you’ve been given a holiday which south asian country would you go to?

I’d probably pick Sri Lanka.

I’m from Dhaka, Bangladesh. Therefore, my choice of destination would definitely be India as no other country (from your list) can fulfill all my desires for sight-seeing, mouth-watering food, cheap travel, easy communication etc.

However, being a Muslim I would think twice to travel to India now as their tourist Visa has been heavily curtailed from countries with heavy Muslim population, like Bangladesh, after the November 26 attacks in Mumbai.

Therefore, my second choice of destination would be Sri Lanka since I have never been to that beautiful country where people in general are educated and well behaved than our fellows from Indo-Pak subcontinent (India, Pakistan and Bangladesh). Only the fear would be any Tamil Tiger attack those are destroying the prospect of this country to become emerging Tiger in this region.

My third choice would be Pakistan, as I have left Karachi in 1973 and never ever saw that country again. I wanted to see Islamabad but could not do so since those days I had no means to travel inside Pakistan as I was student in most of the times. However, recent turmoil and threat of Indian attacks as well as US incursion in pursuit of the Afghan Taliban would make that country a bit less attractive to visit now. But I will fulfill my dream when the tranquility restores.

I was in Iran for two years (June 1977-June 79) and saw this beautiful country when King Reza Shah Pahelvi was in his waning days. I came back after seeing four turbulent months of Mullahs’ reign. Iran is also on my list of destination to visit just to see how much that country has changed from what we saw as a very prosperous and progressive country who were vying with Turkey to modernize their society.

Hope I could express my opinion with objectivity.