In 2015, many Pakistanis bagged top awards and honours at various forums around the world. If this continues in 2016, Pakistan might just make it to the hall of fame for other than being ‘terrorism central’ and rubbing cricket balls the wrong way!  

By Deneb Sumbul

Another Oscar?

In 2012, Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy brought Pakistan’s first Oscar home with her moving documentary, Saving Face. And the good news is that another of her documentaries has been shortlisted for the 88th Academy Awards in the Documentary Short Film category. Titled A Girl in the River: The Price of Forgiveness, it is about honour killings in Pakistan, and is produced by Tina Brown and Sheila Nevinsin in collaboration with HBO Documentary Films. The documentary, which was released on October 28, has received rave reviews. Scheduled for a worldwide premier on HBO in 2016, the 40-minute film is about an 18-year-old girl who survives an attempted honour-killing and lives to tell the tale. Out of 74 entries, A Girl in the River was shortlisted along with nine other documentaries. The final five nominations for the Oscars will be announced on January 14, 2016. Will Sharmeen bring another Oscar home?

 

Top Gun

At its 11th convocation ceremony in Karachi in December, the Greenwich University presented an Honoris Causa – an honorary degree of mass communication – to Sultana Siddiqui, the President of HUM TV Network. In her career encompassing 40 years, Sultana Apa – as she is fondly know in the entertainment industry – wears many hats: director, producer, businesswoman, and beyond. The degree was in recognition of her large body of work and outstanding achievements in the field of entertainment. She is also the first – and the only woman in Asia – to start her own TV channel network. Siddiqui began her career as a producer in PTV Karachi in 1974. Currently her company, HUM Television Network, includes three TV cable channels and assorted magazines. In recognition of her work, Siddiqui has earned numerous awards and accolades, including the Pride of Performance by the Government of Pakistan, and the Scroll of Honour award at the 5th GR8 Women Awards ceremony held in January 2015 by the Indian Television Academy, that celebrates women’s achievements in various fields. Under Siddiqui’s stewardship, HUM TV dramas have also won several awards and are known for highlighting social issues with a focus on women.

On the Forbes List

Foremost American business magazine, Forbes, listed 28-year-old Fiza Farhan, the CEO of Buksh Foundation, among the 30 under 30 social entrepreneurs for 2015. Fiza is the fourth woman from Pakistan to be included in the Forbes list of young game-changers, movers and makers. A microfinance foundation operating in Pakistan since 2009, the Buksh Foundation focuses on clean energy projects in the poor and rural areas of the country and has disbursed loans to over 12,000 local entrepreneurs so far. The institution has also trained 135 plus women as energy entrepreneurs and brought solar-power lights to almost 7,000 households across the country. Incidentally, in September 2014, Fiza was nominated as the ‘Future Energy Leader’ at the World Energy Council, for promoting renewable energy in Pakistan.

Striking Gold 39 Years later

Weightlifting athletes, Abdur Rehman and Muhammad Nooh Dastgir Butt, brought home six gold medals (three each) from the 17th Asian Youth Weightlifting Championships in Doha, Qatar in January 2015. Competing in the 77kg category, Abdur Rehman defeated all his rivals by lifting weights totalling 251kg, while Nooh Dastgir defeated all his competitors in the over-94kg category. He clinched the top position by lifting a grand total of 330kg. In the same championship, three silver medals were bagged by Pakistan’s Fahad Hussain Butt. The last time Pakistan won a medal in the Asian weightlifting games was in Bangkok in 1976, when Muhammad Arshad Malik won a silver in the middleweight category.

Haute and Happening

Deepak Perwani, the designer par excellence, whose brand stands at the apex of Pakistan’s couture scene, brought some well-deserved accolades home. In February 2015, among 285 nominations, the Bulgarian Fashion Council along with the European Fashion Council – awarded Perwani first place among the world’s top 10 fashion designers from the Middle-Eastern region at the Bulgarian Fashion Awards. His brand was also ranked the sixth most innovative design house in the world. Perwani also won this year’s ‘Fan’s Favourite Award,’ ‘Unique Guinness Acknowledgement’ and ‘Charitable Initiatives,’ making him the first Pakistani to win this kind of recognition.

Bollywood Darling

Pakistani actor and heartthrob, Fawad Khan, who’s making waves in Bollywood, became the first Pakistani to win the Indian film industry’s prestigious Filmfare award in the Best Male Debut category. Held in Mumbai in February, the 60th Filmfare Awards honoured the best in Indian cinema in 2014. Fawad Khan won for his role in the film Khoobsurat, beating newbies Tahir Raj Bhasin (Mardaani), Tiger Shroff (Heropanti), Sharib Hashmi (Filmistaan) and Freddy Daruwala (Holiday) nominated in the same category. The first Filmfare Award for Pakistan was won by Nazia Hasan in 1981 in the Best Female Playback Singer category for her song “Aap Jaisa Koi.”

The Thrill of Victory

Among the winners of the 2014 Bram Stoker Awards in Atlanta on May 9, was a Pakistani English writer, Usman T. Malik. Malik won in the category of Superior Achievement in Short Fiction for his story, ‘The Vaporization Enthalpy of a Peculiar Pakistani Family.’

These awards are held by the world’s leading organisation for horror and dark fantasy writers and publishers – the Horror Writers Association – which honours the best writers in 11 categories from the previous year. International best-selling authors, Stephen King and J. K. Rowling, have been among the previous winners. Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America had nominated the same story by Usman for the 2014 Nebula Awards. Usman is also co-founder of the Desi Writers Lounge and holds writing workshops for would-be science fiction writers.

Top of the Summit

Rohayl Varind, a 19-year-old Pakistani from Faisalabad, won the World Summit Youth Award (WSYA) 2014-2015 in Sao Paulo, Brazil. Forty jurors judged 2,000 entries from 140 countries from across the globe and Varind’s contribution, ‘Voice of R,’ was included among the 18 outstanding and creative e-content and social entrepreneurship projects designed to reduce poverty and hunger, and to address Millennium Development Goals. With numerous campaigns, protests, fundraisers and social events under his belt, Varind, who is also a social entrepreneur, is running two web-based, non-profit magazines that promote and portray Pakistani youth, both nationally and internationally.

Behind the Bionic Eye

Salman (aka Mark) Humayun will be receiving the National Medal of Technology and innovation from President Obama on January 22, 2016. He has repeatedly been listed among the top 20 scientists in the world by The Financial Times.

Salman has dedicated many years on research aimed at restoring sight to the blind, using his medical and engineering education and know-how to develop the bionic eye.

Perhaps the secret of his success lies in the genes: Salman is the grandson of Dr Lt Col Ilahi Baksh, personal physician to the Quaid-e-Azam and Nony Humayun, daughter of Aslam Khattak, a former deputy prime minister of Pakistan and a well-known politician of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

Journalist With a Cause

Pakistani journalist Haroon Janjua was awarded a silver medal in the Elizabeth Neuffer Memorial Prize category by the New York-based United Nations Correspondents Association (UNCA) for his story, ‘Brick kiln workers: the endless battle’ published in August 2015 in The Friday Times. The UNCA has a membership of over 200 producers and correspondents from around the world, and every year awards are given for the best print, broadcast (TV or radio), online and web-based media coverage of the United Nations field operations.

Miracle Woman

Muniba Mazari, 28, is an inspiration not just to women, but to all those with disabilities as well. Being a paraplegic did not stop her from becoming an artist, a model, a wheelchair anchor/concept editor, a motivational speaker and the mother of an adopted child. This year she was featured in BBC’s 2015 Women of Inspiration and became Pakistan’s first female goodwill ambassador for UN Women Pakistan to advance gender equality and female empowerment. As the goodwill ambassador, Muniba will be an advocate for the UN Women’s “Planet 50-50 by 2030: Step It Up for Gender Equality” and other campaigns. When she was 20, Muniba was paralysed in a car accident. She began painting while still recovering at the hospital. Currently, she also works at a school for underprivileged children and is looking for donors and philanthropists to fund the school in order to enroll more children. She is also a part of Toni and Guy’s wheelchair modeling campaign and the brand ambassador for Body Shop Pakistan and Pond’s ‘miracle woman.’

 

Hot Shot

At a ceremony in London in November, Pakistani cameraman Haider Ali was awarded the Rory Peck Award for 2015 for his camerawork in the documentary, Pakistan’s Hidden Shame. Based in London, the Rory Peck Trust, provides practical assistance and support to freelance journalists from around the world. The Trust also confers awards on the best freelance news gatherers in current affairs. This year, freelancers from Pakistan, Iraq and Syria walked away with the top honours: Ali received his for his brilliant expose of the sexual abuse of thousands of vulnerable young boys in Pakistan who fall prey to paedophiles.

Our Own Mother Teresa

The board of the Harmony Foundation, Mumbai, unanimously decided to confer the prestigious Mother Teresa Memorial International Award 2015 for social justice on Bilquis, wife of Abdul Sattar Edhi, who is a humanitarian in her own right. The award was given in recognition of the care she provided to Geeta, the deaf and mute Indian girl, for a decade, after she had mistakenly crossed the border into Pakistan. Geeta continued to practice her own faith, while at the Edhi Foundation. She was finally repatriated to India at end October. Medecins Sans Frontieres jointly received the award with Bilquis Edhi. Nobel laureates, the Dalai Lama and Malala Yousafzai have been previous recipients of this award.

Techie Gold

At the 2015 Asia Pacific ICT Awards (APICTA) last November, teams representing Pakistan won three gold medals and one silver at a ceremony held in Colombo, Sri Lanka. The three teams and the products for which they won the top honours were: Eyedeus Labs for their product ‘Ingrain,’ Evamp & Sanga for their ‘Mobile Audio Streaming Service’ and students of the National University of Sciences and Technology (NUST) College of Electrical and Mechanical Engineering for their research project, ‘Active and Intelligent Powered Ankle Foot Prosthesis for Transtibial Amputees.’ This year, P@SHA (Pakistan Software Houses Association for IT & ITES) led the delegation, comprising 50 members with 22 technology products, to the APICTA Awards and competed against 184 products from 17 other countries in the region.

In the Hall of Fame

Twenty-two year old taekwondo black belt, Ahmad Amin Bodla, became the first Pakistani to be officially inducted into the USA Martial Arts Hall of Fame for his 26 World Records in Martial Arts and Fitness, five awards from the Guinness World Records and one from Germany’s Book of Alternative Records. Since 2012, this ace martial arts athlete has made it to the ranks of the elite club of martial artists by creating world records in the most kicks, knee-strikes and punches, etc. He now runs his own martial arts academy.

Worth a Thousand Words

A panoramic and visually stunning shot of Lower Kachura lake, Skardu in Gilgit-Baltistan by Zaeem Siddiq became the winning image of Wiki Loves Earth 2015 contest in October. The photograph was taken at the Central Karakoram National Park in Skardu and was chosen from over 100,000 submissions from 9,000 contestants across 26 countries and judged by a panel of nine international judges – all well-known photographers skilled in nature photography.

Wiki Loves Earth is a photography contest in which participants focus on capturing beautiful images of protected nature areas and upload them on Wikimedia Commons for the purpose of raising public awareness about the environment. Zaeem Siddiq gets an all-expense paid trip to attend the annual conference of Wikimedians known as ‘Wikimania,’ being held at Esino Lario, Italy in 2016.

Global Citizen

Syeda Ghulam Fatima, a Pakistani labour rights activist, was among the six honorees to receive the 2015 Clinton Global Citizen Awards in New York. Fatima won for “Leadership in Civil Society.” As the General Secretary of the Lahore-based Bonded Labour Liberation Front Pakistan (BLLF), Fatima, along with her husband, works for the betterment of bonded labour in Pakistani brick kilns. She was instrumental in securing the release of 80,000 bonded labourers through the freedom centres she established for the bonded brick kiln workers to get them protection and legal counsel. She has also trained more than 600 women in alternative skills for poverty reduction. Fatima and her organisation first shot to international limelight in August 2015, when they were featured in a seven-part series by the popular internet photojournalism Facebook page, Humans of New York.

Math Wizard

Rajinish Aneel Bhatia, a student of grade 7 from PakTurk International School in Jamshoro, along with other team mates from the same school, represented Pakistan in the Math Challenge V held at Pan Asia International School in Bangkok and clinched a gold medal carrying a cash prize of 3,000 THB. Between November 17 and 18, 136 teams comprising 433 students from 33 schools in 11 Asian countries competed in the prestigious international Math Challenge V competition which aims to encourage students to study and excel in math and critical thinking. Rajinish’s team mates, Harun Yilmaz of grade 8 won a silver medal, while Abdul Wasay Kandhir and Abdul Wasay Memon, of grade 7 and 8 respectively, bagged a bronze medal each in the same contest.

A Girl’s Motorcycle Diaries

Inspired by her late father’s dream to travel the world on a motorcycle, 20-year-old Zenith Irfan decided to hit the road solo, on her motorbike, riding through the difficult Kashmir belt. She is probably the first woman to do so – thereby breaking societal stereotypes about women in Pakistan. What made Zenith’s six-day adventure from Lahore to Karachi most daring was that she travelled alone in parts of the country that are regarded as extremely dangerous, with only a backpack. But she did not face any resistance within her family or the public. Her main challenges were the rugged terrain, broken roads and the public glares along the way. While women in neighbouring India, have been riding scooters for the last 20 years, female motorcyclists are still a rarity in Pakistan. Zenith plans to continue her journey and document all her trips in her motorcycle diaries on Facebook titled: Zenith Irfan: 1 Girl, 2 Wheels.

Flames of Passion

Rescue 1122 of Lahore proudly presented Shazia Parveen, 25, as the first female firefighter in Pakistan and in all of Asia. Parveen, from Punjab’s Vehari district, joined Rescue 1122 Emergency Services in 2010. The idea of working in an all-male environment did not deter her. In fact, during her extensive training, she saw many of the 600 trainees recruited along with her quit because they couldn’t take it anymore, but she stayed put. People smirked at her choice of profession but that would change to respect each time she rescued women and children from raging fires and saved people’s precious belongings and property .

Cooking up a Storm

The cookbook Zaiqay Frontier Kay – Dera Ismail Khan Kay Bhulay Bisray Pakwan, published in Pakistan, received top honours at the prestigious Gourmand World Cookbook Awards this year in Yantai, China. The book won in the ‘Best Cookbook for Peace’ category, though it was nominated in the ‘Best Vegetarian Cookbook,’ ‘Best Culinary History Cookbook’ and ‘Best Local Cuisine Cookbook’ groups as well. Also translated into English as Flavours of the Frontier – Forgotten Recipes from Dera Ismail Khan, Zaiqa is a collection of treasured recipes by the late Pushpa Kumari Bagi, dating back to the times when Hindus and Muslims lived together in Dera Ismail Khan and shared a rich cuisine and culture.

The late author’s family, as well as Kiran Aman of Markings, the independent Pakistani publisher of the cookbook, represented Pakistan at the 2015 award ceremony held in June. Internationally regarded as the ‘Oscars’ of cookbook awards, Gourmand International celebrates the best publishers and food writers from around the world who `cook with words.’ This is the second year in a row that Markings has represented Pakistan. They won their first Gourmand Awards in 2014 in the ‘Best Pastry Sweets Cookbook’ category as publishers of the recipe book titled Deliciously Yours by Lal Majid.