Lust for Life ?

JANUARY 2000 - Had Mrs. Tony Blair been living in Pakistan, she needn’t have paid a fine for boarding a train without a ticket. The very thought is ludicrous. Firstly, she wouldn’t have been on a train – any train. Royalty in Pakistan never ever travel by train unless they have the entire train to themselves and their camp followers, complete with top class cuisine and all the creature comforts. Secondly, any foolish ticket collector who would have dared challenge the first lady would have had his head chopped off in half a second. The very thought of checking any one in power is probably a punishable offence now. Thirdly, she would have simply sailed through followed by forty five thousand sycophants in hot pursuit. No, Cherie would have never ever been held up a lowly ticket collector.

But then Mrs. Tony Blair is the wife of the Prime Minister of Britain. She is not Benazir Bhutto and neither is her husband Nawaz Sharif or General Zia ul Haq or the many other bright lights which have dimmed our future. She is a commoner, wife of an elected representative of the people and very much restricted by rules and regulations that apply to al those who live in Britain. When Monica Lewinsky was taking oral lessons in instant diplomacy and the whole world went crazy with President Clinton eating many humble pies while groveling in the dust, there was mild amusement in Pakistan amongst the country’s blue-blooded rulers. They were amused that the leader of the most powerful nation had been brought to his feet by what was after all just a little mischief. They clicked their tongues knowing that a hundred Monicas were servicing a hundred legislators daily and at the drop of a hat – or whatever it is that drops on such occasions.

They knew that orgies on a scale Bill Clinton couldn’t even dream of, were enacted nightly at dozens of rest houses, VIP cottages, State Guest Houses, 5-star hotel suites and other dens of pleasure. Here ministers, top brass, civil and khaki, business tycoons, fly by night operators and other shady notables, legislators, judicial riff raff and still others who live in the happy twilight zone of corruption, mixed happily in one long heady surrender to sins of the most carnal variety. Maulana Sami ul Haq, torch bearer and inspirational figure to many who aspire to perfect the art of the delectable sandwich, was to such gentle folks, a hero and a man to follow. Of course, many of those who were lost, entwined amongst long-limbed and doe eyed sex sirens, were sure that in the Maulana they had a mentor, whose nimble exploits and daring physical flexibility was an act they could aspire to follow. But the good Maulana was only one of the torch bearers. There were many and just as many were the nation’s good suppliers and pimps who made fortunes feeding off the lust of those who believed these privileges were theirs by right.

In the mornings, after having had a marathon innings in various king sized beds across the land of the pure, they attended to other matters, presiding over sessions devoted to Islamic jurisprudence, or the question of riba and on a higher moral level, the state of the nation’s morality. With lush and flowing beards, gleaming and lustrous with all the attention given to them, they would wax eloquently over the need for a strong moral fibre – theirs having shredded faster than the eye could register. There were even more who were not even burdened with such flowing mantles. But that touch of outward piety not gracing their faces was in no way a disqualification because they too sermonized on and on, about virtue, truth, justice, dignity and all the other things which make nights boring in VIP Cottages. And just when things were too hot and the call girls, local lasses with peroxide tresses and the genuine blondes from the Central Asian States were taking up too much of their time, day and night (and in between), there were the celestial getaways to soothe the soul- the Umrahs performed with utmost devotion twice, thrice and four times every year. Here, they supplicated themselves before a higher power and having cleansed the soul, returned with greater purpose to sink into sin- till the next time.

If this reads like a bad portion of a Harold Robbins novel or Sidney Sheldon’s latest offering, banish the thought. Pakistan is no fiction country. Public morality has always been a dispensable commodity and in the hands of its rulers, the country has slid further and further down that murky slope. Sins of the flesh have been one thing. Drinking has been another. There are too many stories that have surfaced from time to time, from every conceivable area in Pakistan. In Azad Kashmir they were rollicking in guest houses, drinking the finest stuff and savouring the choicest pieces flown in, while across the border, Kashmiris died. But if you talked to these ‘freedom’ fighters, they could knock you down with their speeches of high resolve and sacrifices. Those who were not into flesh and wine, were making hay through lucrative contracts and deals. The only thing you needed was to be undeserving. The rest was manipulation. It was thus not uncommon to run into these new symbols of our resurgence at airports, hotels and public places amidst their threatening bellows of, ‘Don’t you know who I am?’ a line I am convinced that’s spoken thousands of times across the land daily. Flouting authority and rules that lay in tatters any way, they rode across every obstacle without the slightest respect for any law. It was as if they owned the country and in a very real sense of the word, they did. When President Leghari went to the States to attend his son’s graduation, he took along an entourage that embarrassed even the diehard Pakistani officials who were at the receiving end of such trips of megalomania. The country ran up huge bills just paying for the parking of His Excellency’s plane, not to mention the limos, the hotels and the parties that followed. Later, the same patriot flew in a commandeered PIA plane all the way to New Zealand to attend the Commonwealth Conference blowing millions of this impoverished country’s resources since he could not bear the thought of a commercial flight. When his engine fell off near Darwin, he was grounded but only till another PIA plane flew there to fetch his lordship. He still did not take a commercial flight. Today, he preaches austerity and the need to support his party for a great Pakistan. Hallelujah.

Which brings us back to Mrs. Blair. Well she paid a ten pound fine in addition to the 9.60 pound fare (since she didn’t have enough money in her bag !!!). When was the last time Ms. Bhutto or indeed Mian Sahib, bought a litre of gasoline and paid for it ? Mrs. Blair should have married a Pakistani politician. Silly lady.