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A DICTIONARY OF MUSLIM NAMES
₨ 995The resurgence and revitalisation of Muslim culture have created a growing interest in the study of Muslim names. Throughout the world Muslims share similar names, be they in the Middle East, the Indian subcontinent, Southeast Asia or new migrants in the West. And it should not be forgotten that the first thing Allah taught Adam was names.
The predominant language in Muslim names is Arabic, followed by Persian (Farsi), the two major languages which transmitted Muslim culture in its early stages and later expansion. An important source of Muslim names consists of the ninety-nine attributes of Allah mentioned in the Qur’an and the hadith. According to Islamic belief, the relationship between man and his Creator is that of servant and master, and therefore a Muslim feels gratified to be named as a servant of one of the attributes of Allah.
The purpose of this dictionary is to give the meaning or bearing on the Islamic heritage of the words, Arabic or Persian, which form parts of Muslim names. By way of illustration, it gives references to Muslims who left their mark on history in different ages, in different fields, and in various parts of the world. Where appropriate, the Qur’an is cited.
ISBN: 1850653577
Publisher: VANGUARD BOOKS -
A FORGOTTEN VISION
₨ 995A learned and intricate study of human spirituality, this work covers a vast panorama of human thought, aspiration and experience, and brings forth a fresh, unorthodox, original, and unbiased view to some of the great questions of our time.
A fascinating and thought provoking study, this is a breakthrough in the history of religion. Each one of us is used to living in a single religious tradition. But if anyone gets weary of this and longs to drink from all the great religious traditions of mankind, he is told, ‘No, you can study whatever tradition you like, but you can live in only one of them.’
The author is at pains to underline the fact that the past history of spirituality of all great religions shows that unity is not merely an intellectual endeavour. It is, rather, the profound consequence of transcendence from the ego/self centred, property oriented culture, in which each of us is born and which shapes ‘human nature’.
ISBN: 9694022819
Publisher: VANGUARD BOOKS -
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A SENSE OF SIEGE
₨ 895This book explores the nature of the friction between the Muslim world and the West, looking at legitimate perceptions and grievances on both sides.
Arguing that “Islam versus the West” does not represent the arena of the next global ideological struggle, the authors examine specific issues — for example, the enlarged role of Islam in internal politics — that require careful handling to prevent the consolidation of states into opposing blocs.
ISBN: 9694022673
Publisher: VANGUARD BOOKS -
ACHA MUSALMAN BURA MUSALMAN
₨ 1,295In this brilliant look at the rise of political Islam, the distinguished political scientist and anthropologist Mahmood Mamdani brings his expertise and insight to bear on a question many Americans have been asking since 9/11: how did this happen?
Mamdani dispels the idea of ‘good’ (secular, Westernized) and ‘bad’ (premodern, fanatical) Muslims, pointing out that these judgments refer to political rather than cultural or religious identities. The presumption that there are ‘good’ Muslims readily available to be split off from ‘bad’ Muslims masks a failure to make a political analysis of our times. This book argues that political Islam emerged as the result of a modern encounter with Western power, and that the terrorist movement at the center of Islamist politics is an even more recent phenomenon, one that followed America’s embrace of proxy war after its defeat in Vietnam. Mamdani writes with great insight about the Reagan years, showing America’s embrace of the highly ideological politics of ‘good’ against ‘evil’. Identifying militant nationalist governments as Soviet proxies in countries such as Nicaragua and Afghanistan, the Reagan administration readily backed terrorist movements, hailing them as the ‘moral equivalents’ of America’s Founding Fathers. The era of proxy wars has come to an end with the invasion of Iraq. And there, as in Vietnam, America will need to recognize that it is not fighting terrorism but nationalism, a battle that cannot be won by occupation.
‘Good Muslim, Bad Muslim’ is a provocative and important book that will profoundly change our understanding both of Islamist politics and the way America is perceived in the world today.
ISBN: 9789694025537
Publisher: VANGUARD BOOKS -
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AFGHAN RESISTANCE
₨ 450ISBN: 3540511385 – Paperback
Publisher: SPRINGER
ISBN: Y2822
Publisher: VANGUARD BOOKS -
AFGHANISTAN
₨ 1,295This book follows a generally linear historical form. It starts with an account of the country and its people, and then describes and analyses its history, with particular reference to its relations with neighbouring powers and its dominant internal theme, the ongoing struggle between its rulers and tribal society. Attention is paid to the growing dichotomy during the twentieth century between an increasingly sophisticated urban elite and the traditional countryside, and its culmination in the communist coup and Soviet invasion. This is followed by an analysis of the reasons for the Soviet withdrawal and the subsequent civil war.
ISBN: 9694024323
Publisher: VANGUARD BOOKS -
AFGHANISTAN OF THE AFGHANS
₨ 1,495creative writing in the English language has been a part of the literary tradition of most former British colonies in Africa, the West Indies and South Asia for the last 150 years or so, but little critical attention was given to this writing till the mid
ISBN: 9694023106
Publisher: VANGUARD BOOKS -
AGRICULTURE IN PAKISTAN
₨ 1,495Agriculture in Pakistan has come a long way since 1947. Much has changed but it remains a dominant sector of the national economy. This book contains a critical analysis of the transformation process that agriculture has undergone in Pakistan. The analysis is based on a wealth of past and current data and an extensive review of literature. The book begins with a bird’s eye view of the changing role of agriculture in the national economy, its overall performance, and references to some of the underlying factors. It looks at the effects of agriculture on rural income distribution and poverty. It then focuses on the natural resource base for agricultural growth and examines changes in the production and productivity of crops and livestock. These changes are given an institutional context in terms of farm structures by ownership of and tenure on land and their differences in the use of resources and farm enterprises (crops and livestock), followed by an analysis of markets for agricultural products, resources and inputs. This completes the production and marketing processes. Finally, it addresses two important questions. Who are the main players in the process of change in Pakistan’s agriculture? What role has public policy played in terms of its effects on the observed changes and outcomes?
ISBN: 9694025028
Publisher: VANGUARD BOOKS -
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ALICE IN WOUNDERLAND
₨ 895Alice’s wonderland is a curious and unbelievable place where she shrinks to three inches and then suddenly grows to become a giant. She has tea with March Hare and Mad Hatter who tell riddles that have no answers. She loves to play a game of croquet — in which the croquet balls are live hedgehogs and mallets are live flamingos — with the Queen of Hearts who is constantly ordering everyone to be executed. “Off with his head!” she orders.
This is one of the most fascinating tales of our time, loved by generations of children because Lewis Carroll wrote it especially for them!
This book is adapted and abridged especially for young readers in simple English which retains a sense of the original text. It includes questions on graded vocabulary and comprehension exercises that are ideal for classrooms, libraries and personal collections.
ISBN: 9789694025162
Publisher: VANGUARD BOOKS -
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ALIVE AND WELL IN PAKISTAN
₨ 1,295‘Casey plunges into Pakistan like a knife, unearthing and unravelling the often unexplainable and unpredictable contradictions of a country on the edge. Pakistan just happens to be one of the most complex and difficult countries to describe, but Casey does a magnificent job. Casey’s prose sings, and his portraits are master class. A conjuror of images and sensations in an unpredictable land.’ Ahmed Rashid, author of Taliban.
Ethan Casey explores what life is like in a Muslim country on the frontline of the US-declared ‘war on terror’ while living, working and teaching in Lahore, Pakistan. Drawing observations from the street, university classrooms and interviews with lawyers, journalists and politicians, Casey updates his understanding of the Pakistani experience and sets it within a context of recent and contemporary history. Revisiting a decade of ground-level reporting, he humanises domestic politics; attitudes towards the West and India; and the Kashmir and Afghanistan issues.
Alive and Well in Pakistan is an engaging and well-informed literary reportage that demystifies the uneasy place that Pakistan occupies in an uncertain world.
‘Ethan Casey documents his travels in Pakistan, reflecting the moods of the historical moment in compelling prose. Like Conrad and Greene before him, he is, I suspect, out to travel dangerously.’ Norman Sherry, author of The Life of Graham Greene.
ISBN: 9694024935
Publisher: VANGUARD BOOKS -
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AMERICA’S WAR ON TERROR BECAME A GLOBAL WAR ON TRIBAL ISLAM?
₨ 1,4951n the wake of the 9/11 attacks, the United states declared war on terrorism. More than ten years later, the results are decidedly mixed. Here world-renowned author, diplomat, and scholar Akbar Ahmed reveals an important yet largely ignored result of this war: in many nations it has exacerbated the already broken relationship between central governments and the largely rural Muslim tribal societies on the peripheries of both Muslim and non-Muslim nations. The center and the periphery are engaged in a mutually destructive civil war across the globe, a conflict that has been intensified by the war on terror. Conflicts between governments and tribal societies predate the war on terror in many regions, from South Asia to the Middle East to North Africa, pitting those in the centers of power against those who live in the outlying provinces. Akbar Ahmed’s unique study demonstrates that this conflict between the center and the periphery has entered a new and dangerous stage with U.S. involvement after 9/n and the deployment of drones, in the hunt for al Qaeda, threatening thevery existence of many tribal societies American f irepowerand its vast anti-terror network have turned the war on terror into a global war on tribal Islam. And too often the victims are innocent children at school, women in their homes, workers simply trying to earn a living, and worshipers in their mosques. Battered by military attacks or drone strikes one day and suicide bombers the next, the tribes bemoan, “Everyday is like 9/11 for us.”
In The Thistle and the Drone, the third volume in Ahmed’s groundbreaking trilogy examining relations between America and the Muslim world, the author draws on forty case studies representing the global spanof Islam to demonstrate how the U.S. has become involved directly or indirectly in each of these societies. The study provides the social and historical context necessary to understand how both central governments and tribal societies have become embroiled in America’s war. Beginning with Waziristan and expanding to societies in Central Asia, the Middle East, North Africa, and elsewhere, Ahmed offers a fresh approach to the conflicts studied and presents an unprecedented paradigm for understanding and winning the war on terror.
ISBN: 9789694025667
Publisher: VANGUARD BOOKS -
AN INTRODUCTION TO LINGUISTICS
₨ 795Linguistics, the scientific study of language, has contributed towards the study of culture, behaviour and cognition. Its major focus, however, is human language which is a fascinating field of study in its own right. Unfortunately, no university in Pakistan offers a masters degree in linguistics. In fact, even though departments of English have introduced courses in linguistics, their main focus is on teaching the English language.
This book is divided into fourteen chapters and defines a wide range of concepts. Beginning with the definition of linguistics, the book traces the history of its development. It explains how sounds combine to make up a language. There are chapters on morphology, the study of parts of words, and semantics, the study of meaning. The book includes Chomsky’s theories of transformational generative grammar. The conclusion and bibliography guide readers to other books on linguistics.
ISBN: 969402286X
Publisher: VANGUARD BOOKS -
AN INTRODUCTION TO THE POETRY OF FAIZ AHMED FAIZ
₨ 995FAIZ AHMED FAIZ (1911-1984), poet, teacher, editor, freedom- fighter, dramatist, critic, progressive writer and Lenin Peace Prize recipient, was the author of eight collections of poems in Urdu and is considered one of the great poets of the Indo-Pakistan subcontinent. He was no mere ‘dreamer of dreams’. Great poets like Faiz are warriors and act as the conscience their times. Countries have frontiers but the war against slavery and exploitation has no frontier. Faiz espoused the cause of freedom in Pakistan, and for the peoples of the world. He ranks with poets like Pablo Neruda, Nizam Hikmat and Louis Aragon. His poetry, rich with the classical blood of Ghalib and Iqbal, acquired a characteristic hue and he excelled in both the nazm and ghazal form, blazing a trail of love and revolution. This is the first English language study to be published anywhere of the poetry of Faiz and a critical appreciation of his life and times.
ISBN: 969402000X
Publisher: VANGUARD BOOKS -
ANCIENT HISTORY OF BANGLADESH, INDIA & PAKISTAN
₨ 300A single-volume of Ancient History, delineating its various facets, both political and cultural and incorporating the fruits of recent researches that have abundantly appeared since 1950, has not been attempted before. Author has tried to write a clear and readable account of Ancient History and Civilization and one that embodies the results of recent historical scholarship. The book covers the Vedic age, the post-Vedic civilization, North India in the Sixth Century BC It also explains new religious movements, Maurya age, political disintegration and foreign invasions. The Gupta empire North India, Deccan, South India, India’s intercouse with the outside world, social and economic conditions, political, institutions, religion, language and literature, art and the architecture have been discussed in depth. Author has tried in maintaining a delicate balance between political history and social, economic and cultural history of ancient perod. It is hoped that this book will serve as text for Honours and Postgraduate students. Research students can also use it as a main source book.
ISBN: 9694024390
Publisher: VANGUARD BOOKS -
ANGLO-INDIAN LIVES IN PAKISTAN
₨ 2,995In this compelling study Dorothy McMenamin recovers the histories of Anglo-Indians in what would become Pakistan and traces the trajectories of individuals and families into the post-independence world. Grounded in an absorbing series of oral histories, McMenamin’s narrative is full of human drama and complexity. It offers a bold challenge to the strong emphasis on colonial power and racial hierarchies in recent work, forwarding a counter-reading enriched by her own deep personal knowledge of this community within Pakistan and in the Anglo-Indian diaspora
ISBN: 9789694026497
Publisher: VANGUARD BOOKS -
ARIF NAQVI’S ABRAAJ GROUP & THE GEOPOLITICS OF KARACHI ELECTRIC
₨ 2,495In 2017, Arif Naqvi and The Abraaj Group were on the brink of changing the world of private equity. Abraaj was a pioneer of a new model of impact investing built on the idea that making money and doing good are not mutually exclusive. It had helped transform communities and companies across the Middle East, Asia, Africa and Latin America by investing in healthcare, education and clean energy, and in 2017 it was on the threshold of closing a new fund that would provide S6 billion worth of investment to these emerging markets. But then it all came crashing down.
On 10 April 2019, after landing at London Heathrow, Naqvi was arrested on fraud charges. He is facing extradition to the United States and a potential prison sentence of up to 291 years if he is found guilty.
The dominant media narrative has painted Naqvi as a thief and fraudster, the so-called key man in an organised criminal conspiracy. But in this explosive new book, which is based on extensive research and interviews with key players, Brian Brivati discovers that things are not quite what they seem and finds that in this case of alleged fraud there is actually no money missing. Icarus explores how Abraaj found itself caught in the middle of a geopolitical war between the United States and China and when it would not bow to the whims of these global behemoths, economic hitmen tried to wipe it out.
ISBN: 9789694026428
Publisher: VANGUARD BOOKS -
ARRIVAL OF THE MOONSOON
₨ 995Taufiq Rafat is acknowledged as the finest Pakistani poet writing in English. He was born in Sialkot in 1927. Educated in Derra Dun, Aligarh and Lahore, he has been writing English verse for the past 45 years. His work has featured in three Oxford University Press collections of Pakistani English poetry, First Voices (1964), Pieces of Eight (1970), Wordfall (1976) and has been anthologised widely abroad in such publications as Poems of the Commonwealth, and Mentor’s Modem Asian Literature. His poems have been set in second-ary schools and College English courses in Africa, Australia and the United States, as well as in the intermediate English syllabi in the Punjab and Sind Universities in Pakistan.
His recent books include English verse renditions of the celebrated Punjabi poets Bulleh Shah and Qadir Yar’s Puran Bhagat; both volumes have received acclaim at home and abroad. He is now work-ing on a fourth book Lullabies of the Punjab, and is also in the pro-cess of writing his first novel in English.
This book brings us to 1978, and will be followed in due course by another volume called: Half Moon Poems 1979 — 1984.
ISBN: D8304 – Hardback
Publisher: VANGUARD BOOKS
ISBN: D8304
Publisher: VANGUARD BOOKS -
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BACHA KHAN, CONGRESS AND NATIONALIST POLITICS IN NWFP
₨ 1,095
ISBN: 9694024978
Publisher: VANGUARD BOOKS -
BETWEEN TWO BURRS ON THE MAP
₨ 895This is the story of a 1,100 km journey, of which 800 km were on foot. Salman Rashid trekked through the three greatest mountain ranges on the globe: the Himalayas, the Karakorums and the Hindu Kush. Following mostly in the footsteps of the great explorers of the 19th and early 20th centuries, Rashid spent a whole summer reliving ‘the quintessence of early travel and exploration’ in difficult conditions and extreme weather.
ISBN: 9694024315
Publisher: VANGUARD BOOKS -
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BHUTTO: A POLITICAL BIOGRAPHY
₨ 1,495Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto came from a wealth family of feudal landowners in Sind. Although west-ernized by education in the United States and in England, he became the champion of the Third World when he was appointed the youngest Foreign Minister in Asia in 1962.
Disillusioned with his one-time mentor, President Ayub Khan, he orchestrated civilian demonstrations which toppled him from power. A skillful and sophisticated politician, he nevertheless failed to prevent (and some say le even provoked) the bloodbath which led to the secession of Bangladesh.
He assumed power in the aftermath of the debacle, and swept the general elections in West Pakistan with a slogan of ‘iroti kapara makan’ ‘food, clothes and shelter’. Bhutto’s regime, which began with so much promise, eventually fell to an army coup amid charges of violence and oppression. His trail, which lasted nearly two years, caused world-wide sensation. In spite of pleas for clemency from many heads of state, he was hanged on 4 April 1979.
His courage in the face of death made him a martyr whose shadow will fall on the politics of Pakistan for years of come. Salmaan Taseer’s political biography provides unique insight into this dramatic career and into the political structure of Pakistan. The author interviewed Bhutto on several occasions and reveals hitherto unknown facts about his rise and fall, and provides an ac-count of intrigue, feudalism, populism and religion which is highly relevant to what is happening in Pakistan today.
ISBN: 9789694026084
Publisher: VANGUARD BOOKS -
BRITISH MILITARY POLICY IN INDIA, 1900-1945
₨ 995The decline of British imperialism had far reaching colonial and post-colonial consequences. British policy and Indian history, for obvious reasons, unfolded in the foreground of this decline from 1900 onwards. This volume contextualizes crucial aspects of modern India’s military past. It contends that British imperialism, like all empires, declined due to its inherent contradictions. Managing the military affairs of the British Raj comprised a crucial element of these contradictions.
While mentioning the challenges posed by India’s military system to British policy, this volume highlights the tension between the imperatives of reform and the compulsions of economy and traditions felt both by the British and the Indians involved in managing colonial military affairs. Between 1900 and 1939 the colonial Indian war machine could be refurbished only up to a point, primarily because of the very system which had produced it. The significance of military reform and decolonization were first underscored by the Great War (1914-18) and subsequently even more by the Second World War (1939-45).
This socio-political history of the colonial Indian military organization investigates why reform remained largely theoretical even as the British used Indian resources to defend a weakening empire through two world wars. Ultimately, World War II transformed the Indian armed forces but eventually, as this book asserts, this transformation worked against the British.
ISBN: 9694024943
Publisher: VANGUARD BOOKS -
BUILDING A NEW AFGHANISTAN
₨ 1,095Given resumed Taliban power and attacks, Afghanistan must tackle a host of serious problems before it can emerge as a confident, independent nation. Security in this battered state continues to deteriorate; suicide bombings, convoy ambushes, and insurgent attacks are still all too common. Effective state building depends upon eliminating the national security crisis and enhancing the rule of law. This book offers a blueprint for moving the embattled nation toward greater democracy and prosperity. Robert Rotberg and his colleagues argue that the future success of state building in Afghanistan depends on reducing its dependence on the opium trade and enhancing its economic status. Many of Afghanistan’s security problems are related to poppy growing, opium and heroin production, and drug trafficking. Building a New Afghanistan suggests controversial new alternatives to immediate eradication, which is foolish and counter-productive. These options include monetary incentives for growing wheat, a viable local crop. Greater wheat production would feed hungry Afghans while reducing narco-trafficking and the terror that comes with it.
Integrating land-locked Afghanistan into the Central Asia or greater Eurasia economy would open up trading partnerships with its northern and western neighbours as well as with Pakistan, India, and possibly China. Developing a sense of common purpose among citizens would benefit the economy and could help to unite the nation. Perhaps most important, bolstering better governance in Afghanistan is necessary in order to reduce chaos and corruption and enact nationwide reforms. Fresh and insightful, Building a New Afghanistan shows what the country’s leadership and the international community should do to resolve dangerous issues and bolster a still fragile state.
ISBN: 9789694025087
Publisher: VANGUARD BOOKS -
CALLING A SPADE A SPADE
₨ 995His selected newspaper columns will make it plain that open mindedness coupled with a deep understanding of Pakistani history was all Minoo needed to soar above many of his compatriots in the realm of ideas and principles.
ISBN: 9789694025339
Publisher: VANGUARD BOOKS -
CENSUS OF PUNJAB, 1931
₨ 1,500The publication of decennial census reports was initiated by the British Government during the middle of the nineteenth century and has been continued after independence. Questions of reliability and bias in the compilation of information as well as motivations which informed the publication of these reports have been raised and are relevant to every user of census reports. Even so, the censuses were often conducted with painstaking efforts and have preserved for us extremely wide-ranging information on the social, economic and political aspects of Indian life.
They contain information on the distribution and age structure of the population; castes and communities, patterns of occupation, patterns of land-holding and tenancy, health, migration, language, and education, etc., to name just a few aspects of the panorama of Indian society. For researchers interested ‘n understanding Indian life, the reports of he decennial censes compiled by British officers remain, despite the problems of bias, misunderstanding or conscious distortion, an invaluable source of information.
The census reports consisted of two ‘profile a general social and economic ‘profile and statistical material. The general profile contains an account of the census operations, the geographical and physical features of the area, the ethnography of caste and communities and changes in age-structure, health, education, employment, landholding pattern and 4enancy, etc. The statistical part contains data on geography, rainfall, temperature, distribution of population according to different demographic criteria, caste and communities, health, education, employment and migration and landholding and tenancy.
Census reports have, as a rule, been used by demographers, economists and economic historians, and a great deal of this use has been limited to the statistical data contained in them. Sociologists, social historians and political scientists have made very little use of these reports. These reports provide, particularly in the volumes entitled ‘General Reports’ which were published separately for each state as well as for India as a whole, ethnographic information on castes and tribes, describing their internal organization, social changes taking place in them, and the emerging problems of interaction among the different castes and communities. Social movements and trends towards social mobility among the castes and communities are also often discussed. Even from the viewpoint of the sociologists and social historians, therefore, the census reports are invaluable sources of information and cat** provide useful material on how the different sections of Indian society were responding to the processes set in motion by British rule.
The census reports are today a body rare documents available in only a few select libraries and even these libraries do not always have all the available volumes which in an average census year extended to more than a hundred for the whole of India. This reprint of Part I of Report of Census of India 1931 for Punjab is published in the hope that it will be welcomed by individual researchers as well as libraries.
ISBN: C1181
Publisher: VANGUARD BOOKS -
CENTRAL ASIA IN HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE
₨ 895Since the demise of Soviet power, the newly independent republics are redefining their identities and their relations with the world at large. In Central Asia, which lies at the crossroads of several cultures, the emerging trends are complex and ambiguous.
In this volume, leading experts explore factors that have driven the region’s historical development and that continue to define it today; overlapping Islamic, Russian, and steppe cultures and their effects on attempts to delimit national borders and to create independent states; the legacy of Soviet and earlier imperial rule in economic and social relations; and the competition between Uzbek, Tajik and other group identities.
The authors make few predictions, but their original and thought provoking analyses offer readers new insight into aspects of Central Asia’s past that may shape its future.
ISBN: 9694022665
Publisher: VANGUARD BOOKS -
CHARLIE WILSON’S WAR
₨ 1,495In a little over a decade, two events have transformed the world we live in: the collapse of the Soviet Union and the rise of militant Islam. Charlie Wilson’s War is the untold story behind the last battle of the Cold War and how it fueled the new jihad.
George Crile tells how Charlie Wilson, a maverick congressman from east Texas, conspired with a rogue CIA operative to launch the biggest, meanest, and most successful covert operation in the Agency’s history.
In the early 1980s, after a Houston socialite turned Wilson’s attention to the ragged band of Afghan “freedom fighters” who continued, despite overwhelming odds, to fight the Soviet invaders, the congressman became passionate about their cause. At a time when Ronald Reagan faced a total cutoff of funding for the Contra war, Wilson, who sat on the all-powerful House Appropriations Committee, managed to procure hundreds of millions of dollars to support the mujahideen.
The arms were secretly procured and distributed with the aid of an out-of-favor CIA operative, Gust Avrakotos, whose working-class Greek-American background made him an anomaly among the Ivy League world of American spies. Nicknamed “Dr. Dirty,” the blue-collar James Bond was an aggressive agent who served on the front lines of the Cold War where he learned how to stretch the Agency’s rules to the breaking point.
Moving from the back rooms of the Capitol, to secret chambers at Langley, to arms-dealers conventions, to the Khyber Pass, Charlie Wilson’s War is brilliantly reported and one of the most detailed and compulsively readable accounts of the inside workings of the CIA ever written.
ISBN: 9694023831
Publisher: VANGUARD BOOKS -
Checkbook Aur Cruise Missile
₨ 995Whether discussing her childhood or the problems of translation in a multilingual society, Roy and Barsamian, the producer and host of Alternative Radio, engage in a lively and accessible manner. Speaking candidly and casually, Roy describes her participation in a demonstration against the Indian dam program as “absolutely fantastic”. She jokes that her Supreme Court charge for “corrupting public morality” – in the case of her novel The God of Small Things – should have been changed to “further corrupting public morality.” She calls on her training as an architect to explain what she means by the “physics of power”. Like a house of cards, she argues that “unfettered power…cannot go berserk like this and expect to hold it all together.”Roy has been acclaimed for her courage (Salman Rushdie) and her eloquence (Kirkus Reviews), and her writing has been described as “a banquet for the senses” (Newsweek). She has found a readership among fiction enthusiasts and political activists. The Chequebook and the Cruise Missile captures Roy speaking one-on-one to her audience, revealing her intense and wide-ranging intellect, her very personal voice, and her opinion on momentous political events.Arundhati Roy’s novel The God of Small Things was awarded the Booker Prize in 1997. She is the recipient of the 2002 Lannan Foundation Prize for Cultural Freedom.
ISBN: 9789694025278
Publisher: VANGUARD BOOKS -
CHILDREN OF A LESSER GOD
₨ 795Millions of children in Pakistan live short and painful lives, suffering the worst forms of exploitation and neglect. Such injustice is often explained away as a direct result of the abject poverty in which their families live.
Yet lethargic legislatures, uncaring judges and poor planning by the state must share in the guilt of ignoring the pains and rights of such children. This book sets out to put the record straight. It argues that approaches to the question of child prisoners should require a totally new, care-oriented discipline, especially where legal rights are concerned.
The book examines the extent to which laws are actually applied in practice. Recommendations are then offered to correct the deficiencies in the system. An added bonus for lawyers and human rights organizations involved in the defense for children’s rights is the inclusion of eleven thoroughly updated appendices containing all relevant laws and amendments.
ISBN: 9694021316
Publisher: VANGUARD BOOKS -
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CIRCULAR HISTORY OF PAKISTAN
₨ 2,295This book’s central thesis is that our cyclical political history is, in fact, like a short movie clip, set on a time-loop, that creates a perpetual déjà vu for those in the theater. Every political scene has been enacted before and is being re-telecast repeatedly. We are stuck in circular time and history and have not found our Nirvanic moment to follow the alternative trajectory of linear growth and development.
The first part of the book, ‘Our Circular History’, recounts our political journey of a recurring, predictable, painful, and vicious decade-long Samsara of cyclic birth and death of order and freedom. This bird’s eye view shows how the same episodes keep happening with mind-boggling regularity, and how each of our institutions is responsible for our entrapment in circular time and history.
The second part of the book, ‘Chronicles of our Times’, narrates what is currently happening in our polity. Our circular political past primarily shapes contemporary events, but we also mimic what is currently happening in other parts of the world, where new weaponized and micro-targeted social media has facilitated the trend of cartoon-history and political jokers.
The last part of the book, ‘Future Panoramic Realities’, uses a broad angle lens to view developments in the Indian subcontinent, in Eurasia, and in the wider world.
We cannot escape our Malthusian dilemmas, without redefining our national priorities, our Hobbesian snare. Without that shift away from geo-rentals and geo-politics, we may not be able to escape our entrapment in vicious cycles, or even downwards spiral.
The key to an endless growth cycle is investment in innovation, knowledge, people, and creativity. That is the only real virtuous cycle: without that, there can only be one-off spurts of growth. Only by investing in geo-economics, people, knowledge banks, and critical technologies can we join the virtuous growth and development cycles.
ISBN: 9789694026411
Publisher: VANGUARD BOOKS -
COLONIALIZATION OF ISLAM
₨ 895What is the social base of Islamization? What norms can be derived from it? What areas are being Islamized? What is Islamization all about? These and similar pertinent questions are dealt with in this book.
The theoretical framework developed and elaborated in the first chapter is substantiated by a wide range of data that follow.
This pioneering study gives an insight into the different manifestations of Islam, rural and urban social structures, the tussle between modernity and tradition, between colonial and indigenous societies. In short: the struggle between mullahs and colonializing masters.
ISBN: 8173041482
Publisher: VANGUARD BOOKS
