Prof. Tahir Kamran teaches history and philosophy at Beaconhouse National University, Lahore. Earlier he taught at Government College University (GCU), Lahore. He has served as the Iqbal fellow at the University of Cambridge, as professor in the Centre of South Asian Studies. He has authored four books and has written many articles on the history of the Punjab, sectarianism, democracy, and governance. He was the head of the department of history at GCU when he founded a semi-annual scholarly journal, The Historian.
He has been influential in the Higher Education Commission of Pakistan and implemented methods to improve educational standards in Pakistan. He has been a visiting fellow at Southampton University, the SOAS and at the University of Cambridge. He remained associated with Government College University, Lahore as chairperson of Department of History and the dean of the faculty of Arts and Social Sciences of the University until January 10, 2018.
He established Khaldunia Centre for Historical Research in Lahore. The Centre publishes academic books. Under the auspices of the centre, he leads a team which edits a semi-annual scholarly journal, Pakistan Journal of Historical Studies. The journal, which primarily focuses on histories of emotions and animals, is edited in Pakistan and published in the United Stations by Indiana University Press, Bloomington.
He is instrumental in internationalizing the GCU. Due to his efforts, the number of international students in the University has increased considerably.
In the first part of the interview, he said: 26:22 There is no academic expert on India. In my presence one professor said: "I stop easting if I come to know that Indian tomato is part of my food."
Prof. Stanley Wolpert's biography of Jinnah entitled "Jinnah of Pakistan" is a very good book. In fact, it is his best book.
In this part of the interview, he said: You have to keep in mind the context of Jinnah's statements. Policy statements are different from political statements. As long as the BJP is in power, there is no hope. The ideology of Hindutva is the stumbling block.
I was disturbed to read "Creating a New Medina" by Dr. Venkat Dhulipala, a professor of South Asian history at the University of North Carolina. It is a strange book.
In my lifetime, India-Pakistan relations will not improve.
After the partition, Indian Muslims came under stress.
Note: I conducted this interview on February 20, 2022 and it was first published on February 22, 2023. I am re-publishing it because good things bear repeating.
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Shakil Chaudhary is an alumnus of Government College, Lahore. Subsequently, he studied international relations at Quaid-i-Azam University Islamabad and media at the London School of Economics. He has worked for several English-language newspapers.
He has written a critically acclaimed bilingual book, Handbook of Functional English (Ferozsons), to help those who wish to improve their English skills. Prof. Tariq Rahman, one of the finest linguistic scholars in South Asia, has praised it in these words: "This book is an excellent guide for the South Asian user of the English language. It gives examples of both the British and American varieties of English and provides guidelines to avoid the common errors of most Pakistanis when they write and speak English. It is also a comprehensive guide for pronunciation, vocabulary, editing and all other aspects of English usage. It has been written with great care and attention. I recommend it to students, editors, writers and other users of English in Pakistan."
Shakil has conducted many workshops on communication, writing and critical thinking skills. He is a former president of the Progressive Writers Association, Islamabad (2021-2022).
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