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change arts
Storytellers on stage
Culti-multuralism
House of crafts Even in these desperate times, particularly for culture, the Rafi Peer Theatre Workshop insists on keeping the show going. Their most recent initiative, the Crafts Village at the venue which houses the Puppetry Museum on Raiwind Road, was inaugurated a week back.
change They say that people who complain about taxes can be
divided into two classes: men and women. But Pakistan's taxation system does not embrace a satisfactorily nuanced system of identification and categorisation among potential taxpayers. For all practical purposes, it shifts the burden on the taxpayers mainly according to their incomes and ability to pay. Little consideration is given to social inequities and deprivations made worse by a non-enabling environment for probably the most outstanding category of eligible citizens: women. While unacceptable in the casual formality of the rigid tax laws, it is not surprising. In a social milieu defined by patriarchy and men-friendly interpretation of the state religion, which permeates all aspects of life, it is unsurprising why like most other laws the taxation laws too are ambiguous, unfair, unrepresentative and gender-blind when it comes to women.
Eligible women For the Federal Bureau Revenue the motto simply is "we've got what it takes to take what you've got" -- not for them is to differentiate among taxpayers apart from their incomes. For instance eligible women income and wealth taxpayers are considered a homogenous group that will pay up upfront or, like most taxpayers, do their best not to. No allowances for special treatment are made for sub-categories of eligible women taxpayers in Pakistan who face difficult social and cultural impediments in situations that men, in similar circumstances, almost always don't: single parents, divorced, unmarried (particularly those over 40 years of age when it becomes very difficult for this status to change) and physically challenged (mostly due to medical conditions). Some also struggle, in addition, to hold on to what little property they have but may not have the money pay regular taxes. It is precisely due to this pointed lack of emphasis on sub-categories by the taxation authorities that it is difficult to find verifiable statistics of the numbers of women in Pakistan eligible to be taxpayers. FBR is silent on how many women pay how much in taxes each year. Or what women get in return for paying taxes. Even the non-tax officialdom is less than efficient about precise figures for the number of divorced women in any given year. The last national census -- conducted in 1998 -- indicates that in the then population of 145 million, at least 3.4 percent of women in the 40-45 age bracket never married (3.3 percent in the rural areas and 3.7 percent in the urban), 6 percent were widowed (5.8 percent rural and 6.5 percent urban) and 0.7 percent were divorced (0.7 percent rural and 0.7 percent urban). Considering that women's life expectancy is barely 70 in Pakistan -- this easily projects into over a million women aged 40 or above who have never married, are widowed or are divorced. Not all of them were, or are, engaged outside their homes for gainful employment. But those that are, and may potentially be tax eligible, easily run into hundreds of thousands at any given instance.
Where are taxes that pay? What little concrete data in the larger-picture perspective that is available is enough to back up the claim of non-existent support or facilitative systems or non-exploitative mechanisms when it comes to taking taxes from women but being proportionate, if not over-compensative to women by making it worth their while to pay taxes. According to the UNDP Human Development Report 2009, Pakistan ranks 141 out of 182 countries on the Human Development Index; 124 out of 182 countries on the GDI (Gender Development Index); 99 out of 109 on the GEM (Gender Empowerment Measure) and 101 out of 182 countries on the HPI (Human Poverty Index). This, according to Sinf Surat, a think channel based in Islamabad that promotes dialogue on the neglected faces of gender inequity in policies, society and development strategies, is a double jeopardy for Pakistani women: first their share in GDP growth is not valued and their contribution to labour and level of effort in such key areas as agriculture and urban-based industry and business vis-à-vis is not acknowledged. But when it comes to paying taxes, the principle of equality is applied without the concept of equity. Although women play an active role in Pakistan's economy, their contribution is widely acknowledged to be grossly underreported. Even so, the World Bank's reports of 1997 stated that women constituted 28 percent of the country's labour force. The 1980 agricultural census stated that the women's participation rate in agriculture was 73 percent. The 1990-1991 Pakistan Integrated Household Survey indicated that the female labour force participation rate was 45 percent in rural areas and 17 percent in the urban areas.
Taxonomy of justice It is difficult not to acknowledge the changing demographics, economic upheavals and social and cultural transformations in Pakistan. More women are joining the work force. Even from sketchy data it is clear that divorce rates -- and therefore -- households with women single parents are increasing. For example, despite its small size -- its population in 1998 being 0.6 percent of the national population -- Islamabad's percentage of divorced individuals stood at 0.26 percent of its population in 1998. This is the second highest in the country after Punjab, the most thickly populated province where the numbers were 0.45 percent. And yet, says Malik Mukhtar, an arbitration council official in Islamabad, only 10 percent of the divorce cases are documented. The under-registration of divorce also results from customary practice; marital dissolution is traditionally an informal process and it is de facto, not de jure -- divorce which is the norm in the case of male initiated divorce, leaving women to usually fend for themselves economically. The Islamabad Arbitration Council divorce registers indicate the number of divorces increased threefold in 2005. Significantly, female initiated divorces rose from about 20 percent of the total in 1995 to 48 percent in 2005. So, how does one deal with a more humane view of women having to pay taxes while balancing it with the need to get as many tax rupees from all citizens irrespective of gender to run the country? One solution is what's called the "Ramsey taxation principle", which states that a good whose demand (or supply) is more elastic -- i.e., responsive to prices -- than another one, should be taxed at a lower rate. The reason is that the more responsive the equilibrium quantity of the good is to prices, the more the tax distorts the allocation of resources. When applied to people this principle is proven by econometric studies: women's labour supply is more elastic to wages than that of men, as is the case in Pakistan. So if we were to increase taxes for men and reduce taxes for women, the increase in female labour supply would be larger than the fall in male labour supply. In short, a good tax goal could be to achieve equality between men and women by first allowing women to pay lower taxes than men until 'equality' is achieved. When that goal is reached, the affirmative action gender tax can be removed.
Taxing policies, not women Says the UNDP: "National economic policies and plans need to recognise the roles and contributions of men, women, boys and girls, and address their needs equitably. However, even gender-responsive policies and plans often fail to improve gender equality and empower women because insufficient resources are allocated to implement them. Although resources alone will not achieve gender equality, ensuring adequate financing is a necessary step. While taxes are a key source of financing for such initiatives, tax reforms can increase the tax burden on the poorest women, and at the same time fail to generate enough revenues to fund programs needed to improve their lives. Gender-responsive planning and budgeting ensures that fiscal resources are generated and allocated in a way that affects women and men equitably." That includes taxation eligibility and taxation. As the tax reforms in Pakistan move forward (slowly, more than surely), it is time to think about women. It is time to go beyond rhetoric. Those who manage generation of funds and architect public policies must revisit the structure of taxation with a gender lens and apply such factors as costs of stigma, discrimination and social poverty faced by women who are divorced and, or single mothers or those who never get married because of various reasons. This is not an argument to abolish taxes on eligible women taxpayers in Pakistan; it is an appeal to make the tax codes on them representative. Taxes women pay should distinctly improve women's lives. Because taxes are the key source of revenue governments themselves raise, understanding the nature and composition of taxation and current tax reform efforts is the key to reducing poverty, providing sufficient revenue for public expenditure, and achieving social justice, in particular for women. In Pakistan, to date, no specific intervention has been directed towards examining the gender implications of the existing taxation rules culture and practice. It is time to change this. More and more Pakistani women who are divorcees and/or single mothers, unmarried women (above 40 years in particular) and those physically challenged who go about with dignity and take care of themselves and their families deserve better from the state.
arts When Ahmed Ali Manganhar
talks about his work, words like 'shararat' and 'mazahiya' permeate his Manganhar's oeuvre, he says, was born of a continuous and exhaustive exposure to jejune works by his peers depicting Pakistan in a stockpile of stereotypical images of bombs, mullahs and burqas. For his own body of work, he reverted to wistful nostalgia and the bygone pervasive air of innocent romance that mingled in our lives when cinema was king and the stars were bright on celluloid. Manganhar declares he often watches Pakistani movies from the 1950s and 1960s and they stir his soul. Inextricably linked to cinema of yore has been the tradition of the billboard painter, an art form that Manganhar says has been a significant component of his adolescence and youth, when he would watch the artists who came to his town of Tando Allayar from Hyderabad and Mirpur Khas and paint their gargantuan boards to attract cinema goers to movies released. In fact, their wilting profession, overridden by technology, has become Manganhar's cause célèbre. The paintings are medium sized canvases that depict portraits of Pakistani film stars of yore as may have once been seen on the come-see-me larger than life billboards. The actors are shown in exaggerated poses denoting traits of anger and villainy and romance and timidity. The washes of acrylic give a half-finished look as if the sign painter were building up his piece and having made his assistants finish the groundwork with the first layer of paint, was looking to see what details, if any, were necessary to finish the work at hand. The work is remarkable in that it hypothesizes a work in progress by a billboard artist without making us feel that the work itself is incomplete. Manganhar uses the diptych as a way of contrasting the characteristics most often attributed to the actors -- Sultan Rahi is the indefatigable Maula Jatt, along with the other popular villain of Pakistani cinema Mustafa Qureshi. There's the screen goddess Rani as a shrinking violet or voluptuous Neelo. For good measure, Manganhar throws in some images from Hollywood and Bollywood -- Lawrence Olivier as Hamlet and Waheeda Rehman and Guru Dutt in Kagaz ke Phool. Still, as identifiably as these celebrities have been portrayed, Manganhar is not content with simple portraiture painted in cinema hoarding style. Waheed Murad with his boyish, clean looks, often known as the Chocolate Hero of the screen, has been depicted in one of his rarest screen portrayals when he plays the role of a woman and the idea of representing this hero in drag is almost shocking. Manganhar distinguishes with a keen eye between the cinematographic three-dimensional moving image of film and the two-dimensional plane of the still photograph of the scene. While he desists from articulating the flatness of the composition of a still from a movie, he does not try to render it in its three-dimensionality either, thus absolving himself of a pre-supposed responsibility to the form and with it, abdicating all pretensions of formalism. It is not often that we see an artist who has thought so much and so deeply about his work. The paintings are generously sprinkled with other billboard effects. Manganhar notes that sign painters rarely used too much detail in their work as the gigantic faces were meant to be viewed from a distance and details became irrelevant to the task at hand, which in essence was to create a visual splash. Simultaneously Manganhar invokes the masters of pop art and their credo of commercialism as art. Warhol drew inspiration from popular culture, working with portraits of celebrities using silk screens and other methods of mass production. He heightened the colour palette and reconstituted the scale of the image, thus redefining pictorial realism and extending its concept. The informed and intellectually sprightly artist that he is, Manganhar transforms the approach of the pop artists to turn the norms of the genre on its head -- while the Warholites addressed concerns of industrial mass production and material abundance, Manganhar uses the techniques of the genre to talk of an art created with no technology, few resources, by one artist for one billboard -- the human element ensuring that the billboard artist could not replicate the painting he had made the day before in its exactitude. With all his effort towards depicting romance and idyll, the titles of the paintings tell another story. Not made for each other, Dying and Killing for love and Not blood brothers, are some of the titles. This inevitable degree of cynicism that seeps into Manganhar's work, arises not so much from his personal scepticism as much as a sense of pegging the work to present day realities that must, the artist insists, prevail eventually.
Storytellers on stage Sania Saeed and Shahid
Shafaat are bringing three gems on stage for Karachiites. Manifesting Sania's The first Kahani "Aunty" is adapted by Shafaat from a short story of Henry James with the same title. The story revolves around two college friends, who happen to meet each other some time later in life. The two characters stand poles apart in their outlook to the phenomena of aging and love. They are played by the seasoned actress Sania Saeed and Fizza Zehra of the Odd Couple fame. The 30-minute long story addresses a complex situation, in which an aging woman tries to find a Mr. Right for herself. It seems obvious that some women don't want to grow old or rather grow up, and strive to keep themselves young by dieting less and exercising more. They tend to believe that they are in competition for a mate with the younger generation for all times to come. But it becomes a tough (and expensive) struggle for them in our society, for they end up with anything but a partner in love. This story has an edgy take on the nature of young men as well. The second Kahani is taken from the works of master storyteller, Anton Chekov. Titled "Lottery", it is adapted with precision to locate the cunning behaviour attached to manhood in the institution of marriage. Played by Sania Saeed and Saleem Meeraj, the story is about how a marriage can have an imbalance -- by the standards of traditional men – if the wife has won a lottery of a sizeable amount. It brings out the fear, the anger and the insecurity in men, for they were born and brought up with the idea of keeping all fun in life for themselves and not to share it with their better halves. The last but not the least: a story of a long-abandoned love enacted by Sania and Ehteshamuddin, with a supportive cast of Fizza, Saleem and Shahzad. It is a one-act play by a Spanish dramatist SJA Quintero and is titled "Aik Subha". The play traces back the charm of a love lost in the dust of partition, as the two aged lovers meet accidentally in a park after decades. They are now old and have played their life innings on their own. They do not recognise each other immediately, but a reference of their youth lived in old Delhi proves to be the point of reference for the re-emergence of their love. Toned and punctuated with a subtle humour of decency, the dialogue between the two aged lovers is a treat in itself. Shahid Shafaat is a director of not-so-expensive sets and simple lighting. So don't expect elaborative sets like you have recently seen in The Seagull and Meri Jaan. But Shafaat's best quality as a director is his way of going for impromptu blocking. This aspect of his work is quite visible in this latest production of Katha, for his actors appear to use the space at will and give an impression of being in command of what they are doing. They don't look like mere puppets of the director. Interestingly, this method of letting actors have their own space within the boundaries marked by the script itself is quite common in young theatre directors these days. Other notable directors of this genre of improvisation are, of course, Zain Ahmed and Sheema Kirmani. With her mature acting skills, Sania Saeed is once again going to leave her mark on the minds of her audiences. And as days of hyper-theatrical performances pass by, the Karachi Arts Council is going to have a story-telling production at last.
The idea of multiculturalism has not ceased to impress curators, critics and art organisers around the world. Hence the group show 'Available Light' at Alhamra Art Galleries By Quddus Mirza It may sound like a fabricated story or a joke, but late
Zahoorul Akhlaq once described a talk show that What that earnest and eager Sikh uttered, sometimes, takes place in other forms and occasions. The overt reference to multiculturalism, both by the producers and presenters of art, often leads to funny and unusual occurrences. Yet the idea of multiculturalism has not ceased to impress curators, critics and art organisers around the world. On surface, the effort to hold multiculturalism dear and showcase it appears a politically correct step, aimed at removing the historical wrongs. But deep down it is connected with globalisation, a phenomenon understood to be an evolved form of colonialism. In times gone by, countries under the European Empires (British, Dutch and Spanish) followed a singular system: of government, code of law, education and (in some cases) language and religion. With the US holding the hegemonic power in the realm of politics, economics, military and information, the world is transforming once again into a place that boasts similar type of food and uniform brands of fashion (McDonald's, Pizza Hut, Levis, Gap and Armani), identical threats (Islamic terrorism), one mode of payment (credit cards) and shared means of communication (sms and emails). At a time when the nations are shedding differences at an enormous speed, superfluous efforts to represent multiculturalism seem odd and outdated. Especially now that the countries, traditionally considered to be on the periphery, are fast catching up in the fields of art, culture and commerce (for example India and China). Thus any attempt to 'include' the subject of ethnic identity and focus on the theme of 'cultural differences' in a group show on the part of a Western curator or organisation is seen as a delayed act of bridging the gap. A gap that has already been covered by many individuals without benefiting from the marginalised positions or minority privileges. In that respect the present exhibition of artists from Canada and USA at Alhamra Art Galleries is an endeavour to bring art from a far away land to a new and uninformed audience. Titled 'Available Light', the show consists of photographs, digital prints and video installations. Although the curator describes the term and idea of 'available light' a binding element, since all the works are related to light in one way or other (photos taken in light, digital works are seen on luminous screen – of a computer, before these are printed and videos are projected through light on a wall or panel), this justification or link between various works seem rather far-fetched. A large part of the exhibition appears to be dealing with the theme of multiculturalism. For instance, the work of Norman Takeuchi is clearly connected to his Oriental past. Kimonos with images from Japanese sites and people are installed in the gallery, along with documentation of their initial and actual scheme of display on poles at the roadsides in Canada. His work, a means to rediscover his heritage through traditional apparel, joins him with numerous other artists who are trying to locate and then use their roots; almost a shortcut in the contemporary art world, where exotic still holds much attraction and acceptance. Likewise, Hans Joerg Mettler has focused on train journey in different parts of the world, with a range of multi racial passengers engaged in intimate or innocent activities. The experience of travelling in and above the city is communicated effectively, yet the presence of a divided world as his 'subtext' turns his work into another attempt to represent a 'globally-correct' imagery. A similar device is displayed in the series of ten photographs by Cecile Boucher, in which head dresses of different types are worn by individuals of multiple nationalities. All of these characters are facing the detailed map of one or the other part of Canada, with a portion of map composed at the lower half of each picture. Not only the variation in hats, scarves and caps, the diverse hairstyles also betray the divide in ethnic backgrounds. In addition, captions such as 'Urban Legend' under a girl with headscarf and 'African Beauty' for a white woman wearing a colourful turban, suggest the artist's desire to document and depict the multiracial society of Canada (or of the world!). This attempt towards presenting and projecting a diversity of race and culture is seen again in the digital prints of Sandra Hawkins. One of her superimposed picture portrays original inhabitants of the continent along with an urban scene of North America. This and other works in the exhibition demonstrate these artists' rather late fascination -- or fixation -- with multiculturalism that is slowly relinquishing its relevance.
House of crafts Even in these desperate times, particularly for culture,
the Rafi Peer Theatre Workshop insists on The area has been developing since the Museum started being built in 1997. Now it is not a building site nor a lone structure as the locality has urbanised at a rate faster than expected. The Museum is also not a one off thing but has alongside it the open air theatre, the café and an open expanse where outdoor programmes have been held. On one side of the open expanse the Crafts Village has also sprung up with about sixteen shops and two art galleries. Artistically designed, so as not to stand out inappropriately against the museum, café and the open air performance arena, the row of shops has a veranda in front and a corridor at the back which leads to the two art galleries that will in future function fulltime for the purpose for which they have been built. There is no emphasis on any one particular craft as it houses a number of them. Probably with more space it will have as many crafts as there are in the country -- a fabulous thought because the number is huge and the prospect of going through a maze of an unending craft bazaar or village quite fanciful. Initially the shops have crafts which are about clothes, indigenous textiles, embroidery, woodwork, jewellery, clothes, leather-ware, pieces carved out of bone primarily camel bone and musical instrument making. The shop that sells musical instruments specialises in sarangi which itself is on the verge of extinction and its craft of making too is no longer a business that fetches profit. A very difficult instrument to play and also to make, it requires the right wood, seasoning and the correct strings made of the right metal/ alloy/gut and lastly the adjustment of the strings according to the music -- which only an musician turned instrument-maker can do. The sarangis have been placed in the order in which they are made perhaps to give to the viewers an idea of the various stages in its intricate making. Similarly other traditional instruments too are dying out and there is place for all of them at the craft museum. Some like the percussion instruments used in weddings and other festive occasions like the dhol, dholki and naal are also on display as indeed as the cymbal and daff which are also used in folk music. The venue is also the unofficial home of folk puppets and puppetry in the country. Folk puppetry too was dying in view of the growing competition of the electronic media and more technological fascinating forms of entertainment. By holding the puppet festival and giving the puppeteers a place to stay and work, if not revived the ancient art of string puppetry, has slowed down its ultimate extinction. Making string puppets too is an art. The puppets are all old and no puppet is made of wood, only repaired if damaged. Then there is a whole method of cutting and stitching their costumes and making them up, sharpening their features and defining their gestures according to the characters that they play. Faizaan Peerzada wants to expand the crafts village by building on top of the existing structure. That will double the space now available which can accommodate many more crafts which are suffering the same fate. In an age that is racing towards the uniformity of globalisation and its standardised expressions, perhaps the emphasis on the crafts can be an activity that reflects the diversity of the peoples, religions and cultures that are being smothered by the forces of sameness. The crafts do have a utilitarian function but carry with them the flavour of the place they originate from. There is cold impersonality that defines a mass produced product. The crafts exude the place and people and so shall the Craft Village on Raiwind Road.
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jokes aside, the system of taxation of eligible citizens in Pakistan
manifests generally the same approach as most policies on other subjects that
deal with the state's primary responsibility towards the welfare of its
subjects: inadequate levels of exclusivity, ownership, relevancy, fairness
and benefit.
vocabulary suggesting how much fun he's had painting the canvases presently
on display at VM Art Gallery. The solo show entitled 'Not made for each
other' -- a wonderful sarcastic witticism -- is perhaps the most
comprehensive body of work that Manganhar has produced for a while.
acting skills and Shafaat's directorial authenticity, these gems based on key
aspects of marriage, friendship and love are treated with a subtle humour and
understated sarcasm. The duo is all ready to hit the theatre scene in the
city with their low-budget yet impressive production called "Kahaniyan",
under the banner of their homemade theatre group Katha, to be staged at the
Arts Council Karachi from November 21-25.
he watched during his stay in Canada where a Sikh, while discussing minority
rights and ethnic issues, became so passionate that he started using the word
culti-multuralism, instead of multiculturalism. 
keeping the show going. Their most recent initiative, the Crafts Village at
the venue which houses the Puppetry Museum on Raiwind Road, was inaugurated a
week back.