By virtue of both its history and its geography, Pakistan remains an endless source of fascination for us. Most of it is serious business, for after four wars every move the Pakistanis make is calibrated carefully by us. Yet even when their cricket team arrives, so enormous is the excitement that we put it on our cover.

Apart from Akram versus Sachin, Pakistan held our attention this year for other reasons. It began well, with Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee's historic bus drive into Pakistan. But embraces do not last long between hostile neighbours, and weeks later Pakistan had infiltrated Kargil and sparked off a bloody war. Hardly had that finished when Sharif was ousted by his army chief, General Pervez Musharraf. All through this India Today has kept abreast of the developments, analysing Pakistan's every move. This year we have done five cover stories on Pakistan. This week, with Sharif's trail, comes the sixth.

There is a drama to a deposed leader, stripped of office and now quickly threatened with possibly even a hangman's noose. There is an irony too that Sharif is not being tried in a regular court but in the anti-terrorist courts he set up himself. The male members of his family have been imprisoned and the women left to fend for themselves, friends have turned hostile witnesses, and his living conditions under scrutiny. Eventually all Musharraf may do is completely discredit Sharif. But in Pakistan, as history suggests, you can never tell what happens next.

(Aroon Purie)