The More Things Change…..

DECEMBER 2000 - In Pakistan, progress is usually confined to the three or four large cities and within those, to a few select areas, where those who matter either live or are expected to travel through. So while many people in Lahore particularly, were full of praise for the revolutionary steps that Shahbaz Sharif took in making Gulberg’s main boulevard, wide enough and smooth enough for Formula One racing, some of us were not impressed. In the end such show piece projects benefit the select few, who in any case hardly feel the bumps and jumps seated as they usually are in large and sleek limos. For them, the smooth carpeting on this boulevard meant even lesser time to commute between homes or offices and such places as the Punjab Club, the Provincial Assembly and the Lahore Airport. In due time, we discovered that the huge funding that made imported date palms a possibility, were all sucked out from such unattractive and low profile areas like health, social welfare, education,etc.

Mian Shahbaz Sharif may have been a dynamic Chief Minister, but in the end he simply took desperately needed funds from a starved social sector and poured it on roads and avenues and plush landscaping. How did this benefit the rest of the poor people who also throng the Punjab province and struggle to find roads that aren’t littered with craters, street lamps that aren’t minus lamps and sometimes streets as well. As for ornamental date palms airlifted from Brunei (we were proudly informed in those days), what can one say except to gape in horror at what madness possesses those in power. Lahore may have a few smooth roads, but it also has one of the highest pollution levels in the world. This is great. The same stupid thinking gripped SS’s elder brother who equated wide roads with progress and prosperity. We can all zing to Islamabad in our VTIs at a speed that till recently was equated with Fokker aircraft taking off, but the motorway has done nothing for the country except mired it further in debt. As it loses money daily with vehicular traffic moving along in sparse formation, the folly of our leaders has been left for a financially bankrupt country to haul on its broken shoulders – if you will excuse the purple prose. Perhaps Merc travellers, viewing the rolling landscape of the flat plains of the Punjab or the rugged beauty of the Salt Range from behind that fabled triangle, can be forgiven for praising the foresight of the Mian brothers, but it is a disaster, all 339 kilometres of it as indeed is the Gulberg Boulevard. A few months ago, two aged citizens were mowed down in front of Lahore’s largest department store, in an accident that was rather symbolic. In the world of the Mians and leaders of that mind set, there was no room for pedestrians. Only 4 by 4s and 4200 cc cars. Those who lived on the roads, died on the roads.

Which brings us to the rather bizarre sight of gaily painted yellow machines of various descriptions that are seen on any late morning in the large cities where the people of Pakistan reside; those in villages and small towns are not worth noting. As the brushes go round and round picking up flecks of dust from the edges of the roads and other machines water green belts and happy flowers, while still other machines, sprinkle roads and avenues, it is not hard to understand that this is the core philosophy that drives Pakistan – to destruction surely but then those who are the authors of these lopsided and demented schemes, are living only for the moment – their moment. Posterity ? They don’t even know what the word means. This is a society run by people who are not interested in tomorrow. Firstly, what logic creates a situation where mechanised implements are put to use in a country which specialises in cheap human labour ? We all know that the answer to that silly observation is that when was logic necessary to form policies or take steps ? The argument that the squadrons of sweepers on the payrolls of municipal corporations were forever absent from their duties, is no argument. The corruption and inefficiency of the administrators of the corporations was used to import expensive and totally unnecessary machines. The same weird logic or whatever word describes the senseless state of mind that grips Pakistani officialdom is now being unleashed by having machines scan passports at airports. Countries which use such modern techniques usually do so having enough money to spend and not enough people to employ at economical rates. We have neither so we import the expensive machines, lay off thousands and add to the crime, economic deprivation and so on, making sure that machines and not human beings can scan your passports. This is madness but this is official policy. It obviously makes sense in Islamabad.

While those of us who live in the larger cities and privileged areas within these cities, can happily tool off to work passing glistening machines shining our shining roads, it is strange that the authorities see it perfectly fit to launch their cleaning, mopping and watering operations round about 9 am. Right bang smack in the middle of the traffic lanes will be huge yellow trucks coming from the opposite direction sprinkling the roadside. Why these gentle folk cannot be at work before 7 am escapes explanation. Perhaps there is some logic here as well. Of course there is no such conflict at work in the bulk of the country, where people still live in the last century and even beyond that. Whatever has passed for progress in some parts of the country has not even brushed past our people. Ayaz Amir rightly said two weeks back that Chakwal and Lahore were not any different since in neither place could one hear Wagner or see good theatre. The stark contrast that makes up life in Pakistan is beyond belief at most times and each successive government seems to drift further and further away from ground realities. Our priorities, official and private, are centred around the most artificial things, which may make Lahore better than parts of India, but in the final analysis is still far from satisfactory. It is these lopsided priorities that force people to drive their children – those who can afford a car, to school and back. Since the country, by and large, has no reliable public transport worth the name, parents are forced to do the school run. So you get traffic jams every day in the morning and the afternoon, as the one car-one child syndrome makes for blocked roads and violent tempers. Surely all parents would happily let a school bus take their children to and from school, but in the absence of such a basic facility, there is no option but to add to the lines, stay parked with engines running, burning money and adding to the pollution of the already polluted environment. Even as we multiply and travel swiftly to the 150 million mark, there is no sight of a public transport system and there isn’t one on paper either. While other countries have invested in such things, we have frittered our scarce resources on ornamental fountains, imported palms and monstrous buildings housing some very small and insecure men and women.

Are things ever going to change ? Surely the signs are in the other direction. We have so much going for us even as we continue going down, but when will there be a leadership that will for once put its nose to the ground and proceed to move from there. All we have is people who are propelled into power which they do not deserve and whose short sighted and foolish thinking further erodes our slim chances of progress.