ONE recently learned from the works of an erudite, and a very hardworking etymologist, Shakil Chaudhry, that the correct translation of the Urdu word ‘takiya kalam’ was ‘pet phrase.’ It looks to have solved a problem of sorts that people would keep stumbling upon every now and then, and quite often leaving them bewildered. For instance, Pakistan’s peerless former interior minister, Rehman Malik, had a pet phrase ‘categorically’ stuck ineluctably to his tongue.

The gentleman appeared helplessly convinced that his word would not be believed unless he rhymed it with ‘categorically’ in his chaste Punjabi language. ‘I categorically deny,’ the echoes of the oft repeated statement still seems suspended in the country’s air, thick with rumours, doubts, suspicions and lingering uncertainty. The gentleman, however, was never heard saying, ‘I categorically admit.’

But in all fairness Rehman Malik will not be remembered as the only person who incessantly harped on the word to lend credence to his plethora of statements and misstatements. In Pakistan everything that is done, or undone, by persons of all manners in positions of power and authority has to be categorical or nothing. People, both in the public and private sectors love to play with fashionable words not only to flaunt their superficial and ostentatious knowledge but also to cover up their inefficiencies and their poor understanding of the ground realities.

Paradigm shift, software park, web portal, advocacy, monitoring and evaluation, workshop, development modules and rethinking development are some of the catchy words in the repertoire of the con men which they could be seen employing to their last limits without translating them into reality as far as public good is concerned. Thus quoting Rehman Malik’s pet phrase, it would be nothing less than a timely exercise to draft categorical definitions of development terminology as it is applied in Pakistan.

Project Cycle: A project is for a limited period of time meaning thereby that it has to be completed in the stipulated time period after it is approved in the PC-I form by the authority concerned. The feasibility report of the project is prepared in PC-11 form and passing through various phases the cycle comes to a stop with the submission of a final report in form PC-V.

In Pakistan those tasked with the execution of the project take the word cycle in its literal meaning as slow moving mechanical device and hence do not mind if the project cycle keeps moving at its own sweet will beyond its lawful lifetime.

Some of the examples of this static view of the project cycle are the Hassanabdal Mansehra Express Way, the Peshawar Ring Road, the Lowari Tunnel, the Jamrud Road underpasses and the long awaited Peshawar Sanitation and Traffic Projects. All these projects have tested the patience of the people likely to benefit from them beyond the endurance level.

Survey: Survey in the context of Pakistan assumed an altogether different dimension after the British government recently confessed to be the financier of a regular series of surveys in the tribal areas of Pakistan with a view to finding out the response of the tribal people to the US drone strikes. The latest round of survey found 63 per cent of the tribal people, up from 59 per cent saying nay to the drones.

Such scientific precision in the tribal areas where a war is raging has left the observers numb and speechless. It is beyond comprehension what pervert pleasure Britain aims to derive from such a flawed and doubtful exercise since Britain which is a US ally in the war against terrorism and which has never been heard as much as yapping or even meowing to any US misadventure in the world. British government, or MI5, then splashes such survey reports in glitzy hardbound covers in showy events.

Monitoring and Evaluation: People tasked with the monitoring and evaluation of works in Pakistan look at and perform the assigned job in the manner of their school days’ monitoring; no record of monitoring is maintained, neither any evaluation report is prepared after the school timings are over. Such facile jobs are not on offer anywhere else in the world.

No doubt then that an earthquake of 6 magnitudes on the Richter scale brings down all public structures like cardboard tenements in a wind, and the country has to suffer power outages for 12 to 18 hours daily.

Skill Development: Pakistan has only just discovered the relevance of manual skill development, and hence both the developers and the beneficiaries appear to have been left wonderstruck by its latent windfalls. Since both the donors and recipients draw unimaginable satisfaction from the numbers, it is quantity rather than quality that is guiding the policy makers.

Both the milling jobless targeted youth and the planners appear to be interested only in the short term gains of a stipend for a few months as against the long term benefits of imparting and learning a profitable skill. Scientific tracer studies like monitoring and evaluation are hardly carried out to find the true fruits of the projects.

Human Resource Development: It must now be read as human liabilities adjustments to find resonance with Pakistan’s predicament in this vital field. The problem is rooted in Pakistan’s faulty civil service which keeps ludicrously priding itself on its colonial legacy. In the highly competitive 21st century, the mechanics in Pakistan’s civil service are still manufacturing square pegs for round holes. There is a glut of non-professional personnel in Pakistan’s bureaucratic corridors who are being shoved in every conceivable slot of which they may not have the slightest idea.

Consultant: A little less than sixty years ago, Qurratul Ayn Haider in her timeless novel ‘Aag Ka Darya’ wondered what magical powers the platoons of consultants or advisors were endowed with in the newly created country to merit their appointments.

The baneful descriptions has not only stayed but has got worsened over the following decades with the good for nothing consultants raking in more and more dividends to the eternal loss of an Categorical definitions of development unwary citizenry. A consultant is more often than not a wizened and vastly opinionated gentleman who having failed in his earlier stint of over three decade long stint insists on staying in the fray at all costs.

Consultancy: In Pakistan a consultancy is normally awarded to a blue eyed person although he or she may be the least qualified of all contenders. Computer and information technology and the popular tools of cut and paste have made the jobs of the consultants all that much less cumbersome. Experience in the relevant field is not required. In many cases the consultant’s report does not see the light of the day. This is particularly true in the case of Pakistan’s troubled tribal areas. Scores of reports outsourced at millions of rupees during the last few years have been confined to the shelves without as much as even a cursory reading by the hiring agencies. The reports based on secondary information and lacking substance and depth perhaps deserve such callous treatment.

Workshop: Workshops held mostly in five star hotels provide much needed rest and recreation both to the donors and the recipient agencies. In many cases the services of dilettante events managers are hired to keep the participants engaged. At one such workshop arranged by the USAID, the event manager who probably had never stepped into the tribal areas asked the participants what they preferred should be prioritised for the tribal land: purchase of hardware or establishment of a software park?

Rethinking development: Rethinking development is the favourite subject of planners and economists in Pakistan. If what we see in today’s Pakistan is the result of earlier thinking then the prospects look gloomier indeed; more rethinking is apt to lead to more inaction, more inefficiency and even poorer development.