| June 30, 2005 | Thursday | Jumadi-ul-Awwal 22, 1426 |
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Khokrapar reopening
‘Soldiers not ready for war’
Coping with fires
Profession and practice
Streetlights
Disparity in GPA system
Budget and senior citizens
Division of subcontinent
President’s tour
Irrigation water
Privatization
Gifts: keeping track
Mr Hira Gulrajani in his letter (June 12) praised the attitude of the Quaid-i-Azam Mohammed Ali Jinnah towards the minorities.
THE press on June 23 carried reports quoting the prime minister that the final decision with regard to the laying of a gas pipeline from Iran would be taken in accordance with the national interest. The four words that have most commonly figured in the statements and speeches of the country’s public figures, as well as in official press releases and handouts, are ‘national interest’ and ‘common man’.
The statements and speeches, etc.. made by various presidents and prime ministers during Pakistan’s existence of about 58 years have always contained words to the effect that the policy decisions taken by the different governments were to safeguard the ‘national interest’ and for the good of the ‘common man’.
A few examples in this regard: the Objectives Resolution was included in the preamble of the First Constitution to protect the national interest. Later, during Gen Zia’s period, it was made a substantive part of the Constitution to safeguard the national interest. Ahmadis were declared a minority, prohibition was imposed and private assets and industry were nationalized by the government of Z.A. Bhutto to protect the national interest and for the benefit of the ‘common man’.
Later on when Gen Zia arrived on the national scene, industries were denationalized on the plea that this step was in accord with the national interest. Martial law has been imposed and lifted a number of times again in the name of protecting the national interest and to ensure the betterment of the common man.
We supported the Taliban and their regime in Afghanistan was given formal recognition as it was considered to be in Pakistan’s national interest. This policy was reversed overnight in 2001 — also in the name of national interest.
At present, privatization of national assets is being pursued at breakneck pace and the rationale given is that this is in line with the supreme national interest. I would like to point out that the greatest proponent of privatization in modern times was Lady Margaret Thatcher.
However, even she did not embark upon this policy with the haste that is being observed in Pakistan. The only explanation for the course of action adopted by our government may be that our economic managers know more about the process of privatization and are more committed to serve the ‘national interest’ and the ‘common man’ than their counterparts in the UK or other countries.
In short, the words national interest and common man are bandied about by our public figures ad nauseum.
Strangely, there has been no attempt to define the ‘national interest’. I wonder whether national interest is independent of the policies being adopted by the governments that happen to be in power at a particular time. Or is national interest is what a particular government of the time so declares? Is national interest an abstract concept or a value one which is grounded in objective conditions of our country?
NASIRUDDIN KHALID
Islamabad
THE Association of Peoples of Asia, Sindh chapter, has requested the prime ministers of Pakistan and India to reopen the Indian consulate in Karachi without delay and the Khokrapar-Monabao link as soon as possible. Similar requests and demands have appeared from other organizations and individuals.
As of now people have to go first to Islamabad for an Indian visa and then to Lahore for onward journey into India which is a vast country. This involves unnecessary expenditure for basically lower and lower-middle class people. Someone going, for instance, to Agra will first have to travel to Islamabad for his visa and stay there for two or three days. If he gets a visa, he will go to Lahore and stay there for another two or three days to get a seat on the Samjhota Express. Thereafter, he will travel through almost all of UP to reach Agra, which borders Rajasthan. This journey is three times longer and costlier as compared to Sindh-Rajasthan travel — Hyderabad-Mirpurkhas-Khokrapar /Monabao- Jaipur-Agra.
Opening a consulate in Karachi will cater for Sindh and Balochistan visa requirements. India can also open another consulate in Lahore to cater for the Frontier and Punjab. This will greatly reduce the enormous workload on the Indian high commission in Islamabad.
I suggest another concession. The Indians had announced last year that senior citizens of over 55 years of age will have easier travel facilities and get preferential treatment. I request that both governments should announce a concession of 50 per cent on railway fare, if not the air fare, for senior citizens.
S.M.KAZIM NAQVI
Karachi
“UK army not ready for war” — 38 per cent of its forces suffer serious weakness in their readiness level and two per cent were labelled as critical”. This is the finding of the British national audit office, a public spending watchdog (Dawn, June 16).
In the recent past, a US commander remarked after the deployment of the US army reserve in Afghanistan and Iraq that it is rapidly turning into a broken force and may not be able to meet its optional requirements in future (Dawn, Jan 7).
Several hundred US soldiers in Iraq have undergone psychiatric care, some have fled to Canada with their families seeking asylum, some filed law suits against the Pentagon for the period of their overstay in Iraq, etc.
The truth is that the soldiers have never liked what they are doing in Iraq and Afghanistan. Besides, after 9/11, the world has changed in many respects and values and systems have changed and so also the soldiers’ outlook on war. It is difficult to believe that the soldiers can be separated from the changes as, after all, they are human beings who think, understand and can decide things for themselves.
The information explosion the world over has made people, including soldiers, more knowledgeable and enlightened than their predecessors. We all believe in better and more peaceful lives than our predecessors, that peace will prevail over war, and that dialogue and cooperation will be the key policy of nations.
This explain why young US boys and girls are now less interested in joining their armed forces than their parents were.
Z.A. KAZMI
Karachi
THE report ‘City buildings ill-equipped to cope with fires (June 25) by Mr S. Raza Hassan is 100 per cent correct.
The law that governs is the Karachi Building and Town Planning Regulations (KBTPR) 2002, chapter 13 which clearly lays down the law that buildings which are ground plus three stories or above need to have the following (the 1979 KBTPR also had similar mandatory requirements):
a. Stand pipes system
b. Installation of an interior fire alarm system (it is also states that all schools having more than 30 students must have an interior fire alarm system).
c. Signal stations
d. The structure must meet fire resistance requirements and standards and, most important, there must be fire exits from these buildings. This was not done in the past nor is being done today in the buildings being built in Karachi. The CDGK commercialization policy does not meet these mandatory requirements. There is no provision for any sub-stations, etc. Basically, each and every law which safeguards life, property and environment is violated for money.
The responsible department is the master plan group of offices, the CDGK and the Karachi Building Control Authority. The KBCA chief’s statement that they only inspect a site after completion is correct. The law states that the KBCA has to check the site at each stage and verify. He is stating what they really do, i.e., look the other way.
Shehri has been shouting hoarse about these very issues. Only the consumer and sovereign citizen of this country and city can stop it. Demand safe and healthy living conditions. if the people continue to accept a fire/death trap condition, the builders/policymakers will continue to give it to them.
MRS AMBER ALIBHAI
General Secretary, Shehri-CBE, Karachi
PRIME Minister Shaukat Aziz has said (Dawn, June 22) the benefits of economic development will reach the common man by ensuring fiscal discipline and transparency by following principles of good governance. But where are these noble virtues? Fiscal discipline, transparency and good governance have never existed in Pakistan’s 58 years. There has been loot and plunder all around.
There is massive corruption. Corruption and poverty go together. Nothing grows under the shadow of corruption. Against the prime minister’s insistence on following fiscal discipline, please look at the following:
a. The prime minister is heading a cabinet of about 70 ministers, ministers of state, advisers and others (some of them known loan defaulters, etc,) even when seven would do the same jobs efficiently.
b. Buying bullet-proof luxury cars at exorbitant cost. The latest instance being the speaker of the National Assembly shopping himself a Rs11-million luxury car.
c. Umra trips by the prime minister and others with planeloads of free loaders.
d. Allotment of costly government land/plots to favourites at cheap rates.
e. Frequent foreign trips by the president, the prime minister and others with planeloads of followers.
Has our prime minister ever walked into a katchi abadi to see himself how the poorest live? The gap between the rich and the poor is too wide. In the existing situation, it is time to create opportunities for the poor to survive.
ABDUL SAMAD KHAN
Karachi
THE streetlights at the junction of Ruby Street and the Baloch football ground facing the Platinum Colony in Garden West, Karachi, have been out of order for some time now, plunging the entire area in darkness.
The area is thickly populated, with several residential buildings converging on the dark strip of the street where all types of vehicles ply at all hours of the day and the night. Hence all, particularly the old and infirm and worshippers going to the area mosque, are at great risk, specially at dawn and dusk.
We request the KESC authorities to immediately set the streetlights right.
RESIDENTS
Karachi
THE attention of the Higher Education Commission, the ministry of education and other relevant authorities is drawn towards an important issue that is directly affecting many students in our country — the dissimilar grade point average (GPA) system adopted by various universities and business institutions.
The GPA system for evaluating and grading a student’s academic performance is not uniform in our universities and business schools. For example: IBA Karachi maintains 3.0 GPA at 83 per cent to 86 per cent marks, CBM Karachi 3.0 GPA at 75 per cent to 86 per cent marks, Sindh University, Jamshoro, 3.0 GPA at 71 per cent to 86 per cent marks, Karachi University 3.0 GPA at 71 per cent to 74 per cent marks, the QAU, Islamabad, 3.0 GPA at 65 per cent to 79 per cent marks, and Shah Latif University, Khairpur, 3.0 GPA at 55 per cent to 69 per cent marks
This dissimilar GPA system is directly affecting good students from securing jobs in the marketplace. I have an MBA finance degree from IBA Sukkur (affiliated to IBA Karachi) with 82 per cent marks and a GPA of 2.75, and am myself a victim. I could not qualify at the recent recruitment of management trainees at NBP (although I qualified for all the selection process) because of this dissimilar GPA system. I was rejected from NBP because I secured 2.75 GPA (equivalent to 3.65 GPA of Karachi University) against the selection criteria of 3.0 GPA as set by the NBP management despite the fact that the GPA system is not uniform in our country. And in this way deserving candidates or candidates securing higher percentages are forced to remain out of job and are discriminated on the basis of dissimilar grading system for which they are in any way not at fault.
I request the authorities concerned to standardize the GPA system in the universities and business institutions so that talented and hard working candidates can get the jobs they deserve in our corporations. That is the only way we can retain our graduates and discourage a brain drain from our country.
IMRAN KHAN SHAIKH
Karachi
AT A meeting of representatives of NGOs working for senior citizens, it was strongly felt that senior citizens who now form 10 per cent of the population have been ignored in the new budget. Only government pensioners have been given a paltry raise of 10 per cent in their pensions which will be eaten up by the 12 per cent inflation.
The members felt that even though the joint family system provides a social security net to the elderly, their most pressing need for medicare cannot be met by the younger generation, specially during illnesses like Alzheimer’s disease.
It was resolved that:
a. The government should reserve at least five beds for senior citizens in every ward of general hospitals in the province at all levels.
b. Wherever possible, a special geriatric ward should be established in general hospitals in the province
c. All senior citizens who are ill should be provided medicines at subsidized rates of at least 50 per cent.
d. Disparities between various categories of government pensioners should be narrowed down so that all retired people may get an equitable amount of pensions to meet the rising cost of living.
MRS SHIREEN
REHMATULLAH
Karachi
I remember an incident that took place on January 5, 1948. I was going to my office near the Masjid-i-Khizra when some acquaintances stopped me and took me to a corner of an office block. They showed me their “catch” locked in the toilet. I reprimanded them and asked that the young girl in a white sari be released.
On failing to convince them, I went straight to the boss for help. He immediately rang up some high-ups and upon my return I found that the girl had been released. The next day I heard that the Quaid was very upset. In a strongly worded directive he ordered that all looted material be deposited in nearby mosques.
A lot of furniture and electrical appliances were piled up in the courtyard of the Jacob Lines mosque.
The Hindus were thus able to retrieve their belongings. Here I would mention that the Quaid had camped in Lahore to ensure that normality returned.
S. FARID AHMAD
Karachi
BRITAIN ruled the world with treachery and firepower. America is ruling the globe through ‘might is right’.
President Gen Musharraf seeks to rule the world simply through his foreign trips. His mission has taken him to almost every nook and corner of this planet, but it is costing this debt-ridden country billions of rupees where more than half the population still lives below the poverty line.
As a worried Pakistani, I will request the president to take a round-the-world-trip, along with his side-kicks, so that he could accomplish his cherished goal in one go.
In doing so, the president will be able to save many more billions of rupees which could be utilized in providing such basic facilities as electricity and clean drinking water to millions of suffering Pakistanis.
REHAN SIDDIQUI
Karachi
RAUNTI minor (Ghotki taluka) that is fed by the Ghotki feeder (Canal) has been without water for several years. Owing to the non-flow of water in the minor, it is filled with wild bushes. Thousands of acres of fertile land, which was irrigated by the minor, has turned into desert. Economic activities in the area have received a setback. The underground water is sweet but, thanks to spiralling oil prices, growers cannot install oil- engines. Even then, tapedars come to receive all agriculture taxes.
The growers of this area appeal to the Sindh irrigation minister, who is also the elected representative of Ghotki, to look into the plight of the growers and issue orders for desilting and cleansing of the minor to ensure proper flow of water into the minor to save the growers from being ruined.
Besides, the minister should visit the affected area and personally observe the condition of the helpless growers and the minor.
AGHA ALI GOHAR KHAN
Ghotki
THE expression ‘privatization’, as it has come to be used today, means deregulation, implying removing the control of government. Just as the word ‘government’ connotes an organization belonging to a country, similarly privatization should carry with it the hallmark of nationhood. In this context whenever an institution is privatized, the process of privatization should be confined to Pakistanis. In fact, no foreign country, however friendly it may be to Pakistan, should be allowed to participate in the privatization process. After all, monetary consideration cannot be a factor when national pride is involved.
In this context it can be said that the privatization process of the PTCL appears to have been wrong, because it has transgressed the limit of national pride by giving the control of an important institution to a foreign country, friendship notwithstanding. Such a trend in privatization process should be curbed, in fact banned altogether, otherwise history may repeat itself when we will be confronted with another East India Company situation which led to British rule in the then undivided India.
A.M. SAYIED
Karachi
THE top dignitaries of so many countries who frequently visit each other obviously exchange gifts which have got to be of some significance and cost. The gifts to be given out must be paid from the government account but what happens to the gifts received? Is there any established precedent of keeping an account of these and whose property do they ultimately become?
May I request those in government to help me?
A.B.S. JAFRI
Lahore
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