Price Of A Deal
Musharraf may have bent backwards in a bid to make his country the standard bearer of the US in the region. Of course, there are financial rewards for Pakistan, but the fear of a fundamentalist backlash continues to keep the nation on tenterhooks.

Circle Of Death
Violence fuelled by bigotry and foreign money brought the Taliban to power. Now as things come full circle the Islamic militia may meet an equally brutal end.

Afghanistan 1978-2001
Its women once enjoyed social freedom, and there was joy and peace. It is now a country perverted by the missionaries of a grim utopia. A social history in pictures.

NEWSNOTES

	ECONOMY CLASS: Gavaskar (above) speaks up for ex-players like Umrigar (below)

Mumbai: In a letter to BCCI President A.C. Muthiah, cricket legend Sunil Gavaskar has demanded that the board treat ex-players better, instead of paying fat salaries to foreign consultants. The letter, dated September 11, 2000, came after Gavaskar read recently that former Test captain Polly Umrigar was given economy class airfare to attend a meeting of the National Cricket Academy committee in Bangalore. He said he was not making a case for ex-players, but "surely economy class travel can be avoided".

Gavaskar also brought up the issue of the board officials commandeering passes during international games in the country, giving ex-players a raw deal. (Ex-players get a single non-transferable ticket while ex-presidents get seven transferable ones.) He suggested that former players and administrators be treated on a par. Writes India's former cricket captain: "Surely those who have toiled and sweated for India deserve the same consideration if not more than those who have administered the game."

Copies of the letter have been circulated to all the affiliated state associations in the hope that these issues are taken up at the board's forthcoming annual general meeting. Muthiah will certainly have much to discuss.

Malice Gets Legal Nod

Delhi: Irrepressible octogenarian Khushwant Singh has been permitted a little malice after all. After six years of legal wrangling, last week the Delhi High Court allowed the writer to go ahead with the publication of his autobiography Truth, Love and a Little Malice. Many may be looking forward to reading it, but not Union Minister for Culture Maneka Gandhi. After the publication of extracts from the book in India Today in October 1995, Gandhi had filed defamation and injunction charges against Singh to "protect the fair name and respect of her family". Gandhi has been asked to pay Rs 10,000 as litigation cost to the man of wit and kisses. For her, Singh is certainly "not a nice man to know".

Unemployed, But Still Busy

Lucknow: Chief Minister Rajnath Singh had plenty of reasons to dismiss tourism minister Ashok Yadav: he has been absent from the Assembly, allegedly ran his department from Delhi, and had attacked Brahmin and Thakur leaders in the party. The last straw came when he had his brother file a petition in the Supreme Court against the state Government's MBC policy. Out of a job, Yadav is now busy projecting himself as a martyr to the cause of dominant backward castes.

MetroScape

Fort Of Arms
In the 16th century, a Portuguese governor fortified a strategically located house to defend ships in the harbour of an island on the west coast of India acquired from the Sultan of Gujarat. Mumbai grew first into a fort and then into a city from here.
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Looking Glass

Delhi Photography:
Pradeep Bhatia

Delhi Music Concert: Pandit Ram Chatur Mallick Dhrupad Foundation

Delhi Sculpture: Sculpter Hemi Bawa