The Kabul chaos and South Asia

It may not be the Saigon moment, but its reverberations are unlikely to be any less calamitous.

When JB Tuhure, 78, died last week, he was affiliated with the Maoists, but he rose to fame singing songs of awareness to solicit support for the Marxist-Leninists. The undertone of sadness in the revolutionary songs of Tuhure was unmistakable. Tuhure's tunes were simultaneously rebellious and reassuring. It's unlikely that complex emotions crossed the minds of the largely uneducated Taliban fighters that killed singer Fawad Andarabi in cold blood, but hardcore Islamists condemn music and fine arts. Love and fear are said to be the only two primary emotions that drive all human actions.