ARMY housing, and the real estate business in general, is an industry like no other in Pakistan. The fastest bucks are turned here which explains why so many ex-army officers are distinguished realtors. So many indeed that the time may have come to consider teaching real estate as a separate subject in the Pakistan Military Academy, Kakul.

We may be begging the Americans for F-16s and there may be more admirals than ships in the navy — and, come to think of it, more air marshals than fighter squadrons in the air force — but when it comes to creating comfy nest eggs for senior military officers, patriotic hearts and minds can rest assured we beat other militaries hollow.

At an Indo-Pak talking shop in Islamabad a couple of summers ago, I met a Lt Gen Oberoi from the Indian army (I forget his first name) who told me that when he was director-general, military operations, in Delhi, his counterpart in ‘Pindi was Lt Gen Pervez Musharraf.

I couldn’t help saying that this just went to show how much better off we were than India. In India, DG, Mily Ops, usually remained just that. In Pakistan they had the option of becoming presidents of the republic.

The connection between military upper mobility and the gigantic strides taken by defence housing is obvious. The military’s commanding position on the national horizon is the key factor pushing military privilege.

Just a month ago while on a freebie trip to Sri Lanka, for one of those inevitable seminars on Indo-Pak relations, I asked Lt Gen Sarabjeet Chahal who had just retired from the Indian army — his last posting commandant of the National Defence College — whether he had a house given him by the army. No, but on his own he had bought a house in Gurgaon, South Delhi, for good measure adding that their housing policy was lousy.

It set me thinking about the great progress in this sector on our side of the border. A retiring general not only has a house, if he’s worth his salt, he has several, besides residential plots in cities here and there and the obligatory 50 acres of agricultural land which every general, admiral and air marshal thinks it his birthright to be gifted with in Bahawalpur.

Unless born unlucky, he’ll also have a job in Fauji Foundation, Army Welfare Trust, or the hundred other avenues for employment now open to the fighting senior ranks of the Pakistani military. Gen McArthur could have had no idea what his famous observation would mean in Pakistan: soldiers don’t die, they fade away. We’ve done a variation on this theme, senior soldiers, in one form or another, sticking around forever.

And we are worried about the president’s uniform. As if his taking it off would usher in the democratic revolution we all await. Parliamentary democracy is now in such a state, call it mauled, that it seems no better than an adjunct or extension of General Headquarters. There is a directorate-general for everything in GHQ. Why not, in the fullness of time, a DG Democracy?

But to return to defence housing. As you approach ‘Pindi from the south along the Grand Trunk Road, in the fork formed by the road to ‘Pindi and the road to Islamabad a massive defence housing project is coming up, its scale so impressive that it appears to dwarf all other national endeavours.

A more effective recruiting poster for PMA, Kakul, would be hard to imagine. For this great adventure in housing tells you two things at once: where real power lies and which is the surest ladder to success in this country established, as we never tire of reminding ourselves, for the greater glory of Islam.

Defence housing societies in Karachi and Lahore are tucked away in relatively far-off corners. This one hits you smack in the eye for it guards the approaches to ‘Pindi, a defence housing colony with its camouflage off, so to speak.

Gen Musharraf said some time ago in Karachi that the army did housing schemes better than anyone else, which was the reason why houses or plots in them fetched such handsome prices — excellence, in other words, earning its just rewards.

Truer words were never spoken. For housing colonies threaten to become the military’s leading specialty, quite beyond anything to do with tanks, artillery or other aspects of military professionalism: the one field mastered above all others.

In a way this is good for it makes the Pak military about the strongest factor for peace in the subcontinent. A military into housing in such robust fashion is a military that much less inclined to jump into battle for the right or wrong reasons.

Our peace overtures to India — aka the fine art of unilateral concessionism, whereby we make all the concessions while India looks on impassively in the confident expectation of more — thus have a solid underpinning.

Even the Americans, our godfathers in the peace process, couldn’t have figured this one out — that the way to subcontinental peace runs through Pakistan’s defence housing societies.

Now for a digression: competing with the army in the real estate business is someone for whose entrepreneurial ability my admiration knows no bounds, Malik Riaz of Bahria Town, whose success in this field has been phenomenal. If while approaching Pindi and Islamabad you see signs proclaiming the budding wonders of Defence Phase 1 or 2, there are an equal number pointing to the glories of Bahria Town.

Bahria means navy and when the scheme was first floated people thought the navy was behind it, resulting in a mad scramble for applications and plots. Of course the navy had nothing to do with it, but the person who should have challenged the misperception did nothing about it: Pakistan’s most famous naval chief, Grand Admiral Mansoorul Haq, subsequently jailed for corruption in the famous “submarine commission” case.

Later, much later, the navy went to court contesting Malik Riaz’s right to use the name “bahria”. While the case is still pending Malik Riaz continues as proprietor of the “bahria” housing label, this in a country where it has never been easy to run afoul of the defence establishment. This should give some idea of the clout this Pakistani Donald Trump enjoys.

A couple of months ago at a function in ‘Pindi a retired lieutenant-general from Chakwal came up to me and said that his land had been forcibly occupied by Bahria Town. I asked in amazement, “In Pakistan a lieutenant-general’s land forcibly occupied?” Former army chief, Gen Aslam Beg, who was standing nearby, said, “If the presidency can be occupied, why not some land?”

A smart thrust, admittedly, but one which I thought missed the point. I was expressing astonishment not at the army’s competence in seizing the presidency — no surprises there — but at a private individual’s ability to mess with a retired lieutenant-general. Then remembering that this particular officer was on the wrong side of events on October 12, 1999 — one of the very few officers who went along with Gen Ziauddin Butt’s appointment as army chief by Mian Nawaz Sharif — I understood.

When the tables were turned on Gen Butt — my Lawrence College schoolmate, Lt Gen Mahmood of 10 Corps, leading the pro-Musharraf assault on the Prime Minister’s House — there could be no greater sin than association with the defeated Butt. With an Achilles’ heel like this, it must have been easy to take advantage of the hapless general. (Lesson for all generals: never be on the losing side.)

Some months ago, however, Bahria Town outdid itself by taking out half-page ads in leading newspapers proclaiming the opening of a special executive sector for distinguished citizens ‘who had made a name for themselves in national life’.

In this sector 100 plots were said to be reserved for military personnel, 100 for the higher judiciary, 100 for senior mandarins and, something which met with my wholehearted approval, 100 for senior journalists. What’s more, all at half the prevailing price.

Splashed for a few days, this ad was suddenly withdrawn, never to be displayed again. I hate to think that Bahria Town for once lost its nerve.