If India really wanted to welcome Pakistan, it should have been efficient enough to respond to our queries
KARACHI: Do we as Pakistanis have any self-respect, self-esteem or dignity? When we talk about breaking ties with our relatives or friends, we have a whole lot of ego that stops us from being generous enough to re-tie our knots. But when we talk about going to India for the T20 World Cup 2016, we don’t even have an ounce of self-respect and dignity.
When someone treats you like an option, we should help them narrow their choices by removing ourselves from the equation. If India really wanted to welcome Pakistan, it should have been efficient enough to respond to our queries and reassure the Pakistani government about its security issues. Indian leader Mahatma Gandhi once said, “Self-respect knows no consideration”. The Pakistani team reached Kolkata on March 12. They went ahead with the matches but what about our self-respect?
Why can’t we prove that Pakistan is a place where we can also hold such events? India is ever-reluctant to send its players to Pakistan, yet our Pakistani team proceeds to India every time they’re asked to. I sincerely hope Pakistan plays host to a series of matches soon with the Indian team playing on our soil — and we surely would set a more gracious example.
Afreen Mirza
Published in The Express Tribune, March 17th, 2016.
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