Journalism Pakistan
Journalism Pakistan
Freedom of expression shrinks in Pakistan as PECA Amendments take toll: report اظہارِ رائے کی آزادی محدود، پیکا میں ترامیم سے میڈیا کو شدید دھچکا: رپورٹDawn urges Indian media to abandon war rhetoric ڈان کی بھارتی میڈیا سے جنگی بیانیہ ترک کرنے کی اپیلIndia bans 16 Pakistani YouTube channels following Pahalgan attack پہلگام حملے کے بعد بھارت نے پاکستان کے 16 یوٹیوب چینلز پر پابندی لگا دی'In A Different Realm' offers a philosophical take on cricket's greatest innings ان اے ڈیفرنٹ ریلم کرکٹ کی عظیم ترین اننگز پر ایک فکری نقطۂ نظر پیش کرتی ہےCoordinated or coincidence? Identical tweets by Pakistani journalists raise eyebrows ہم آہنگی یا محض اتفاق؟ پاکستانی صحافیوں کے ایک جیسے ٹویٹس نے سوالات اٹھا دیےThe PSL paradox: pageantry or progress? پی ایس ایل کا تضاد: دکھاوا یا ترقی؟Sher Afzal Marwat launches personal attacks on journalists after PTI expulsion پی ٹی آئی سے نکالے جانے کے بعد شیر افضل مروت کے صحافیوں پر ذاتی حملےJournalist Sanaullah Khan alleges FIA blocking accounts of YouTubers and families صحافی ثناء اللہ خان کا انکشاف: ایف آئی اے یوٹیوبرز اور ان کے خاندانوں کے اکاؤنٹس بلاک کر رہی ہےA launch in style: Dr. Nauman Niaz unveils 'In A Different Realm' ان اے ڈفرنٹ ریلم کی رونمائی: ڈاکٹر نعمان نیاز کی کتاب Sindhi journalist AD Shar brutally murdered, PFUJ declares three-day mourning سندھی صحافی اے ڈی شر کا بہیمانہ قتل، پی ایف یو جے نے تین روزہ سوگ کا اعلان کر دیاAJK government registers case against newspaper and staff آزاد کشمیر حکومت کا اخبار اور عملے کے خلاف مقدمہJournalist Arzoo Kazmi alleges FIA threats, possible arrest over reporting صحافی آرزو کاظمی کا دعویٰ: ایف آئی اے کی دھمکیاں، رپورٹنگ پر ممکنہ گرفتاری

Ayaz Amir says he was 'distraught' when told to stop writing for Dawn

 JournalismPakistan.com |  Published November 11, 2017

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Ayaz Amir says he was 'distraught' when told to stop writing for Dawn

ISLAMABAD - Columnist Ayaz Amir says he was “distraught” when Dawn asked him to stop writing his weekly column after he joined politics in 2007.

His column used to appear in Dawn every Friday.

Interviewed by journalist Adnan Rehmat for Herald, the columnist from Chakwal said that in the winter of 2007 “I was out on my campaign trail when [then editor] Abbas Nasir called me and said, ‘We have discussed your position and there is a conflict of interest. You should write a farewell column’.”

Amir went on to become a Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz member of the National Assembly in the 2008 elections. He quit the party in 2013.

He says his efforts at convincing the Dawn management to allow him to continue writing his weekly column “cut no ice…”

Trying to convey his desperateness at that time, he tells Herald that in his “entire life, I have not pleaded with anyone so much as then.” He argued that he had never written propaganda or party columns. He also cited examples of a socialist politician, Eric Samuel Heffer, a leader and parliamentarian of the Labour Party in the United Kingdom in the 1960s. Heffer regularly wrote for The Times.

In his last column for Dawn on December 21, 2007, Amir had hoped it would be a “temporary goodbye”. He maintained that for most of his adult life he was associated with Dawn, “starting when the full glory of General Ziaul Haq's benign rule was upon this unfortunate land.”

After he was asked to stop writing for Dawn, he turned to The News. “I then called Shaheen Sehbai of The News who promptly agreed and I started writing for The News.”

However, he says after he started writing for them, “Dawn came back to me and said I can start again. And this while I was a Member of the National Assembly. It did not work out.”

He maintained that all his life he has been “comfortable” with journalism. He terms his stints in the Pakistan Army, foreign office and as a politician “paths of necessity”.

Leaving behind politics, he is nowadays writing columns in Urdu for daily Dunya. “I may have stopped writing my English column –  if Dawn would not have me and I have differences with The News, there aren’t many other avenues here [in English]. So I became an Urdu columnist. How many English columnists have become Urdu columnists? Almost none.”

Photo: Twitter (@ayazamir)

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