By Razeshta Sethna

In Pakistan, hope has a conjoined twin: resilience. For third-generation Pakistanis today there aren’t many reasons for optimism in a country where since independence a great deal of ruin, decay and backwardness has set in. Liberals claim their progressive way of thinking is unthreatened, that there is hope beyond the challenge of education, terrorism, and economic collapse; that the religious right is a minuscule minority unable to win an election, in a country already in the grip of non-secular proxies.

By Pav Akhtar

Last month sympathisers of the English Defence League (EDL), including a founder member of the far right group, were the core initiators of a proposed ‘East End Gay Pride’ march through Tower Hamlets.