Fascinating History. Interesting Medieval Incidents from Indian and Middle Eastern past.

The song and the musician A haunting melody stirs the strings of our soul. More than any other form of music, it moves us spiritually, bringing our sublime feelings to the fore. In the film industry, the music of some films such as Parwana (1947), Mahal (1949), Aawara (1951), Madhumati (1955), Sahib Bibi aur Ghulam (1962) and some more, had a captivating, apocalyptic and eerie feel. It must be clarified here that haunting music is not horror music. The former is alluring, mesmerising and captivating whereas the later is repulsive, scary and disturbing. The former attracts whereas the later repels. Sub-continent music industry has produced many musicians, such as Madan Mohan, Salil Chaudhari, Shankar-Jaikishen and some others, who have given us memorable haunting melodies. However, the prince of haunting music remains Khawaja Khurshid Anwar. He did not produce this genre of music for just one song or one film. In his professional life, he gave us a series of film adorned with hauntin...

It was the middle of 1972. I was nineteen and a flight cadet in PAF Academy, Risalpur. I was spending my summer break in Lahore with my family. We were residing in a rented apartment at 'Yadgar Chowk' -now renamed Azadi Chowk. The apartment block is opposite Minar-e-Pakistan, across the Old Ravi lake on the corner of Ravi Road. A part of that apartment building has now been demolished to construct a slip road for traffic coming from the River Ravi and turning left for the Circular Road, under the magnificent oval traffic bridge. The lower portion of the building housed the well known 'Ravi Chargha'; easily located on the google map. People familiar with the area would know that the place is a walking distance to the Shahi Mosque; and that’s what I used to do most mornings during holidays. With everyone at my home out for their daily chores, I would walk to the Mosque for my favourite past time; reading. As I had grown up in the area and had visited the Mosque-Fort co...

I grew up in Gumti Bazaar area of walled city Lahore and would often pass by this exquisite mosque that stands where Dabbi and Kaisara Bazaars merge with Kashmiri Bazaar. It has three main domes; a larger one in the middle and two smaller ones on the sides. It has smaller domelets on top of its two tall and four short minarets. It also has a long row of nine, flanked by two shorter rows of six each, small decorative domelets on top of the fore wall of the main prayer chamber. All these domes and domelets are golden in colour. In addition, all these domes have decorative golden petals at their bases. It was intriguing to me at that tender age that the only other structure in the City having similar style and golden colours is the memorial complex of Guru Arjun Dev cum Raja Ranjit Singh, adjacent to the Shahi Mosque that I often used to frequent. Having become wiser, I now know that the gilded domes, the petals and domelets are part of Gurudawara rather than Mosque architecture. A mosqu...

Vandalism is Terrorism. In case of historical buildings and heritage artifacts, no other principle need apply. In our country, damage occurring to our centuries old heritage due to gross dereliction of duty by concerned officials is more than any one person can cause by an intentional act of inscribing ones name on a pillar or pulling out one odd brick or a tile from a wall. The former act of omission is a more damaging crime than the latter of commission. Negligent officials in this case must be treated with harsh laws and their unforgiving application, otherwise we, slowly but surely, stand to lose these precious structures. Does it matter whether damage occurs because of an explosive device or due to neglect and apathy? The resultant loss to our architectural wonders in both cases is of the equal magnitude and equally irreversible. On the 6th of this August, I was in Lahore and went round the inner city. I have been pained to see the state of Maryiam Zamani Mosque in Masti Gate. I...