Floral expressions

report of an exhibition

Floral workshop provides opportunities to women for enhancing their professional skills in the floral industry, reports UZMA ALEEM

Floral art society of Pakistan arranged a workshop under the title of ‘Expression’ after General body meeting for January of chapter Lahore. Islamabad’s top floral art designer Yasmeen Sohail conducted the workshop and gave an outstanding demonstration on contemporary designs with new concepts and techniques of floral art.
Almost all the members from chapter Lahore of FASP attended the workshop and participated in training session of workshop.
While talking to Sunday Plus Information sectary of FASP Farida Hassan said that women from all walks of life were the members of floral art society and they tried to actualise their wonderful sense of aesthetics through this unique and delicate art. “This art actually adds colour and life in home décor. Moreover this art has become a growing industry all over the world. FASP is also striving to give international exposure and recognition to Pakistani floral art designers. Our designers participate in international floral designing competition. Though they lack modern facilities and techniques but due to their exceptional sense of aesthetics they receive terrific appreciation at international floral art arena,” she added.
Show Chairperson Zehra Azmat said that FASP won the competition of holding World Floral Art Show 2008 because of its talented floral art designers and efforts of office bearers of society, but unstable law and order situation proved impediment and World floral show 2008 at Lahore was cancelled. “Now it is need of the hour to improve the law and order situation in Pakistan for the growth of this industry,” she opined.
Rubina Khalid, Sectary of Floral art society of Pakistan, said that aim of floral art designing was not to satisfy aesthetics only, rather FASP believed in helping less privileged people of the country and held fund raising exhibitions for the deprived sector of society. Previously they arranged a grand floral show for the poor patients of Shaukat Khanum Memorial cancer hospital and SOS village etc. “Now we want to bridge the gap between rich and poor of society through elegant activities of art,” she said.
“The Society holds regular shows within the country, which has played a vital role in creating appreciation for capturing the beauty of flowers through different techniques. Participants take keen interest in the floral art competition. The club provides the plant and designing materials to each participant but they bring their own tools’ kits. For this workshop of contemporary floral designing 11 groups are formed, names of the eminent floral designers are followed; Zahra Aslam, Huma Jamshed, Farida Hassan, Nighat Izhar, Dr. Tahoor, Nazli Asif, Aqeela Saeed, Saima Sikander, Anjum Raheel, Shahnaz Mehmood, Shirin Khan, Sameera Nadeem, Ambreen Irfan, Romana Maqsood, Durdana Asif and Aqsa Aslam,” she added.
“Flowers are the gift of the nature and symbol of love while such workshops provide opportunities to women for further enhancing their professional skills in the field,” said Anjum Rehman.
“FASP members are admired globally for their unique designs. Our members also go aboard to attend international training workshops and competitions of floral art. In following days they are going UK and Australia to participate in international floral art conferences and workshops,” she said.
The Floral Art Society of Pakistan is member of World Association of Flower Arrangers (WAFA), which aims at promoting the art of flower arranging throughout the world to reinforce the ties among member countries through regular exchange visits and establishing international standards for flower arranging competitions.
A number of ladies related to the field of arts and working in different institutes having passion for floral decors and the members of Pakistan Floral Society attended the workshop.
The members also displayed elegant arrangements of fresh flowers adorned with various accessories.

Human Cargo

Human Trafficking

The phenomenon of human trafficking has made people cargo commodities and which is an open violation of basic human rights, reports UZMA ALEEM

‘Its so suffocated around, my breath has stifled, please help me, help me please, I cannot breath……….it has become difficult to breath. Please help me, I do not want to die…….. Oh God please help……… is there anyone to rescue me………please, please ……..ple…….’ these were the last few sentences uttered by Hamid Watto. Hamid was illegally migrating to his dreamland Dubai via a cargo container that was completely sealed and ventilation was almost impossible. In that cargo container of 12x12, 46 people of different age groups travelled, along Hamid six people died of suffocation before reaching Dubai while 39 people were jailed because of illegal migration.
This incident is not a single example of human trafficking, such incidents appear in headlines of newspapers when victim of human trafficking caught by police in different countries and they distort the image of country too.
Human migration is not a new phenomenon. For centuries, people have left their homes in search of better lives elsewhere. In the last decade, the process of globalisation has enhanced the ‘push-pull’ factors, which drive migrants’ desires to seek more gainful employment abroad. This has caused an unprecedented amount of migration from the least developed countries of Asia, Africa, South America and Eastern Europe to Western Europe, Australia and North America.
Criminal networks that smuggle human beings for financial gains increasingly control the flow of migrants across borders. Due to more restrictive immigration policies in destination countries and improved technology to monitor border crossings, willing illegal migrants rely increasingly on the help of organized people smugglers. Like Hamid did to reach Dubai.
People smuggling is not a homogenous criminal activity; the price of the trip, conditions of travel and status upon arrival can vary significantly.
Trafficking is distinct from smuggling insofar as the traffic of human beings involves the exploitation of the migrant, often for purposes of forced labour and prostitution. People smuggling simply implies the procurement, for financial or material gain, of the illegal entry into a state of which the individual is neither a citizen nor a permanent resident.
It is acknowledged that the smuggling of people is a growing as a global phenomenon. It is not only a trans national crime, but also an enormous violation of human rights and a contemporary form of slavery. Currently, economic instability appears to be the main reason for illegal migration movement throughout the world.
When S+ probed about this growing illegal phenomenon it was found that many of the willing migrants from Pakistan undertook the hazardous travel to their destination country with criminal syndicates specialised in people smuggling. These syndicates arranged everything for the migrants, but at a high price, like recently a government servant from province Punjab paid Rs. 700,000 for illegal immigration to Greece.
Very often the travelling conditions are inhumane, the migrants are overcrowded in trucks, containers or boats and fatal accidents occur frequently. After their arrival in the destination country, their illegal status puts them at the mercy of their smugglers, which often force the migrants to work for years in the illegal labour market to pay off the debts incurred as a result of their transportation.
People smuggling syndicates still benefit from weak legislation, huge profits and the relatively low risk of detection, prosecution and arrest compared to other activities of trans national organized crime. This creates the need for a structure, which enables police and other law enforcement agencies to co-operate on a global basis.
Leading Human rights activist Ansar Berni said, “actually human trafficking has become a complicated phenomenon and profitable business dominated by organised criminal groups and their worldwide chains. It generates US$7 billion a year and is the second largest illegal trade after drugs and weapons.
Human trafficking often occurs in connection with the movement of the people from rural to urban and from poor to rich areas, both within the country and across the international borders.”
Berni was of the view, ‘trafficking in person is always characterised by elements of exploitation through fraud, coercion, deception, and other illegal means that place people in harmful and exploiting situations.
The cases of human trafficking have been rising in Pakistan and females are being smuggled from rural and urban areas for various reasons including poverty, forced marriage, under age marriage, fake marriage, sexual motive, overseas employment and domestic work.
Mostly small children have been smuggled for the purpose of camel jockey races, child soldiers, domestic work, beggary, sexual assault and slavery,” he added.
Director of FIA Azam joyia said that in 2002, Pakistan had criminalized trafficking in person and had taken several steps to curb its occurrences. He said, “Pakistan is a source, transit and destination point for severe forms of trafficking in persons, especially women and children. Pakistan is a destination point for those being trafficked from Bangladesh, Burma, Afghanistan, and Central Asia. The country serves as a transit point for those brought in from East Asia and Bangladesh to be taken elsewhere, and lastly it is a recruiting ground for those who are internally (inter-provincially) trafficked or sent to Afghanistan and the Gulf countries. Now we are trying our best to curb this problem. Now situation is improving ”.
Almas Mirza, a renowned civil lawyer, said Trafficking in persons was modern-day slavery, involving victims who were forced, defrauded or coerced into labour or sexual exploitation.
“Annually, about 600,000 to 800,000 people -- mostly women and children -- are trafficked across national borders which does not count millions trafficked within their own countries.
People are snared into trafficking by many means. In some cases, physical force is used. In other cases, false promises are made regarding job opportunities or marriages in foreign countries to entrap victims,” she said.
While talking about its global impact she said, “Human trafficking is a multi-dimensional threat. It deprives people of their human rights and freedom, it is a global health risk, and it fuels the growth of organized crime.
Human trafficking has a devastating impact on individual victims, who often suffer physical and emotional abuse, rape, threats against self and family, passport theft, and even death. But the impact of human trafficking goes beyond individual victims; it undermines the safety and security of all nations it touches.”
Collaborative efforts against human trafficking are needed to combat this global menace, she added.



Dying for dreamlands



Routes used for human trafficking may sometimes be simple and direct, whereas most of the times circuitous. The time between departure and arrival may vary from some days to several months or even years. Smuggling is carried out by land, air or sea. During this process many people may perish before reaching their destinations but few lucky ones can reach back to their homes too and a resident of Lahore Zulfiqar Ali is also among those survivors. During an interview with the S+ he told that his cousin, who promised for a good job in Muscat, made him fool. He told about his journey that his cousin, Shahzad, was part of a network of human smugglers and they sent 26 people in a boat having capacity of 3-4 persons.
Actually we wanted to go to Oman for better opportunities of employment.
While talking about that worse journey of his life he said “we reached from Lahore to Karachi then to Gwader. From Gwader we crossed the boarder of Iran, our agent bribed Iranian Army and it became so easy for us to cross the boarder. After ward we travelled through jungles of Iran and then we crossed the Iranian boarder via sea. But unfortunately we missed our way; we have been wondered in open sea, without any food and very small quantity of water, for 4 days. Then a French ship rescued us and provided us food and water. Then before entering in Oman, we were caught by Omani Army and they kept us in a small jail for 26 days, without enough food.” He praised that Pakistani ambassador in Oman remained so cooperative and helped Pakistani prisoners.
While talking about the increasing trend of illegal migration he said, “legal migration from Pakistan is complicated, people smugglers around the globe are profiting and have created a network of organized crime to facilitate the illegal immigration of Pakistan.
The migrants and facilitators are generally amateurs of same ethnic origin of those they are smuggling. This form of illegal immigration poses great challenges to the international law enforcement community and has great ramifications for policy and legislation regarding immigration. He added that now he has released it so he was trying to go





Smuggling routes

Changing methods of people-smuggling networks as a response to legislative and law enforcement activities are necessary for their survival. Flexibility is thus one of the main characteristics of transportation and the choice of routes. This means that the routes used by people smugglers may sometimes be simple and direct, at other times circuitous. The time between departure and arrival may vary from some days to several months or even years. Smuggling is carried out by land, air or sea.
The following outlines are some examples of routes frequently used for people smuggling. Migrants from the Asian region mainly use the route via Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan to Russia and from there, via Ukraine, Slovakia and the Czech Republic, to western European countries or even further to the United States and Canada.
At the same time, the Balkan route from Asian countries via Iran and Turkey and from there, via Balkan states, to Western Europe is used for the smuggling of migrants as well as other kinds of illegal goods such as drugs, firearms, etc.
Especially during summer months, Spain has to face the arrival of thousands of illegal immigrants from sub-Saharan Africa. These willing immigrants undertake the hazardous trip to travel from Morocco to southern Spain through the narrow Strait of Gibraltar, where only 21 kilometres separate Europe and Africa. Many people travelling in small, overcrowded boats have drowned attempting to reach Europe.
Australia is also facing a growing number of illegal immigrants, mostly from the Middle East and southern Asia, landing at its western coasts and especially on Christmas Island, which is located relatively close to the Indonesian archipelago.
Most of the refugees from Asia first enter Malaysia, where they are taken to the south before making a short ferry crossing to the Indonesian island of Batam. From there, it is not difficult to reach Jakarta and go on to the southern Indonesian islands of Bali, Flores or Lombok, where they embark for Australia.
Smuggling migrants to the United States is mostly achieved by putting them on planes. Ships with migrants on board are mainly bound for the West Coast, but the use of this route has dropped considerably. Smuggling networks seem to focus more and more on Central and South America, where they maintain the necessary links to Mexican people smugglers in order to move the illegal migrants via Mexico to North America.

The bane of charity

The bane of charity

UZMA ALEEM reports sadaqa meat and their vendors are adding pollution in city environment


‘A man wearing dirty cloths throws few pieces of meat of sharp red colour in canal, kites and crows catch few of those pieces. Then a shocking incidence appears that one kite expires at canal bank followed by a crow. Another man throws more pieces of meat, this time kites and crows take the flight but do not take any piece. Another man comes and throws more torn pieces of same sharp red coloured meat then till sunset some people repeat this activity time and again. By the evening that particular place has filled with filthy red torn pieces of meat and sharp red coloured spots, flies are flying on that garbage and on two dead birds while a straw dog is trying to satisfy its appetite through the dead birds.’ This series of incidents happen at the canal road, which is one of the busy roads of provincial capital. Actually the religious ritual of giving sadaqaat or providing food to birds has become a heinous act of adding environmental pollution in the metropolis.
Many vendors of sadaqa meat can be found at different spots of main canal road of Lahore and at the bridge of river Ravi. These vendors sell one shopping bag of sadaqa meat of Rs. 10. People, who are passing by them on their motorbikes or cars, buy this sadaqa meat and vendors get their sadaqa by moving this shopping bag around their head (a conventional way to do the sadaqa) and then they throw the meat at the canal bank and move to the next car when traffic signal turns red. It is important to note that most of the people do not touch the shopping bags of the sadaqa meat because of bad odour of meat and dirty shopping bags. But these people firmly believe that they do it for virtue and all bad fortunes would be reverted through this.
While talking to Sunday Plus a sadaqa vendor Shafiq Babu said that they were standing at the road sides to revert the bad fortunes and they were doing it for the betterment of humanity. ‘When people give sadaqa meat and we throw this meat out then actually they throw their bad fortune away from them. We facilitate people by selling meat in cheap prices.’
When Splus probed about the texture and colour of meat Shafiq Babu said, ‘you know about the price hike, the prices of meat has also increased manifold. So we sell pieces of the lungs of cows or buffaloes, that is the reason that the meat looks tender and quite different from the red meat.’ While refusing the allegation of adding some toxic dying chemicals he said, ‘Lungs have the same colour and we do not add any chemical to dye it.’
On assurance from Sunday Plus for anonymity another Sadaqa meat vendor said, ‘we dye meat with sharp red colour to add sharpness and attract the people because the flesh of lungs is of light pink colour which fails to assert the attention of people who tend to give sadaqaat. We use red colour that we buy from paints and sanitary shops. But these dyes are not bad as we have been using these dyes since long.
When S+ asked about the birds’ expiring incidents and low tendency of birds of eating sadaqa meat, he said that it had no connection with low quality of meat or dying chemical, actually these birds expired because they got the bad fortune of people who gave their sadaqa. ‘Moreover we throw meat in huge quantity that they satisfy their appetite soon and then they do not turn back to have more pieces of meat.’
Neelofar Sadiq, a student of environmental sciences, said, these vendors of sadaqa meat are actually adding pollution in the environment of our city. Because they give poisonous meat to the birds and birds may expire after having those pieces of meat. Whereas these meat pieces add more garbage at the beautiful canal bank now the roadside of canal has become polluted as straw dogs roam around the garbage at the roadside. It becomes difficult for pedestrians to walk at footpaths or cross the roads.
While talking to S+ Asma Amir, representative of PCSIR, said, ‘if these sadaqa meat vendors dye meat with toxic chemicals of paints then they are committing crime because some of the chemicals of paints are very dangerous. If they would be given in excessive quantity they can be proved killing for humans too whereas birds can be easily expired by these chemicals. If birds do not eat meat dyed with toxic chemicals even then these chemicals can be poisonous for the spices living in canal water. Moreover if we throw toxic chemical dyes near trees and plants they can be hazardous for the vegetation and even soil.’
‘Some toxic chemicals of paints are resistant to degradation and, due to their environmental persistence, may move long distance and concentrate very far from the sites where they are thrown. These are bio-accumulate in the tissues of humans or animals. The most common among these substances, DDT and PCB (Poly Chlorinated Biphenyls), are widely contaminating the canals and river Ravi they have been found in tortoise of Lahore canal and other marine mammals. PCBs persist in the environment for years and may bio-accumulate up to 70,000 times,’ she added.
She maintained that it was reasonable to believe that many other POPs, Persistent Organic Pollutants, contaminated the canal water but sub types of PCBs which were used in paints industry were also adding pollution in canal water.
Tariq Zaman, district officer of environment of city district government of Lahore (CDGL), was of the view that we had tried several times for the eradication of these encroachments at road sides of canal now their number has decreased but it could not be eradicated completely because these vendors rode on bicycles and moved quickly at the raid of officials of CDGL.
When S+ probed from eminent Islamic scholar Dr. Sarfraz Naeemi about the importance of sadaqaat in Islam and its specific way of giving dyed meat to birds, he said, “This was 1400 years ago long before it became fashionable or “politically correct” to care about “animal rights.” Yet even in this barbaric time the Prophet (S.A.W.) had banned forcing animals to fight for human entertainment (Sunan Abu Dawud #2556). And He taught kindness to animals and birds. We human beings are made viceroy of Allah on earth. What is expected of a viceroy, a trustee or ruler? If those over whom one commands power are killed without cause, have their homes polluted heedlessly with toxic wastes, and have deformities and diseases resulting from the careless and wasteful disposal of carcinogens, should not the ruler be asked if he is discharging his responsibilities and trust faithfully? Unfortunately, there have been altogether too many shameful, unnecessary cases of pollution that have taken their toil on the planet, the animals, and the plants that inhabit it. One wonders if man is taking his responsibilities seriously.”
“Quran 2:30 “…Your Lord said unto the angels: “Lo! I am about to place a viceroy on the earth…,” and Quran 22:65 “Do you not see that God has made subject to you (humans) all that is on the earth”
But what we are doing in the name of giving sadaqaat we are destroying environment and killing birds. In such a situation when people are dying of hunger and they do not have enough to eat then sadaqaat should be given to human beings. No doubt it is good to care for birds but it is better to give alms to humans then to birds.
He said, “ aim of alms is to create equality in society and it can be possible when we people will start giving importance to the needy people as well. A society can flourish only when its members do not spend all their wealth on the satisfaction of their own desires but reserve a portion of it for parents, relatives, neighbours, the poor and the incapacitated. As the saying goes: Charity begins at home. A true believer is thus always prepared, after meeting the needs of his family, to assist other people in need of his help.”
In such a situation when Islam does not promote such alms which are harming living beings like birds and aquatic animals and adding misery for mankind as pollutants and environmentalists also discourage such acts. Then CDGL should take immediate steps to curb this situation.