In 1988, when democracy was restored in the country, ironically remnants of the Zia dictatorship began to demand due coverage for the opposition on state-controlled electronic media: the Pakistan Television (PTV) and radio Pakistan. A National Assembly member of the Islamic Democratic Alliance (IJI), Umer Hayat Lalika, for instance, in his speech on the floor of house on 7 February 1989, criticised the then Pakistan Peoples Party government, headed by the late Benazir Bhutto, for ignoring the opposition on the PTV.
Giving hypocrisy a bad name, dailies like the Nawa-i-Waqt also began to echo this criticism. It was amid this atmosphere Javed Jabbar, the then Minister of State for Information and Broadcasting, informed the National Assembly that 54 writers and intellectuals were banned on the PTV while 49 were ‘blacklisted’ on the Radio Pakistan. The PTV banned these 54 for supporting the MRD movement(1). The Radio Pakistan did not even bother explaining the reason behind the ban. Besides the official ban, there was an unofficial ban on the PTV and Radio Pakistan on a host of writers and intellectuals.
Following were banned on the PTV (2):
Akhlaq Ahmed Dehlvi
Safdar Mir
Amin Mughal
Altaf Ahmed Qureshi
Asif Sheikh (The Muslim)
I A Rehman (Viewpoint)
Tariq Zaheer (Dawn)
Iftikhar Ahmed
Idrees Butt (Aman)
Ghulam Rasul Chacha
Azhar Jafri
I H Rashid (The Pakistan Times)
Aziz Mazhar (Mashriq)
Riaz Malik (The Pakistan Times)
Syed Mumtaz Ahmed (Mashriq)
Aurangzeb (Mashriq)
Ikramul Haq
Sadiq Jafri (Star)
Mahmud Zaman (The Muslim)
Anwar Qamar (Maghrabi Pakistan)
Usman Irfani
Saleem Akhtar
Karamat Ali Samar (Jang)
Ahmed Bashir (The Muslim)
Ibrar Zaidi
Muhammad Mushtaq
Masood Ishar (Imroz)
Qazi Javed
Mehdi Hassan (Journalism Department, University of the Punjab)
Rakhshanda Hassan
Shafqat Tanvir Mirza
Altaf Malik (PPI)
Salim Shahid
Habib Jalib
Kanwar Mushtaq
Shafeeq Mirza
Hussain Naqi (PPI)
Rafique Mir
Yunus Adeeb
Abbas Najmi
Sadaat Saeed (Jang)
Alam Khan
Ghulam Dastgir
Zubair Rana (Jang)
Anwar Sajjad
Ustad Daman
Nazir Naji (Jang)
Badrul Islam Butt
Qateel Shafai
Abid Hassan Manto
Fakhar Zaman
The following were banned on the Radio Pakistan(3):
Akhlaq Ahmed Dehlvi
Safdar Mir
Amin Mughal
Aziz Mazhar
Ahmed Bashir
Altaf Malik
Munno Bhai
Habib Jalib
Yunus Adib
Anwar Sajjad
Ustad Daman
Nazir Naji
Qateel Shafai
Karar Hussain
Hajira Masroor
Hazur Ahmed Shah
I A Khan
S M Taqi
Bashir Mirza
Paikar Naqvi
Habibullah Junaidi
Hasil Baluch
Amin Mughal
I A Rehman
Tariq Zaheer
Idrees Butt
Ghulam Rasul Chahcha
I H Rashid
Riaz Malik
Syed Mumtaz Ahmed
Aurengeb Ahmed
Masood Ashar
Mehdi Hassan
Rakhshanda Hassan
Shafqat tanvir Mirza
Altaf malik
Hussain Naqi
Abbas Najmi
Sadaat Saeed
Badrul Islam Butt
Abid Hasan manto
Fakhar Zaman
Fakhrud Din G Ibrahim
Nabi Ahmed
Ali Yawar
Kalim Durrani
Muhammad Jamil Ahmed
Notes:
1. MRD stands for Movement for Restoration of Democracy. It was an alliance of opposition parties. A mass movement caught hold of, in particularly, Sindh province in 1983-84 demanding restoration of democracy.
2. This list is incomplete
3. Ibid
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Adnan Farooq has worked with daily The Nation, Lahore and daily Jang, Lahore. He has also volunteered for Milieudefensie, Amsterdam. Friends of the earth, Europe, on environmental issues. He has been working with ON FILE, an Amsterdam-based publication run by journalists from all around the world. He studied Conflict Resolution at University of Amsterdam and is living in Paris. He is the editor. |
