to where he sat with other union workers. I remember meeting Miriam Habib, the trailblazing Apa Jan of Pakistan Times, A. H. Kardar and his prim manners and Tahir Mirza, the editor who spoke very little but very well.

As for the living ones, those that exist on the other side of the border have always made interesting subjects. At least two instances related to India and Indians are worth writing about. Six or seven years ago, I went to interview Shekhar Gupta, editor Indian Express, who was in Lahore. As I came out of the hotel where he was staying, a youngish man came to me in the parking lot and asked who I had come to meet and why. Without my asking, he introduced himself as an intelligence agency person and the very next moment gave me his entire life history. More recently, when I returned to the country after attending a conference in India and landed at the Karachi airport, I ran into another intelligence agency person who asked my views about India. Once again, in a matter of minutes, he gave his background and the details of how effective Pakistan's intelligence agencies were. I am not sure about other things, but IQ certainly figures rather low on the list of priorities of those who do the hiring for these agencies.

Blank tapes after some path-breaking interviews are a common occurrence in journalists' lives and yet each time we pretend as if that was the end of life. I admit it gets worse when done with much fanfare. So a blank tape after a panel interview with Intizar Hussain a couple of years ago became a little problematic. I don't know how the editor wrote the entire thing from memory, but I bet I would not have been able to do it. A blank tape matches a blank mind in my case.

In all these years, a few things have remained half-accomplished. In the short stint that I was away from the profession, I happened to meet the great communist leader Sobhogian Chandani in Larkana. Already an old man in 1997, he recalled the entire history of the communist movement in India and here, and I recorded it on audio tape. Somehow, I never got the time to transcribe that interview and send it for printing. I still have it lying somewhere -- as both a prized possession and a regret.

A reporter on the prowl will always find something odd where it's least expected

By Waqar Gillani

Reporting is a full-time job -- something that you must do with your eyes and ears open and, of course, a mind capable of observing, learning and reporting. Though I can quote several interesting experiences I had in my decade-long career as a reporter. These experiences were not only interesting but also helped me learn facts about the society at large.

I still remember how Lt Gen (r) Khalid Maqbool, who served as the governor of the Punjab for the longest time, enjoyed full powers till the 2002 general election. Things changed when Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi became the chief minister. It led to a sort of a power politics between the governor and the CM. Naturally, the media also shifted its focus on the most important person in the province. In a way, the governor lost his sense of importance. At a convocation in Government College University, Lahore, Khalid Maqbool was invited as the chief guest in his capacity as Chancellor, GCU. He was expecting a very warm welcome when right in the middle of the tea, in the beautiful lush lawns of GCU, a crowd of people got impatient and pushed the governor aside. His helplessness was writ large on his face. I am sure he learnt this side of governance -- the hard way.

Denying access to information and bureaucratic hurdles in the way of getting proper information is a dilemma of all third world countries. Sometimes, all this irritates the reporter to a point where he or she feels utterly helpless in the field. I have such an experience to share. I was doing a story on seminary reforms. I had to make a telephone call from Lahore to the secretary interior in Islamabad. I had to go through a whole lot of people -- from secretary's office to section officer (top to bottom) -- as every top officer referred me to the lower cadre official and every lower cadre official asked me to obtain permission from the high-ups. I was going round in circles. It was becoming crazy, chasing people on the phone for two long days. Well, such experiences are quite common in Pakistan.

Another interesting incident that I can recount here is the closure of The Sun International, a local newspaper that was launched in 2000 and closed within a year. As it happened, we finished our day's work in the office and returned home, after the paper had been sent to the press, only to find the next day that the newspaper had been closed. It seemed funny as much as incredulous.

One of the most interesting scenes I witnessed during my reporting days was at Avari Hotel. A function of an NGO was in progress. There was a large number of women present on the occasion, including Punjab legislators. Every one was busy having lunch. Suddenly, I saw something that I could not believe. A 'well-reputed' person, retired as the head of the country's top institution, was pacing in the hallway around women. He would pat on their backs unwittingly -- as he passed them by. Later, I found him enjoying the reaction of the somewhat enraged lot of women. He stood there, in a corner, and kept smiling. I badly wished there was a TV camera around at the time.