Deen Sheikh On the road less travelled.....

Discrimination it seems is a bitter and unpleasant reality of every day life in the land of the pure. Every day whenever so many of us wake up to the morning paper, or log onto news websites or social media, we are routinely bombarded by news and information with respect to discrimination and abuse that Pakistanis are facing in some way or the other. Tales of discrimination faced by religious minorities and sectarian minorities (the smaller sects in the Muslim community) has become fairly common in Pakistan. It all starts with discrimination before it leads to scenarios that are far worse, and those that initiate a form of discrimination feel no kind of remorse for their actions. Many of those practicing discrimination on religious grounds think it is a justified practice since it is their responsibility as those that have accepted the right path to bring others to their fold, using hard or soft tactics. Religious minorities and minority Islamic sects are not the only ones who fa...

The month of may by far has not been the best of months for cinema goers with only a few major film releases hitting cinema across the United Kingdom and the rest of the world. Usually most big banner or major up and coming block busters are held back for the summer months so as to take into account the summer holiday season, when people take their annual leave from work, and the young people attending school, college or university have time off. One of these movies that hit our cinema screens this month of May was the eagerly anticipated 'Avengers Assemble', which brought together some of the iconic super hero's of Marvel comics including the likes of Iron Man, The Incredible Hulk, Captain America and Thor, with an equally formidable star cast. However another eagerly awaited movie to come out this early summer was British actor Sacha Baron Cohen's latest venture 'The Dictator' . By now this legendary Cambridge educated actor is a house hold name among E...

Corporate organisations have come a long way since the era when their day to day operations were all about pleasing their shareholders. Since shareholders were responsible for providing the necessary capital and finances through ownership they were regarded for many years as the only stakeholders involved that the organisation needs to engage in a relationship management exercise with. Over time the definition of stakeholders has gone onto include all the relevant parties involved in the complete value chain process associated with the organisation. Stakeholders now comprises of employees, suppliers, end customers, supporting industries as well as the wider community as a whole. The importance of maintaining and managing relationships with all the relevant stakeholders has given rise to the practise of public relations management as well as relationship marketing. A lot of organisations engage in public relations activities through the development of Corporate Social Responsi...

The world that we live in, we as human beings are exposed to a very large volume of marketing communications courtesy of corporations that want us to spend our hard earned money on their product or service offerings as opposedmto that of their competitors. Due to the volume of information communicated to us through multiple mediums and channels, marketers are always om the look out for ways through which they can break through all that clutter. This is where Word of Mouth marketing comes in and can at times make all the difference in a very competititve environment. Word of Mouth marketing or Word of Mouth for short, though not a new phenomena in the field but has gained significant attention in the recent years. Among the reasons that come to mind include the cost effectiveness of Word to Mouth as a medium through which communication is established, however what really makes it effective is that is user generated communication without any direct asssociation or involvement of the use...

It has been a few weeks since I began my visit t my beloved hometown, the city by the sea Karachi. Now my time has come that I mus bid farewell to my beloved city and head back to the world capital on a tiny and rain soaked island far ar away off the coast of Mainland Europe. But before I could say Good bye and part my ways for the time being, life gave me the opportunity to experience a day of beautiful and truly ispiring weather to fully complete which has been a good and much needed trip home. Being a true Karachiete having been born and raised here, I know that this is the weather we Karachi walas truly admire.  Spring in the city by the sea is usually a time of the year when the weather is fairly hot and the celcius scale can easily reach levels comparable to those of the brutal summer months from July to September. It is a rare treat to see weather in this city during the month of Spring as how Spring should be. Warm, but mild, with flowers blooming and lots of green...

The free market has given us as consumers a wide varity of choices with respect to goods and services available to us. We as consumers in today's liberal market oriented world are truly spoiled for choice. It seems that this culture of consumerism, where one is also spoiled for choice, has had an indirect effect on our social values and how we engage and interact with the world around us. Long gone are the days when socializing was a simple exercise based on meeting and interacting with people. Socialising has now transformed into a full fledged self marketing exercise on an individual level. Basic marketing principles are infact very applicable to our every day social lives. Regardless of whether we go about it conciously or unconciously, social success it seems is now determined by how we as individuals market ourselves by applying the various concepts of marketing principles along the way. To illustrate this, let us revisit some of these concepts and analyse them in this very li...

In the back drop of rapidly growing radicalization of Pakistani society, it has become a commonplace for the remaining liberals or the educated liberals of this society to engage in discussions with regards to radicalization or the causes of radicalization in our society. Most such discussions are now taking place in privacy, where many are some what or the other reluctant to voice their honest opinions out of fear of reprecussions. The fear of reprecussions stems from people's heightened religious sensitivity which brings with it social consequences for the not only the minorities in this nation but also the non practising Muslims. Such reprecussions range from mild harassment to social ostracization to out and out direct life threats which come when the overly sensitive religious individuals start feeling that the liberals and the non practising Muslims are mocking Islam and what ever set of practises come with it. Instead of encouraging open criticism and open dialogue, their re...