شاہ مصطفی احمد ردولوی
افسوس ہے کہ گزشتہ مہینہ ایک بڑی محترم شخصیت شاہ مصطفی احمد صاحب ردولوی نے انتقال کیا۔ گو ان کو پبلک میں کوئی شہرت حاصل نہیں تھی، لیکن ان کی زندگی مسلمانوں کے لیے نمونہ تھی۔ وہ حضرت مخدوم احمد عبدالحق ردولوی قدس سرہ کی اولاد میں تھے۔ اﷲ تعالیٰ نے ان کو دین و دنیا دونوں سے نوازا تھا۔ وہ علی گڑھ کالج کے پرانے تعلیم یافتہ تھے۔ اکاؤنٹسی کی تعلیم کے سلسلہ میں ان کا قیام لندن میں بھی رہا تھا، مگر بڑے راسخ العقیدہ اور دیندار مسلمان تھے، تہجد کی نماز تک کبھی ناغہ نہ ہوئی، لندن کے قیام کے زمانہ میں بھی روزے نماز کی پابندی میں فرق نہیں آیا، اس زمانہ میں جب تک ذبیحہ کے متعلق پورا اطمینان نہ ہوجاتا تھا گوشت نہ کھاتے تھے، سبزی اور انڈے پر قناعت کرتے تھے، پہلی جنگ عظیم چھڑنے کے بعد ایمڈن جہاز سے واپس آرہے تھے جس کو جرمنی نے تارپیڈو کردیا تھا، اس کے جو مسافر بچ گئے تھے، ان میں ایک شاہ صاحب بھی تھے، انھوں نے کل سامان چھوڑ کر صرف کلام مجید ساتھ لے لیا تھا۔
انھوں نے معمولی حیثیت سے ترقی کی اور بڑی دولت پیدا کی اور اسی فیاضی سے اس کو مذہبی و ملی کاموں اور غرباء و مساکین پر صرف کیا، ان کے در سے کوئی مستحق واپس نہ جاتا تھا، اہم کاموں کے لئے بڑی رقمیں دے دیتے تھے، خواجہ کمال الدین مرحوم کو کلام مجید کے جرمن ترجمے کے لیے دس ہزار روپے دیئے تھے، تحریک خلافت کے زمانہ میں خلافت کمیٹی اور اس کے لیڈروں کی بھی مدد کرتے رہتے تھے، اس زمانہ میں ترکوں کی مدد کے لیے ہندوستان میں جو انگورہ لیجن قائم ہوا تھا، اس کے پرجوش رکن تھے، مسلم یونیورسٹی سے پرانا تعلق تھا،...
This paper aims at an evaluation of various approaches to define and redefine the classical theory of the I‘jaz (the inimitability of the Qur’ān) in the perspective of the challenges and problems faced by the Muslim society emphasising a need to cope with the rational thinking, modernity, scientific progress, psychological advancement and civilizational development, though there has been a comparatively lesser description of the rhetoricism of the Qur’ān too. It provides an account of scholarship exploring some novel dimensions of the matchlessness of the Qur’ān in the contemporaneous context. They have justified rationally and psychologically the Qur’ānic historic challenge of producing a book or its some surahs or few verses similar to the Qur’ān that has offered the irresistible call to the whole mankind: “Say: “If the whole of mankind and Jinns were to gather together to produce the like of this Qur’ān, they could not produce the like thereof, even if they backed up each other with help and support”. (Al-Isra 17: 88) The same challenge occurs in the Qur’ān on three previous occasions (Al-Baqarah, 2: 23-24; Yunus 10: 38, and Hūd 11: 13) and later also in al-Tūr (52: 33-34). The content of all the verses referred to above is in response to the allegation of the unbelievers that the Qur’ān had been composed by the Prophet (peace be on him) and then falsely ascribed to God. All this was refuted. This refutation of the Qur’ān was logically established by the modern Arabic scholars through their sound arguments.
Price and wage setting behaviour is a crucial issue in the economic literature, especially for the knowledge of monetary policy transmission mechanism. The present study analyzes the price and wage setting behaviour of firms from Industrial estates of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, using survey-based data. The survey is conducted in the year 2017 in four major industrial estates of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, namely, Hayatabad, Nowshera, Gadoon and Hattar Industrial Estates. A sample of 342 firms is selected through stratified random sampling and respondents are the managers of the firms. Price setting behavior is measured through frequency of price change, length of price contract and importance of demand and cost shocks for price change. The wage setting variable is measured through frequency of wage change. To estimate the effects of determinants of price change/rigidity, models are estimated through ordinary least squares technique in case of frequency of price change as dependent variable while binary logistic technique is used in all other cases. It is found that 70% of the firms have more than five competitors. Most of the firms have only regular customers or a combination of both regular and occasional customers. 60.8% of the firms set the price of their main product, so most of firms operate in imperfectly competitive market structure. 70.8% firms involve in price discrimination, in which 50% of the firms adopt first degree price discrimination. Most of the firms use current information (44%) or a combination of all information (40%) for price-setting of their product, which means that the firms practice is not aligned with traditional Philips curve rather it is consistent with hybrid Philips curve. 26% of the firms in our sample follow time-dependent pricing policy, 21% of the firms follow state-dependent rule and 52.6% firms use a combination of both time and state-dependent pricing policies, i.e. they practice mixed strategy. A relatively high proportion of firms change prices at the change of new calendar year with most of the firms changing prices at the start of fiscal year or calendar year. The most important factors for price stickiness are implicit and explicit price contracts, and minimum price volatility and less uncertainty. Imperfect competitive market structure of firms, number of regular customers, backward-looking behavior, and credibility of central bank and size of the firm are important determinants of price rigidity. While economic literacy and information set regarding expected inflation make the prices flexible. Firms‘ likelihood of price increase higher than that to price decrease in response to both demand and supply shocks. Furthermore, supply-side factors lead to higher frequency of price change than demand-side factors do. The cost of raw material and cost of energy are the most important causes of price change, both for the price increase and decrease. Demand and cost shocks are important determinants of price change for imperfectly competitive firms, backward-looking firms, firms run by managers having more information about economic conditions, while credibility of central bank is important determinant of price change in case of demand shocks only. Size of firms and information set regarding expected inflation do not have any effect. Most of the firms change wage rate once in a year both for permanent workers and daily wagers. Majority of the firms follow time-dependent wage policy. Half of the firms, which are following time-dependent wage policy, change the wage rate at the end or start of the fiscal year. Most of the firms are not found to index wages for permanent workers and daily wagers. Moreover, the percentage of firms not involved in wage indexation is higher for daily workers than for permanent worker. Labor productivity, employment level in the economy, government regulations, taxes, demand for the product, and inflation are important factors of wage change but the most important factor is the labour productivity and least important is pressure from the labour union. Imperfect competition and size of the firms are the important determinants of wage flexibility, because they increase the frequency of wage change, while wage indexation, information set of expected inflation and fringe benefits provided to workers are the important determinants of wage rigidity, because these factors decrease the probability of a firm to change the wage rate. Owing to weak traditional channel of monetary policy, it is important for monetary policy of Pakistan to focus on other channels of monetary transmission mechanism, like asset price channel, balance sheet channel or credit channel; credibility of central bank has to be established to stabilize prices; pre-emptive measures should be taken on the part of central bank to counter supply shocks; wage cuts at the times of recession be avoided; and disinflationary policies be carefully designed as sacrifice ratio, albeit moderate, is not zero.