A beautiful article by renowned writer, prominent journalist, and social figure Rana Mahmood for Dawn London, which you will remember
In response to a question asked by our journalist friend Ghulam Hussain Awan whether print media has lost its importance in the race of electronic media, or rather, unbridled social media, renowned TV anchor Aftab Iqbal said that print media has its own unique status that will always remain, however, he also made an interesting “confession of guilt” that since he has “dedicated” himself to electronic media, he has not been able to give time to his columns, which was also criticized by his friend and renowned bureaucrat Zafar Mahmood who said that he is praying that Aftab Iqbal’s TV shows be stopped so that he can focus on his columns again. Perhaps it is the effect of his prayers that Aftab Iqbal is more visible on social media today than on TV.
The decoration of the famous lawyer Rizwan Sulheriya Sahib in East London. Although I was a backbencher in this academic gathering, I also got the opportunity to speak. Another literary lover and sophisticated person, Zafar Ahmed Sahib, who was the host of Aftab Iqbal, was also seen sitting on the back benches like me. Now, was this the reason for the rush of people who came to meet Aftab Iqbal, or was it the talent of Rizwan Sulheriya Sahib? I leave it to you to decide.
The talk was about the print media, or rather, the pen.
There is a saying among the Arabs:
The sword and the pen are twins.
The Almighty says:
And we sent down iron in it, a great curse and a benefit to people. We sent down iron, which has great hardness and benefits for people. That is, iron is decisive, the form of both the sword and the pen. All human progress is due to the pen; if writing is removed from human progress, then man will again fall into the pits of ignorance and darkness.
A masterpiece was created by the pen of Bahauddin Zakaria’s son-in-law and
the famous Sufi poet of the seventh century AH, Fakhruddin Ibrahim Iraqi, whose title is the first line of that poem.
“Qalam gaood ke man shah-e-jahanam”
The pen says that I am the king of the world.
This Sufi poet was born in the city of Kamijan in Iran, but he is known by the name “Iraqi” because, before his birth, his father, Abdul Ghaffar Kamijani, saw Hazrat Ali Karamullah Wajah in a dream along with some of his senior companions. Meanwhile, a person comes and places a child at the feet of Hazrat Ali. Hazrat Ali picks up the child and places it in Abdul Ghaffar’s lap and says, “Take our Iraqi, teach him well, and write so that the whole world will recognize him.” In just nine months, when “Iraqi” was only six years old, he memorized the Quran. He recited the Quran with such sweetness that people would wait for his recitation every day and night when he repeated it. One day, while he was still a young man, busy reciting as usual, some Jews were passing by, and the Iraqis were on this verse of Surah Taha:
And thus do We recompense those who are extravagant and do not believe in the signs of their Lord, and the punishment of the Hereafter is severe and lasting. Hearing this verse, those Jews were moved to compassion. They fell at the feet of the Iraqi, waited for the recitation to end, and were accepted into Islam by the Iraqi. The whole city came, the people standing at the crossroads showered money on those new Muslims in an emotional outburst, and took them to their homes with the sounds of Takbir.
The residents of Lahore must know that at the junction of DHA Phase 4 and 5, a human-sized “pen” and some books are installed, and under the pen is this masterpiece of “Iraqi”.
“The pen says that I am the king of hell.”
“The pen says that he is the king of the world.”
We have entered an era where even truth is spoken by looking at the trend, and silence is subject to algorithms, but the tragedy of history is that it has never remembered the noise; it has always preserved the writing. Social media creates moments, while the pen carves time. That is why even today, the real fear is of the pen, because a sword or a gunshot only destroys the body, and the pen destroys the system. And this is the reason why if iron is decisive in the form of a sword and a gunshot, then the pen is decisive in the form of consciousness, history, and civilization. A decision that is not temporary, but has its effect for generations.
History is not made by noise, but by writing, and if the pen writes the truth, then it is more decisive than the sword.
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