Aug 28, 03: Kuldip Nayar on India-Pakistan Peace Process
Also a discussion with RIZWAN NAEEM about APSA (Action group of Physicians of South Asia).
Music from "Kabir" by Abida Parveen from Times Music.
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Highlight of the show is KULDIP NAYAR, one of the most respected journalists from South Asia who recently led a people’s delegation from Indian to Pakistan. We will discuss the improving relations between India and Pakistan, his participation in the process, and other events in the Indian Subcontinent.
Also a discussion with RIZWAN NAEEM, a Houston Physician, about APSA (Action group of Physicians of South Asia), an effort to bring Pakistani and Indian Physicians to work for peace in South Asia.
KULDIP NAYAR: is among the most renowned of Indian journalists. A lawyer, author, Member of Parliament and human rights and media rights activist, his illustrious career has spanned five decades during which he has worked for most of the influential newspapers and news agencies in India. He was also a distinguished diplomat and following his appointment as High Commissioner to London, he was nominated to the Rajya Sabha of the Indian Parliament in August 1997. Widely published as an author since 1969, his books have concentrated on national and international affairs.
Covering most of the important events, which have shaped the recent history of India, he was jailed for six months without trial for criticizing the draconian action taken by Prime Minister Indira Gandhi under the infamous 20-month emergency of the 1970s. "But we were able to save democracy then. Today, the threat is to secularism," he says. And his vision and struggle as part of the organizations, 'Citizens for Democracy' and 'South Asia Human Rights' or SAHR which means dawn, is to have a "borderless" subcontinent. "We need to transcend borders. We shouldn't have visas and customs when we go into each other's country. There should be no economic barriers. We should be many nations, retaining individual identities, religions and culture but one people, one South Asian entity," he pleads.
