How criticism of the state is crushed in Pakistan Aneela Z Babar Small Large There's always a limit to what one can write or say. For some activists, even exile has been dangerous Last week the veteran journalist Nusrat Javeed went through multiple drafts of his press diary for the emergency session of the National Assembly. Javeed has been in the media since 1975 and has been a witness to Pakistan’s political adventures . He later wrote in the Nawai Waqt that he was editing drafts as “My main concern was that the writing was becoming too bitter. Not in line with the current climate of ‘freedom of expression’. Rather than writing down the key thoughts in my mind, I was struggling to come up with words that would not cause me harm.”