The coercive apparatus of the government was available to keep the press obedient. One of the most effective ways of doing so was to withdraw patronage. The government itself was the country’s heaviest advertiser and ‘naughty’ newspapers found their revenues drying up. This was a way of applying sanctions.
PIA escaped this pressure. But our time came. Ayub Khan had gone to East Pakistan and had been greeted with some sharp editorial comments, not exactly calls to storm the Bastille, but criticism that bruised the vanity of the regime rather than menaced its power. Unfortunately, PIA advertisements appeared on the same day in three newspapers, The Pakistan Observer, Sangbad and Ittefaq — all leading dailies but the ones tilting at windmills.
I can well imagine the scene. Ayub’s think-tank led by the Governor of East Pakistan (Abdul Monem Khan?) demanding (in their practised, toady way) that action be taken against PIA for ‘trading with the enemy’. Sure enough, I received instructions that henceforth and till further notice, PIA would not release advertisements to these three newspapers.
I was alarmed. PIA was a commercial organization. It played no political role. The press had been supportive of PIA in East Pakistan. Why should we take on board government directives? PIA worked with professional advertising agencies and we did not want to go against their media recommendations. But there was an even greater danger, the danger of the camel getting one foot in the tent. I went to Nur Khan. He agreed with me and told me to give him a paper on why PIA should not be made an instrument in the muzzling of the press. I wrote a strong note and inter alia pointed out that the newspapers were not likely to fold up if PIA withdrew its advertisements, but PIA would make permanent enemies. Nur Khan took the note to Ayub Khan with whom he had an excellent equation. To Ayub’s credit, he lifted the ban and the Ministry of Information got off our back.
PIA had entered the jet-age. It did so by leasing a Boeing 707 from Pan-Am. It was a dry lease which meant that the cockpit and cabin crews were of PIA. On the face of it, it was a risky operation, for if the aircraft had developed technical snags, the pure-jet operation would come to a standstill. But so good was the engineering support, that that single Boeing 707 achieved a punctuality record far better than PIA’s other aircraft, and we were now flying to New York.
But PIA had placed an order for a Boeing 720B and we were ready to take delivery. I flew to Seattle and took some journalists with me. It was winter and New York was snow-bound. We couldn’t leave for Seattle and remained confined to our hotel. Shamim D. Ahmed was our New York manager, and he invited the journalists to his flat for coffee. The journalists had gotten sullen, somehow blaming me for the bad weather. Shamim was an impeccable host, and asked the journalists what they wanted to drink. One of them, from East Pakistan, representing Dainik Pakistan, if I remember rightly, asked Shamim: “Who’s paying?” Somewhat taken aback, Shamim said that it was on the house. “In that case, I’ll have champagne,” the journalist said. I remembered an old Chinese saying: “Not all women in the household are beautiful.” I told the journalist that the choice was between black coffee or coffee with cream, and champagne was not on the bill of fare. “I was only joking,” he said, a little sheepishly.
We got to Seattle and the Boeing people made a lot of fuss and treated us royally. Captain Abdullah Baig was already in Seattle and he would be flying the Boeing 720B to Karachi. Abdul, as we called him, was one of a kind. I don’t know if airline pilots are graded, but he would be at the top of the class. He was by nature a cheerful man, but happiest in a cockpit and at the controls. Whenever I flew with him; I felt safe and though he may have seemed happy-go-lucky, he was a professional to the core. He fitted the bill of ‘Great People To Fly With’. There was some tax problem in New York and to avoid it, there was the option of flying direct from Seattle to London. There was some discussion whether the aircraft had the range to do so, but Captain Baig was willing to give it a try. “What the hell do you mean giving it a try?” I asked him. Abdul had a great sense of drama, and he made the non-stop flight seem like a pioneering step into the unknown. But I was sure that he was having me on, but I feared that he might be having himself on as well. The aircraft, now in PIA colours, was ready and there was a feeling of pride when I saw it. It was our own.
The tax problem remained unresolved and it was decided to fly directly to London. Soon after take off, Abdullah Baig called me to the cockpit and said that he had forgotten to bring the maps and he would have to navigate by the stars. “Which ones?” I asked him. The sky was festooned with them, truly a starry night, tiny lights, distant but no less welcoming as they twinkled, as if, waving to us.
There was more snow at London, and our departure was delayed. Nur Khan arrived in London and would be on the flight which would attempt to make the fastest flight between London and Karachi. It was all somewhat bogus since there was no existing record, but it was a part of the public relations bally-hoo. Nearing Karachi, one could almost sense Abdullah Baig urging the aircraft on, like a jockey giving his mount six-of-the best in the last lengths. The decent was steep. No lazy circling. I thought for a moment that he might put the aircraft in a dive. There was a lot of excitement in the cabin. We touched down at Karachi and had made the trip in six hours and some minutes. We would call it a record-breaking flight.
What was staggering was the reception that the aircraft received. It seemed, as if, the entire PIA work force had turned up in the early hours of the morning. They carried banners and garlands. The reception was not for the passengers, but the aircraft. It was a show of achievement.
The England cricket team, led by Ted Dexter, arrived. It was the first official tour of Pakistan by England and it was strange that it had taken so long to materialize. India, New Zealand and the West Indies had toured Pakistan, and Australia had played one test match in Karachi in 1956. I was back on cricket duty. The Pakistan team had not recovered from its tour of India and Fazal Mahmood had been replaced by Imtiaz Ahmed as captain. The first test match was at Lahore, and once again Jamsheed Marker and I teamed up. I worked at the airport and kept long hours and hadn’t seen very much of Jemi, though we kept in touch. But cricket commentary was second nature for both of us, and we were quickly into our stride.
I have no real memories of that tour beyond the fact that Pakistan lost the Lahore test match by five wickets and the other two, at Dhaka and Karachi, had been drawn. Thus, the series was lost.
The Lahore test match had been played in the last week of October and it was really hot. The weather may have kept the crowds away, but England was not a particularly attractive team to watch and there were no stars in it. Fred Truman, for instance, was not in the team nor Colin Cowdrey. It was not quite a second string because Pakistan struggled throughout. It was just that many of the players were not well known, though there was Dexter and Ken Barrington and M.J.K. Smith who had been run out on 99 at Lahore, as had been Barrington who made 138. My mind was not fully on cricket, and I would get telephone calls from my office even when I was on the air. My cricket friends would say that my attention was on PIA, and my PIA colleagues would say that my attention was on cricket. But I had become good at doing a balancing act.
Ted Dexter scored a double century in the Karachi test match and Peter Parfitt made a hundred. Pakistan was due to tour England in the summer of 1962. The form of Dexter and indeed Parfitt was ominous. Pakistan still relied heavily on Hanif Mohammad, though Javed Burki had made two centuries in the series. But the Pakistan team seemed to be on the decline, still counting on the old guard. The 60s would be a barren period for Pakistan cricket.
