PRIME Minister Nawaz Sharif recently told a public rally in Mingora that the PTI-led provincial government had failed to bring about any change in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, including Swat. His adviser Amir Muqam went further and termed the PTI chief Imran Khan a “fake Khan” (May 21).

Interestingly, a report in ‘Images on Sunday’ (May 22) revealed that the KP government has initiated a project whereby all schools will be provided solar energy so that students don’t have to study in the stifling heat and are freed from load-shedding. Already 400 schools have been converted.

A friend’s relative, who teaches in a government school in Swat, keeps complaining that after the PTI’s coming to power they’re having to work full time and attend school regularly, whereas previously they did as they pleased!

Besides, results of a survey some months back showed KP topped in governance among the provinces and had the lowest corruption. Its police have also been depoliticised and made more autonomous.

About Mr Khan’s ethnicity, he has given all details in his autobiography, Pakistan: A Personal History. He was born in Lahore, the only son of Ikramullah Khan Niazi, a civil engineer, and his wife Shaukat Khanum. Long settled in Mianwali, his paternal family are of Pakhtun ethnicity and belong to the Niazi tribe. His mother hailed from the Pakhtun Burki tribe, which has produced several successful cricketers in Pakistan’s history, including his cousins Javed Burki and Majid Khan.

From his mother’s side, Imran is also a descendant of the Sufi warrior-poet and inventor of the Pashto alphabet, Pir Roshan, who hailed from his maternal family’s ancestral Kaniguram town of South Waziristan.

Instead of needlessly criticising Mr Khan, PML-N leaders should try to emulate the good examples set by him. For instance, when he was seriously injured just before the 2013 elections and there was danger he would never be able to walk again, he still sought treatment at his Shaukat Khanum Hospital, instead of rushing abroad like other leaders do.

A Reader
Karachi

Published in Dawn, May 28th, 2016