The Fiction of truth, the truth of fiction

Dear friends, family and readers: A very wonderful new year 2012 to you all! Thank you so much for your wonderful support and enthusiasm during my publishing struggles and adventures. I wanted to let all of you know that "The End of the World" is about to be published in Kindle (in around 24 hours, as we speak) and that you can soon download it on your Kindles. I will also soon have my novel "Loving the Enemy" available as an e-book online shortly. Thank you all again for your thoughtful support and love of literature. I hope this new year brings you new joy and new directions for spiritual and planetary growth. Love to all, Sushma

The Daily Times has a reportage of our reading: Ameena Hussein, writer and publisher, Sri Lanka; Sushma Joshi, writer and film-maker, Nepal; Ayesha Salman of SDPI Pakistan; and Harris Khalique, human rights activist and development practitioner of Pakistan, said the literature works as a means to expand minds and to provide deep insights on social and political issues that should be expressed to attain the greater goal of human development. Read the article here .

I visited Pakistan from 12-17 December. This was my first time there, and I was surprised by several things. Stay tuned for my op-ed! Here are the links to the conference in which I presented in the panel on literature, titled appropriately `Literature in South Asia: building bridges through fact and fiction`, along with Ayesha Salman of Pakistan and Ameena Hussein of Sri Lanka. It was a very interesting conference that brought together people from all over South Asia. Perhaps the most interesting part was the swing towards "looking East". For more, read on: Crises in West necessitate looking towards East for development

Fiction and the Facts: Writing the History of Development in Nepal Sushma Joshi* Literature and social change has always gone hand in hand since the invention of the written word. As a writer, I have always written fiction and non-fiction simultaneously. I have been a regular contributor to the Kathmandu Post since 1998. For the past two years, I wrote a widely-read op-ed column, “The Global and the Local.” My intention was to bring liberal and critical thinking skills to a Nepali middle class readership, and to highlight social justice issues as if they mattered. I feel I have succeeded, when I see young people with good education actively competing to get their works printed in the newspaper. Just as I draw upon fictional techniques to engage the reader in serious reportage, I do the opposite with fiction—I do not leave it all up to my imagination, but often draw from the treasure trove of real life stories I have heard as a journalist and social change activist in Nepal. My aim...

We must look towards East for sustainable development? Pakistan Today Wednesday, 14th Dec 2011 Islamabad Given the multiple crises in the West, daunting challenge of poverty at home, and the emerging needs to look towards East, paradigms of sustainable development in South Asia need to be redefined, said the speakers at the inaugural session of 14th Sustainable Development Conference (SDC) ‘Re-defining Paradigms of Sustainable Development in South Asia’ organised by Sustainable Development Policy Institute (SDPI) on Tuesday. The region, which hosts half of the global poor population, needs to redefine its approach towards poverty reduction. Its orientation towards development also needs to be redefined with greater regional cooperation and integration. Syed Naveed Qamar, Minister for Water and Power, said South Asian region has a common history and a shared future; instead of embroiled with the different kinds of conflicts tormenting the lives of billion of people, we should coo...