آہ! مولانا ابوسلمہؒ
(پروفیسر مسعود حسن)
۲۲؍ دسمبر کی دوپہر کو کلکتہ کے مسلمان ایک بڑے المناک سانحہ سے دوچار ہوئے، یہ سانحہ حضرت مولانا ابوسلمہ شفیع احمد صاحبؒ کی رحلت ہے، جو ۵-۴ ماہ کی طویل اور صبر آزما علالت کے بعد ۷۳ سال کی عمر میں اپنے مالک حقیقی سے جاملے۔ اناﷲ وانا الیہ راجعون، دوسرے دن صبح ۳۰:۱۲ بجے ان کے ہزاروں عقیدت مندوں اور جان نثاروں نے ان کے جسدخاکی کو پارک سرکس سے متصل ایک قبرستان میں جس کا نام ہم ’گورغریباں‘ ہے، یہ کہہ کر سپردخاک کیا کہ:
اے تیرہ خاک خاطرِ مہماں نگاہ دار
کیں نورچشم ماست کہ دربر گرفتہ ای
نور اﷲ مرقدہٗ و برد اﷲ مضجعہ
مولانا مرحوم کے نام اور مقام سے مجھے بہت پہلے سے واقفیت تھی، البتہ باقاعدہ نیاز اور تقریب ۱۹۵۹ء میں حاصل ہوا، جب مجھے مدرسۂ عالیہ کلکتہ کی پرنسپلی تفویض ہوئی اور میں مدرسہ پہنچا، مولانا مدرسہ کے ممتاز ترین اساتذہ میں تھے، تفسیر اور حدیث ان کے خاص موضوع تھے اور ان دونوں فنون کی بیشتر متداول کتابوں پر ان کی گہری نظر تھی، وہ مدرسہ کی اونچی جماعتوں میں درس دیتے تھے اور بڑی عزت و احترام کی نظر سے دیکھے جاتے تھے۔ میں مدرسہ میں کم و بیش ۵ سال رہا۔ اس پوری مدت میں میرے ان کے تعلقات مخلصانہ رہے اور جب میں وہاں سے رخصت ہوا تو اس کے بعد بھی ان کا اخلاص برابر جاری رہا۔ وہ اکثر میرے غریب خانہ پر تشریف لاتے، گھنٹوں بیٹھتے تھے۔ راقم الحروف بھی ان کی خدمت میں حاضر ہوتا تھا، ان ملاقاتوں میں اکثر علمی گفتگو ہوا کرتی تھی، کبھی کبھی حالات حاضرہ پر بھی تبصرہ ہوا کرتے تھے، مولانا ان مجلسوں میں علم و حکمت کے موتی بکھیر دیتے تھے۔
مولانا کو لکھنے پڑھنے اور تصنیف کا شوق...
Adl and Qisṭ is indeed a manifestation of God’s mercy, rather, it may also be seen as a principal objective of Shariʿah. The origin or sources of administration of justice in Islām are the Quran, Sunnah of the holy Prophet, consensus of opinions of the jurists of Islamic jurisprudence and Analogy (Qiyās). Justice is a sacred obligation of supererogatory. It is obligatory upon the Muslim rulers to appoint judges for the dispensation of justice to attain equality, to protect the human rights from their violation, to safeguard the lives and properties, and to maintain law and order in society. As a judge is supposed to accomplish a very important and noble task being a regent of Allāh, hence, some vital merits and criteria regarding the conditions and qualifications for the appointment of the Qāḍī or judge in the light of the Qur’ān, Sunnah and Islamic jurisprudence and the code of conduct for the Pakistani judges must be observed at all costs. The author of this paper has discussed these conditions and qualifications in this article. There are some unanimous conditions for the appointment of judges, while some others are not agreed upon. While presenting the difference of opinions of the Islamic jurists, the author tried to explain, reconcile the opinions and at some places presented her own view in the light of her analysis and arguments. These conditions are around thirty, but the author according to her own discretion chose some of the most important ones to discuss in this paper.
This thesis investigates the role of Credit Rating Agencies (CRAs) in European financial markets. Traditional activities of CRAs include information supply, certification, and monitoring services for corporations and rating sovereign debt. Any change in the opinion of CRAs on the sovereign debt has strong implications on the financial markets and the real economy. This thesis contributes to literature by investigating: (i) the effect of sovereign rating and outlook changes on the shape of the sovereign yield curve; (ii) the impact of sovereign rating and outlook changes on stock markets at different levels of business cycle; (iii) the effect of financial liberalization on the growth in sovereign ratings; and (iv) the impact of sovereign rating and outlook instability on the access to credit by firms. In order to properly investigate these research questions, we employ a variety of pertinent statistical and econometric tools as required in every chapter. These techniques include but are not limited to state space modelling, vector autoregressions, maximum likelihood estimations, Kalman filter approach, generalized method of moments, and limited dependent variable methods. Findings of this thesis reveal, inter alia, that sovereign rating and outlook announcements play an important “confirmation role” in the financial markets; however, the extent of the effect depends on the announcement type, CRA specificity, kind of market and country characteristics. Specifically, the second chapter shows a significant effect of rating downgrades and an insignificant effect of rating upgrades on the sovereign yield curve; however, we observe mixed results for the effect of changes in outlook status of a sovereign country. The third chapter identifies that stock markets react more negatively to rating downgrades in recovery phases and more positively to rating upgrades in the contractionary period. However, we do not find any evidence of a pro-cyclical effect of sovereign rating and outlook change on stock returns. The fourth chapter indicates a positive impact of financial liberalization on sovereign ratings, and we show that we cannot reject the hypothesis that financial stability is independent of financial liberalization. Moreover, we show in this chapter that sovereign ratings tend to be stable and persistent, otherwise. The fifth chapter suggests a significant negative effect of sovereign rating and outlook instability on the access to credit by firms. The last chapter concludes the thesis with implications of these findings for understanding the role of rating agencies in financial markets, policymaking, designing regulations and for investors and firm owners, both in developing and developed economies.