Ripple Effect

Yes you read that right -- Star Plus, the Indian television channel otherwise banned in Pakistan, but presumably available in most parts of the country, is the most-watched channel on cable television. In fact, it leads the next most-watched channel, Geo News, by such a wide margin that more people watch Star Plus than the next four channels on the ratings list. Not only that, the top five also includes two other banned Indian channels, Sony and Colors. Lest people be suspicious of where I'm getting all this from, this is in fact in the public realm, thanks to brandsynario.com, a Pakistani marketing and advertising website, which has posted the results of an exhaustive survey by Media Logic detailing the viewing habits of Pakistanis for 2010. Media Logic is incidentally the same company that does market research and ratings for the industry and hence its findings are normally taken at face value and accepted by all the channels. There are two ratings lists that are of interest. The...

What's with TV anchors gunning for Veena Malik -- did they expect her to wear the burka on Bigg Boss? -- as if she had ever done that in Pakistan and as if Pakistani film heroines wear such attire in Pakistani movies -- why is Kamran Shahid gunning for her? Would he do that with, say, Nawaz Sharif, or better still, Kayani? Also saw a show on Geo where viewers were asked the question (it doesn't come any loaded than this) that did they agree that Veena Malik's demeanour and behaviour on Bigg Boss had insulted Pakistan? The results, when I saw was watching the channel were: 93 per cent said 'yes' and 7 per cent said 'no'. I bet more than half of those 93 per cent (especially if they were men) wouldn't mind seeing Ms Malik dressed in a mini-skirt. If there's something this country's good at, it's sanctimonious hypocrisy I have to agree with Ms Malik -- people are going after her because she is a "soft target" -- and surely our TV ancho...

I have not seen these published anywhere -- they may be graphic, one of them at least but I am putting them up on my blog because people need to know of the monster of extremism and intolerance that is slowly eating away us from inside the first pic is of the governor -- he is shown from the back -- since he was shot from the back -- the police is trying to pick him up and take him to hospital -- in a police van because they presumably wanted immediate medical treatment -- the other pic shows two elite force policemen holding the killer with their feet on his chest and smgs (sub-machine guns pointing at him) -- this must have happened immediately after the assassination these pics were sent by a friend who did not want to be named -- they were taken by someone (other than him) who was in Mocca at the time -- that is precisely the restaurant where Mr Taseer had been having lunch - incidentally during my last visit to Islamabad, I had coffee at this place with a friend -- and our car was...

I have not seen these published anywhere -- they may be graphic, one of them at least but I am putting them up on my blog because people need to know of the monster of extremism and intolerance that is slowly eating away us from inside the first pic is of the governor -- he is shown from the back -- since he was shot from the back -- the police is trying to pick him up and take him to hospital -- in a police van because they presumably wanted immediate medical treatment --