By Shivam Vij for FirstPost

You cannot SMS ullu chod in Pakistan anymore. Nor can you SMS monkey crotch if you had any reason to do so.

The Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) has banned 1,795 expletives on SMS, ordering telecom companies to filter out SMS-es containing these offending words with effect from 21 November 2011. The letter includes a list of 1,109 English words, more pornographic terms than expletives, and another 586 Urdu words which are more colourful sexual expletives of the standard South Asian kind rather than the plain garden variety pornography.

A letter from the PTA, dated 14 November and signed by its Director General (Services), Muhammed Talib Doger invokes the “Protection from Spam, Unsolicited, Fraudulent and Obnoxious Communication Regulations, 2009″ to pass the order.

The Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) has banned 1,795 expletives on SMS, ordering telecom companies to filter out SMS-es containing these offending words with effect from 21 November 2011. Vivek Prakash/Reuters
The Pakistani Twitterverse was on fire last night as the two lists make for hilarious reading. The English list begins with A.S.S. and ends with yellowman. Some words sound harmless (crap and crappy), others bizarre (Jesus Christ, flatulence, murder, monkey crotch). Many are commonly used obscene words (“FUCK YOU”) and care has been taken to account for alternative spellings (biatch, muthafucka). While many spelling variations of ‘masturbation’ are on it, the correct spelling is not. Most words seem to be designed to prevent ‘sexting’ or sending sexually explicit texts (sexy, lick me, do me, S&M, lotion and porn). The list comes down on anal sex as much as vaginal sex. But it isn’t just sex. By banning drunken they perhaps hope to reduce alcoholism.

The Express Tribune points out, “While much of the list contains expletives, a number of words to be banned include medical terms, terms used by particular minority groups, common words from the English language and rap group, Wu Tang Clan.” The ‘medical terms’ include athelete’s foot, breast, intercourse, condom and period. The ‘daily use’ terms include hole, hostage and harder. Words like gay and homosexual don’t surprise but it’s curious why wuutang raised the censor’s hackles.

In fact, thanks to this helpful compendium many Pakistanis are finding their expletive vocabulary enhanced. @UroojZia asked what bumblefuck and ladyboog meant.

@Zakoota said the lists should be required reading in schools to give children the vocabulary to describe politicians and cricketers. With the amount of phrases that include the word “BUTT”, @KhaLeak wondered if Aijaz Butt was banned as well.

The Urdu list has standard gaalis also popular in north India, but many of them may not be familiar to Indians (such as “dani mani fudi chus“). Some are unfamiliar even to Pakistanis. @FurhanHussain said the presence of Punjabi gaalis in the Urdu list amounted to cheating, but others noted that there is no list of Sindhi and Punjabi language expletives, a grievous omission given that the Punjabi language is particularly full of colourful expletives.

“Padosi ki aulaad” doesn’t sound very obscene. There are some 15 spelling and gender variations of ‘kanjar’, a popular Pakistani expletive meaning dancing girls, often also used to describe cross-dressing or men dancing like women. Some of the Urdu ones are quite creative. There are four variations of “Chipkali ke gaand ke pasine” and some are inexplicable (“Nimbu sharbat“, “carrom board”) and some are zoologically bizarre (“ullu chod” or owl fucker). Some are rather vanilla everyday terms like “Buckwaas” (nonsense) and “Bewakoof” (foolish).

There were so many oddball terms in there at first people though it was a spoof. However, Shahzad Ahmad, an internet rights activist who tweets as @bytesforall, said he confirmed with a source at the PTA that the list was real. The Express Tribune story referred to above has been updated to quote a PTA spokesperson who denied knowledge of any letter and said that the PTA “does not take such decisions and only passes on the instructions to licensees once a decision is taken by a ministerial committee.” The PTA, which is also in the news for directing ISPs to block access to 1,71,261 pornographic sites, is said to have convened a meeting this morning to discuss the uproar.

It’s unclear how telecom companies who cannot even filter out commercial spam will be able to handle this new morality burden. But Pakistanis, used to growing online censorship administered by the PTA, took little time to come up with the obvious workaround to the SMS censorship. The offending words are numbered on the blacklist. Many including @SamadK came up with the idea, “Now instead of typing the whole gaali you just need to send the number. Thank you PTA for making is even lazier.”

Many have already started testing it: @KhanDanish tweeted “I hope Imran Farhat 143 doesn’t do 471 in Friday’s match. #Urdu.”

The Urdu list is here and the English list here.

Filed under: All Pakistan Minorities Alliance, blasphemy laws, Freedoms, Hate Crime, Islam, Muslims, Pakistan, Pakistanis, US Commission on International Religious Freedom Tagged: Ahmadis, blasphemy laws, Christian Minorities, Christians, Hindus, Islam, Jesus Christ, Jinnah, Menstruation, mullahs, Pakistan, Pakistan Telecommunication Authority, Pakistani Chrisitians, Pakistani Constitution, Pakistanis, Period, PTA, Religious Minorities

By Sarfaraz Memon for The Express Tribune

Most shops in Taluka Chak in Shikarpur were open on Wednesday but there was an uneasy calm. Three Hindu men are dead and no one knows the whereabouts of Seema Bhayo, the girl at the centre of the storm. Residents fear that she may also have been killed. The police have no clue.

It is a simple tale of a love affair that turned tragic. The president has ordered an inquiry into the matter. Not to be outdone, the Sindh home minister has suspended the SHO of the area but neither of these moves brought any comfort to the families who lost their loved ones.

The brutal attack took place on Monday, the first day of Eid, when four armed men on two motorcycles barged into the house of one Naresh Kumar, where he and his friends Dr Ajeet Kumar, Dr Satya Pal and Ashok Kumar were present. The intruders opened fire and killed Ashok and Naresh on the spot, injuring  Dr Ajeet Kumar and Dr Satya Pal.

Dr Ajeet Kumar later died of his wounds at a Sukkur Hospital, more so because no one was willing to take him to the hospital. The policemen who were supposed to guard the house were nowhere to be seen. They did not turn up that day, despite the fact that they had been stationed on fear that such an attack was imminent.

The “crime” that these four men apparently committed was that they intervened on behalf of two young men of their community who had been apprehended two weeks earlier and charged with criminally assaulting a Muslim girl. The real story, as told by area residents, was that Seema and Sandeep Kumar fell in love and were caught while they were meeting at the house of Sandeep’s friend, Nakash Kumar.

This correspondent also visited Qazi mohalla where Seema’s home is situated on the right side of the road and the shops of Sandeep and Nakash were on the left side. A neighbour said that Seema and Sandeep used to meet at Nakash’s house. On that fateful day, area residents saw them going in and raided the house and thus the affair was revealed.

It was the promise of a better life which attracted Seema towards Sandeep, said another resident, adding that Seema’s father Nazir Ahmed Bhayo was a mason by profession. When the couple was caught, the Hindu community intervened to settle the matter. President of the Hindu Panchayat in Chak, Prem Kumar, said “We went to the Bhayo elders and told them that we are ready to pay any fine to reconcile the matter.”

Area resident Moulvi Allah Bux confirmed that the Hindu community were trying to reconcile with the Bhayo clansmen and for this they had met Sardar Babul Bhayo, who gave them a positive response and told them that the date of the reconciliatory meeting would be announced on the second day of Eid. But before the meeting could be held, the murders were committed.

While Babul Khan Bhayo was not available, clan chieftan Sardar Wahid Bux Bhayo  said that it was the Hindu community which had resorted to aggression by sexually assaulting a Bhayo girl. According to him, the three Hindus were killed in retaliation for that incident. But he added that he condemned both incidents.

On Tuesday, hundreds participated in the last rites of the three men. The rituals were performed near the Sadhu Bela temple in Sukkur.

Following the notice by the president, the Chak police has swung into action. During raids in different localities, they have apprehended more than 25 people. DIG Larkana Sain Rakhiyo Mirani said that the murder was an act of terrorism. But the Hindu community maintains that the real perpetrators of the crime have so far not been arrested.

Filed under: All Pakistan Minorities Alliance, Desi, Freedoms, Hate Crime, homegrown terror, India, Islam, Muslims, Pakistan, Pakistanis, US Commission on International Religious Freedom Tagged: Ashok Kumar, Dr Ajeet Kumar, Dr Satya Pal, Eid Massacre, Hindu Community, Hindu Doctors, Hindus, India, Larkana, Pakistan, Pakistani Hindus, Religious Intolerance, Sadhu Bela Temple, Seema Bhayo, Shikarpur, Sukkur, Taluka Chak