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Parenting can’t be outsourced
The biggest challenge of parenting is to accept that we are facing a world that is very different from the one we grew up in. This is true irrespective of which country you live in with the additional complexity of a rapid destruction of walls between cultures. The truth is that your solutions don’t work…
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ISIS – Isn’t Isn’t
The faulty logic of the ISIS Preface: Religion is the last resort of the scoundrel…as the saying goes…refers to the tendency of some unscrupulous people to twist religion to justify their own nefarious activity. Genghis Khan famously gave a “sermon” in Bukhara after sacking the city saying that Allah had sent him as a punishment…
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Who decides on gender equality?
Gender inequality a product of culture, not religion: Study. http://google.com/newsstand/s/CBIwuIXDvCA Let me begin with a disclaimer in the best modern tradition of writing that I accept that there’s gender discrimination and that women invariably get the short end of the stick. There is oppression of women, in Muslim societies as much as in others, all…
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All hands on deck – it’s time to stand together
There is a tendency in reporting and speaking about things like the deplorable so-called cartoons of Charile Hebdo and other similar things and say that they are offensive to a certain group of people. I consider this an insult to my humanity and my sensibilities as a civilised, global citizen. Thankfully there are others who…
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Abuse is not a right. It is wrong.
New York Times Headline of Sunday January 11 reads: “More than a million people joined over 40 presidents and prime ministers on the streets of Paris on Sunday in the most striking show of solidarity in the West against the threat of Islamic extremism since the Sept. 11 attacks.” Of course that is NYT’s take…
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Udai Pareek, my mentor and friend
Udai Pareek – the most powerful thing I learnt from him was to give without asking for a return. And I have followed that principle all my life. Who else in this world writes a book full of tried and tested psychometric tests and gives it away? I first met Udai in 1983 when I…
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Boycott or no boycott
We the people find ourselves today in a bind. On the one hand the media delivers to the doorstep of our conscience, images and news, all highly disturbing, heart wrenching and begging for us to do something, anything to make a difference. On the other hand the ordinary person is the last link in the…
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Checklist for Spiritual Development
I wrote in my book -Islam for Beginners – It has been said that true bankruptcy is a full belly and an empty soul. Religion must be a matter of conscious choice.So here’s a checklist to show us the state of our soul. 1. How much time do you spend in personal Ibaadah, by yourself alone, daily? 2. How…
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The Birth of a Narrative
Mirza Yawar Baig Imam & Khateeb Mahmood Habib Masjid & Islamic Center, Hyderabad Looking at the headlines it appears that a story is being built – gradually one article at a time; linking one incident to another, using conjecture in the place of hard evidence – to create the new bogeyman – the Indian Muslim…
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Quranic formula for success
We are all witness to what is happening in Palestine – deplorable, despicable and completely avoidable if only some good sense could prevail on all sides. Naturally we, the common people, Muslim or not, are anguished, perplexed and confused about why there is so much apathy and even active complicity with the aggressors and such…