The holy month of Ramazan has just passed, but it appears that we haven’t learnt anything from the practice of self-restraint and self-control
THE holy month of Ramazan concluded with Eid festivities last week. The pious, in order to feel the pangs of hunger and starvation of the poor and the deprived, fasted (abstained from eating and drinking) from dawn to dusk daily for the entire month. However, consumption of food, hot and cold desserts, fruits, beverages, confectionery, and assorted delicacies multiplied out of proportion. It is beyond our scope to discuss partially explained and partially unexplained phenomenon that surfaces every year among the pious during the holy month of Ramazan. The marketing managers of hotels and restaurants take full advantage of this inexplicable occurrence. They lure the customers with mouth-watering menus in the newspapers, on the billboards, and local television channels garnished with catchy slogans like ‘Eat as much as you can.’
Never-heard-of before dishes with mind-boggling names like Chicken Dum Dum, Chicken Massala Malai, Fish Falooda, Dad (Dark African Delight), Bhangra Biryani, Nuts for Nuttiest etceteras are introduced to the customers ‘for the first time in Pakistan’. The phrase ‘for the first time in Pakistan’ has its own charisma. A military ruler inducts genuine democracy ‘for the first time in Pakistan’. Each prime minister revives and revitalizes the economy ‘for the first time in Pakistan’. Cheap justice is brought to the wronged at their doorstep ‘for the first time in Pakistan’.
The marketing managers always assess before hand marketing opportunities for their clients. The marketing managers of pharmaceutical companies advise their clients to come up with digestion improving tablets, carminative mixtures, and herbal choorans during the month of Ramazan. They also advise their clients to launch massive publicity for their refreshing and revitalizing vitamin and mineral drinks for the pious to regain energy lost during fasting. Thanks to the calculated marketing, the sales of such items surpass collective sales during the rest of the 11 months in a year.
The theory of demand and supply sits supreme on the entire business activities. Sudden surge in the demand for fat-free milk in the market would compel the manufacturers of the dairy products either to enhance production activities or to increase the price of the product. Short supply, deliberate or otherwise, pushes the prices of the items in demand upwards.
Natural and manmade factors influence the demand for commodities and services. Sudden influx of people in a city would create demand for transport including rickshaws, wagons, vans, buses, and taxies. Demand for essential food items including flour, rice, pulses, and cooking oil, would increase. If Karachi experiences winter like the winters of Islamabad, Abbotabad, Peshawar, Quetta, and Murree for a day, it would bolster the demand for new and second-hand woollies. With no possibility for immediate supply of the woollen clothes to meet the sudden increase in demand, the prices would go up spirally.
At times the demand for items like skim milk is created through indirect publicity they call awareness drive. They tell you pure milk is harmful for your health. For that matter anything that happens to be pure and unadulterated is bad, and is bound to kill you. But, don’t they tell us that breast-feeding is best for the child, because mother’s milk is pure and safe for the newborn!
Till very recently drinking boiled water was considered effective measure for prevention from water-borne ailments. The marketing managers keep constant watch on the consumptive trends in society. They suggest useful tips to the clients for sweeping the market with new products. A pharmaceutical company claims that boiling doesn’t eliminate life-threatening jaraseem, bacteria in the water. It is only the wonder tablet devised by the pharmaceutical company that effectively kills bacteria, and purifies your drinking water.
No oil, no shampoo, no medicinal treatment would help you grow hair on your bald head. An old maxim is that once gone bald, you shall always remain bald all your life. The wise reconcile with the loss of hair. They know it, thick hair on the head is no assurance that you will be able to write a short story, compose a poem, paint a landscape, deliver a good speech, or sing a song. But, there are innumerous bald persons all over the world who lamentably feel deprived, as if they have been robbed of something vital. The hair transplant technologists have taken maximum advantage of the weakness of the bald for hair. With the help of the marketing managers they literally trap the bald customers who empty their pockets to see hairless head crowned with a few locks.
The rulers and the rich maintain a team of marketing managers, but with different designation. They groom their appearance and mannerism. They advise them how to dress up for different occasions. How to walk, and how to shake hands with people coming from different strata of the society. Ruler of an aid-giving country extends his hand halfway for handshake, and the ruler from an aid-receiving country grabs his hand with two hands. This is how the rulers of rich and poor counties shake hands. To make rulers popular among the people, the marketing managers even go to the extent of occasionally enacting dramatic unsuccessful attempts on the life of their clients. We are trapped in marketing mines. One erroneous step would blow you up into pieces.
