Madam Noor Jehan
(January 2001)

Awaaz Dey Kahan Hai

So Madam is gone. Buried in, of all the places, Karachi in some graveyard whose name I cannot recall. What irony that she should lie in a city where she had no roots - marooned in a port because she was too ill to travel. When she died, there was the usual confusion that ensues. She never made it to Lahore, which is where she should have been brought in the first place. Why the family didn’t work that one out in advance is hard to understand, but now it is too late. If Nusrat Fateh Ali’s body could be brought from London to Faisalabad in the middle of a scorching summer, why couldn’t Madam return to Lahore? Now it transpires she had written to her son in Lahore to bring her back. Oh well, this will be a subject of much regret always, particularly for those of us who were her fans.

There are now the customary eulogies and articles of praise pouring in from all sides. Even those who were all for stringing her up for talking heresy are contently quiet or shrugging their holy shoulders. Understandable, because we have always displayed a love-hate relationship with artists, whether they are - or were, poets, musicians, singers, painters or dancers. We treat artists with the contempt they deserve and once they are safely dead and buried, bring out bucket of adjectives and start pouring out mugs of accolades. Not that Madam was treated with contempt. You wouldn’t have survived her response. If anything she had the last laugh and the best of the many commercial deals she cut with the great sharks. She was charming and a savvy business woman with great negotiating skills.

I remember meeting Madam around 1993 for a concert that never materialized when after having successfully (was there any other way?) negotiated a goodly sum of money for appearing, she relaxed and between pouts and flickering of eyelashes laid it on about the indifference she constantly encountered. She said that while the government in India had granted a permanent NOC to Lata, who could travel in and out of India, she was constantly bumped from one government nobody to another, just to get a paper stamped – or more likely three since no official can work here except in triplicate. In her inimitable style, she added that she was sure she would collapse in a dingy corridor and there she would lie, the Malika Tarunum of the land. Those were the days of NOCs and travel restrictions. “They don’t listen to me. Perhaps they might to you,” she said. I assured her that if anything, the chances were even less but I did write because there was no way you could promise Madam and not deliver.

I dutifully wrote, but since two and a half people read English newspapers and a quarter, if at all of that glorious number what we waffle about week after week, there was absolutely no reaction. Not that I expected Islamabad to come rushing to Liberty Market with a permanent NOC carved out of a steel block. Ms Bhutto was riding high in those days in Islamabad and I next approached somebody very close to her. “Tell Ms Bhutto to do this for Madam and the public will love her for this gesture. And the women of Pakistan will really appreciate this. If for nothing else, tell her to do it to further her image.” Like all bad ideas, this one petered out. There was no money involved and Ms Bhutto was not interested since money wasn’t involved.

Of course Madam was no saint. She was a thorough professional who punched back hard if necessary. Accused of reneging on deals especially concerts, people would invite her to a private dinner, party or a concert and then, out of the blue, announce that he would sing. She of course, refused. It wasn’t her but the shady organizers who were trying to dupe her. When she told them to take a hike, they called her names and issued false statements against her. This kind of thing infuriated her. Once having booked her for a concert – it was a six day music concert with everyone from Pakistan singing night after night with the finale being Madam’s performance, and after having deposited a heavy advance – in cash of course, with her, we then had to trudge back to her house since the concerts, organized by the Punjab government had to be cancelled at the last minute (the great Jamaat-e-Islami threatened to burn down Gaddafi Stadium since music was obscene and the work of the devil). Madam’s intelligence system had already informed her that there was a cancellation on its way. The sponsors – a shady outfit, had browbeaten us to ‘recover’ the advance and a more foolhardy venture there couldn’t have been. There was no one in living memory that had recovered an advance from Madam in similar circumstances. Madam finished the ill-advised bid with an opening salvo where she moaned that the advance was woefully short and she was about to call us for 25% more! After that we were more or less stumped. How could anyone then ask her to return the advance? We came away looking like idiots and of course she was right. She hadn’t cancelled the concert, had she? This she told us as we slunk away!

This country has no love for those who seek their fortunes painting, singing or writing. It has no time for the performing arts because it is totally confused about what attitude to take. Artists are suddenly ‘discovered’ if they make it abroad. For years Zia spoke to limited audiences, Naheed danced in shadows and musicians died in obscurity. Amanat Ali Khan, Pathany Khan and many more. Our national monuments are obscene rockets, hills of Chagai and tanks. And please let us not rename Gulberg’s Main Boulevard after Madam. She would not be amused.