President Pervez Musharraf has emphasised the need of projecting the soft image of Pakistan. He was speaking as chief guest at the fifth KaraFilm festival award distribution ceremony here on Sunday night.
"When I say the soft image of Pakistan, I really mean culture, sports and tourism", he remarked, adding that was exactly what the government was involved in doing.
He pointed out that a few days ago he attended in Lahore the Rafi Peer Theatre holding the performing arts festival there. "I saw an excellent fusion of the East and West in art and music where I saw a Norwegian women's group performing side by side with Goonga Sain, a Dholak performer of Lahore. I saw a Qawali performance simultaneously with a French Group."
Musharraf said that was a beautiful fusion of the East and West, adding it was the art and music, which acted as a very integrative force within the nation nationally and also internationally. Therefore, the President said, he believed that encouragement of the performing arts really was encouraging integration within the countries and with other countries of the world.
The President said we needed to encourage arts, performing arts, music-vocal, instrumental, theatre etc but we must maintain a balance in all those activities. "There was no lack of talent in Pakistan."
He stated that as far as the government was concerned it had done a lot and travelled a long distance in the last five years and opened a National Academy of Performing Arts being run by prominent artist Zia Mohyuddin. The government had provided an infrastructure to support budding artists to excel in their respective fields.
The President said he was glad to see the youngsters availing those facilities and learning, and added he would like to encourage such an activity to go on.
He said the National College of Arts in Lahore has opened its campus in Rawalpindi also, and was setting up a department of Films and Television and added that the building of NCA in Islamabad would be completed within next year and it would promote art, culture and music.
Musharraf said in front of the National Academy of Performing Arts in Karachi was Arts Council of Pakistan whose auditorium was lying incomplete for many years, which had now been completed and he would like to perform its inauguration. He said Sindh Governor Dr Ishratul Ibad had facilitated a 'Koocha-e-Saqafat' at the road adjacent to the National Academy of Performing Arts, where a lot of cultural activity takes place every Sunday.
He pointed out that we had also opened the Islamabad Heritage Museum, which is one of the best heritage museums and comparable to any museum of the world.
Musharraf said a monument was being created in Islamabad along with museum for Quaid-e-Azam and Allama Iqbal, which would be a showpiece in the federal capital. An excellent museum and a monument are also being constructed in Lahore. The President expressed the desire that Pakistan and India resolve their disputes and foster interaction.
He expressed his gratitude to the artistes who participated in this festival from abroad especially from India. Musharraf said, "We would like to encourage this interaction with the world and India."
He said, "His sincere and genuine hope and desire is that we resolve all our disputes so that we can progress on the path of interaction with each other by helping and facilitating in such activities where we have such commonalities in the future in an unhindered, unhampered manner and get closer to each other." He also expressed the hope that Indian artistes who have come here will carry fond memories of this visit.
Kara Film Festival Director Hassan Zaidi and Geo TV President Imran Aslam also spoke. Sindh Governor Dr Ishratul Ibad, Chief Minister Dr Arbab Ghulam Rahim, Corps Commander Lieutenant General Syed Athar Ali were also present on the occasion.
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