After the closure of famous restaurant Pak-Tea House, Chopal at Nasser Bagh was the place where writers and intellectuals of Halqa Arbab-i-Zauq and Punjabi Adbi Sangat took refuge. The place was provided by the government and its only room was being ignored by the managers. Moreover, the area became very crowded and traffic noise was almost unbearable. The Halqa shifted to the air-conditioned building of Aiwan-i-Iqbal, but the Sangat refused to shift and it still holds its weekly meetings here on Fridays.

The Anjuman Taraqi Pasand Musanfeen occasionally meets here. Another problem recently raised its head and that is parking of vehicles. The management of the Bagh is not kind to participants, but the Sangat continues to hold its meetings here.

In Musharraf’s regime, Governor Khalid Maqbool used to have frequent exchanges with writers and intellectuals. The writers wanted some permanent place where they could go as they used to in good old days, but it could not be possible. Though there was space for them at the old Prince Hotel, now Writers’ Guild House on Montgomery Road, that was ideally located close to all sorts of media offices. The control of the guild house was given to then secretary general of the guild Naseem Durrani of Karachi, a representative of the group, which wanted to sell the guild house and distribute the money to the four provinces to use it as they would like.

Meanwhile, a Pakistan-born Islamic scholar serving in America got closer to President Musharraf and through him she wanted to open an Islamic institute in the building. Musharraf was very kind and he sent federal information secretary Shahid Rafi to occupy the place. The late Raja Rasalu was then office secretary of the guild with whom Rafi had intimate relations because both belonged to Sheikhupura district. Rafi reported to Musharraf that the building was property of the trust and that the government could not acquire it.

Maqbool took the initiative and a place at the Alhamra Arts Council was named as Baithak -- the sitting place for the writers. It had a list of regular members having identity cards also. Asghar Gilani was executive head of Alhamra and he tried to provide best services to critical intellectuals. It was no alternative to Pak-Tea House, but it provided breathing space to writers. The place was well maintained by the late Gilani and his staff. It was also used for small literary events. Though it was not open to the general community because of close membership, it was serving writers quite well. However, nobody from the arts council now pays attention to maintenance of the place. Though people still visit the place, it looks like a deserted one. If Gilani is not there, Alhamra high-ups should appoint a successor to Gilani, the man with no literary or intellectual claims.

Inaugurating the Punjabi Complex at the Qaddafi Stadium, Pervaiz Elahi announced that it would serve as Coffee House or Pak-Tea House to writers. It was doing well but its managers committed a blunder and offered its space to the proposed Chinese Cultural Centre and allowed the use of its facilities for non-cultural and non-Punjabi activities. Its grade 19/20 administrators gave top priority to administration instead of culture. Anyhow one of the administrators, of course not Punjabi speaking, wanted to encourage private literary activities at the complex and he opened the canteen of the complex for such activities and named it as Punjab Café. The newly-established Punjabi Sangat was the first to hold weekly literary sittings here on Saturdays. Apart from that Sangat arranged some functions and one such was in the memory of the late poet Saeen Akhtar Lahori.

Another administrator came, knowing nothing about the function of a cultural organisation, especially related to Punjabi culture and language being ignored for the last 150 years. She boldly declared that she did not know much about Punjabi language, literature and culture, but she would try to serve it. This she said with all humility, which was later on dominated by the ego of a PCS officer. She clashed with the literary elements in her staff and then with the Sangat people. Because she had the power, she closed the doors of Punjab Café on Sangat secretary Yousuf Punjabi. The Sangat started holding its protest meetings on Saturdays outside the Punjabi Complex. In the meantime, administrator Fehmida Mushtaq was withdrawn by the government and the new director general has not yet taken charge of the Punjab Institute of Language, Art and Culture and its complex. However, the government needs to rectify its first blunder and give a better and independent place to the Chinese Cultural Centre.

The most important issue, which was ignored by PILAC managers, was that they should have arranged seminars on the Punjabi/Seraiki language to educate people about the language of the Punjab, which Punjabis have not learnt in schools and they are ignorant about their language and its more than 20 dialects and sub-dialects. It was the duty of PILAC to educate people about the language in which Khwaja Farid, Bulleh Shah, Sultan Bahu and Waris Shah composed their poetry. Is that not unfortunate that a bureaucrat and the first ever PILAC director general, who did his doctorate on Khwaja Farid, does not know in which language Khwaja Farid used to speak and address the congregations? Was it Punjabi or something else? The PILAC should have arranged discussion by qualified linguists and MPAs, MNAs and senators on this burning issue and all record of Khwaja Sahib’s poetry and language should have been collected and preserved on these occasions. It was a historical chance for the PILAC but it missed it because its administration was much superior to language and culture. So far, this has been the motto of all directors general who ruled the Punjabi Complex.