Falling Heirlooms

NOVEMBER 2004 - Allama Iqbal’s crumbling house in one of the lanes of old Sialkot continues to crumble, propped up more by the few sturdy steel girders and less by the empty promises made regularly by various important people swearing allegiance to the memory of the man. Recently, the collapsing structure has been in the news again, followed by the usual nonsense about how dear that house is to all Pakistanis who love the Allama to distraction. In a few days, the issue would be shelved aside, the empty promises lost in the wind and another nail successfully hammered into our collective coffin of national demise.

In far away Ziarat, once Mr. Jinnah’s Residency and the resort where he spent the last days of his life as the disease continued to eat into his fragile body, things are no better. The Residency is in an utter state of neglect and falling apart. Years of indifference and basic attention – we are not talking of quality restoration work, have taken their toll, relentlessly. The building is showing serious cracks in the structure. The walls are decrepit, the floors caving in and the once serene gardens, sun burnt and grassless looking very much like the ruins the Residency is, whichever way you see it. For seven years, before the good Gen. Naqvi unleashed the reign of the yahoos on us, the dreaded Devolution Plan, which its flag bearers today can neither spell nor understand, the Residency was in the hands of the Governor of Baluchistan and worse hands could not have been found. From all that is visible today in Ziarat, his excellency was not interested in setting about restoring this historical building. It would not surprise anyone of us if it was found that he probably never even visited it. If he did, he must have been blindfolded by his guards otherwise how could he been there and not seen the havoc that the Residency was being subjected to? But power does make people blind particularly those who don’t deserve to be in power in the first place. Whatever it was, in the seven years of progressive rule in Quetta, just four hours away at Ziarat, nothing was done to stop the rot and start urgently needed restoration work. I suppose it would be too much to expect the Governor of Baluchistan to comprehend that had it not been for the man who lived in that derelict building once, there would have been no province for his excellency to strut about in fifty years later. However, these are subtle things lost on people who have nothing really to recommend them.

After Gen. Naqvi’s demolition squads took charge of all that they surveyed, the Residency fell from the hands of one inept lot into the hands of another inept lot. The simile about the frying pan into the fire can do scant justice to the quality of the men we are talking about. What powers the DCOs have and if they have ever heard the name of Mr. Jinnah or surmised that a man by this name did live in their midst and was clearly fond of this hideaway where he would come whenever he could, are things that we can only half guess. Certainly since the new handlers took over there has not even been a token resolution demanding funds and professional help in setting the Residency right. If such demands have been made, they must be the nation’s best-kept secret to which we mortals are not privy. The sad report that I saw mentioned that because there is no water, the lawns – well I suppose that’s what we have to call them, are parched, dusty and barren. Those who journey here deface the walls with graffiti as poetically significant as “Khuda Bux Bugti, June 2, 2001” or other equally stirring notations. Those who can’t express their identity so fluently, resort to drawings, squiggles, criss-cross patterns and plain old bold gashes with sharp knives and the like. Others, defecate here, leave all the trash they produced – empty plastic bags that refuse to die, cartons, leftover food, papers, napkins, bottles and whatever else the nation uses after it has had another heavy picnic. There is no staff worth the name to check the mass murder of this historical site. There is no gardener – let us leave it singular because how can the provincial government in Quetta spare two gardeners? The heavens would fall. There are also no sweepers or guards.

Inside the Residency, the grim hand of time and neglect is wreaking understandable havoc. The carpets are decayed and coming apart, the furniture is broken, the paint and polish peeling, the doors are broken, the locks are gone, the fittings don’t work and it would not be a surprise to learn that there is no power and the lights don’t work anyway. In a significant and ironic way, the national flag that refuses to flutter atop the Residency, is in any case, torn, discoloured, the flag post broken. The Pakistan dream in tatters so to speak. There you have it in a nutshell. In a very short time, there will be nothing left to complain about and in a few years even the memory of that house where Mr. Jinnah spent time, will be confined to the dustbin of history. It is however amazing that no funds can be spared for the Residency. Annual upkeep would not cost more than the seat belts of one of the 30 Mercedes Benz limos that are being airlifted even as we speak because security concerns are high and if we lose one of our Federal Ministers in a terrorist attack, the country could be catapulted into a very serious crisis.

As for the other liability that we have to carry, the Allama, nationwide lip service is paid to his life and achievements. Even the Vice-Chancellor wasted no time in rushing to lay a wreath at his tomb until reminded that it was not his death anniversary. However, birth or death – it really does not matter. This is ritual enacted to show the fools reading, listening and watching that those in power have their hearts in the right place – the right side I guess. What defeats me is why doesn’t the Allama’s son step in and take over the restoration and maintenance of his late father’s home? His home too one might add. Why let it slide so far? If it’s really not worth maintaining, why all the fuss all year round? I have been hearing for years that the building is about to fall. Maybe we should simply let it and be done with it. If Mr. Javed Iqbal cannot afford it, although money should hardly be a consideration, what about firebrands of the Islamic Ideology like Majeed Nizami Sahib, who carry the torch and miss no opportunity to let us know it too? Why can’t he step in? Is it that hard to galvanise a group of people to do all that is necessary? We are not asking that they plant daffodils right across the Australian continent, are we?

While we twiddle our toes, there is news on Bab-e-Pakistan due to be constructed at the site of the Refugee Camp, Walton, Lahore in 1947. The Rs.800 m project spread over 110 acres will be inaugurated on 23rd March 2005 by the President most probably. Set to symbolize the suffering of millions who arrived here homeless, the project has a serious conceptual flaw, since it is one-sided and does not take into account the millions who were uprooted from here. In these days of peace talking, surely the right thing is to build something that symbolizes what people from both sides suffered because of a line that cut across everything. A new monument that takes us ahead is good but one that harkens us to a bloody past is very debatable. In any event, we should set right what we have first before blowing money on what is hardly required today.