The much awaited package of structural adjustment reforms was unveiled by the prime minister of Pakistan, Syed Yousuf Raza Gilani, after a cabinet meeting, today.

Despite of high claims of granting internal autonomy, a governor, to be appointed by the presdient, and the prime minister, himself, have been made the supreme authorities. The Gilgit – Baltistan Council would be chaired by the prime minister, who will not be elected by votes of the people of Gilgit – Baltistan, while an un-elected governor, to be appointed by the president, would act as vice – chairman of the council. This arrangement is being seen as a major ploy to control the elected representatives of Gilgit – Baltistan.

It is for the very first time, in history of the country, that a serving federal minister has been appointed governor of a political entity within Pakistan.

A new designation, called Chief Minister, has been created but the CM would not be authorized to form his cabinet. The governor would form a cabinet, albeit with “advise” of the chief minister. Also, the legislative assembly would not be able to elect the chief minister. He would be selected by the Gilgit – Baltistan Council.  This power mechanism  is also being seen as an explicit example of asserting real power players, in the future setup. It is being strongly felt that a powerful governor and a weak chief minister would overrun expectation of autonomy, at the grass roots, making the entire promise delusional and fraught with contradictions.

The Gilgit – Baltistan Legislative Assembly, not authorized to discuss a large number of vital issues related to governance of the region, would comprise of thirty eight members. Twenty four out of these thirty eight members would be elected directly from the districts, while seven females and an equal number of technocrats would also be part of the assembly. Two new seats have been added, one each for women and technocrats.

Some analysts are terming this a package for the region’s political elite, with no real benefit for the impoverished people of Gilgit – Baltistan. 

The creation of a separate election commission, increasing the number of judges of the Supreme Appellate Court from 3 to 5 and establishment of a separate public service commission, however, offer some promise for the region, which has now been formally named Gilgit – Baltistan. Nevertheless, these institutions will be of no real significance in the absence of broader rights and authorities of real decision making. 

Some quarters are seeing this move to rename a few positions in the region’s poltical setup and further complicate the heirarchies of democratic decision making, an attempt to divert attention from the issues raised over Diamer – Bhasha Dam, Bonji dam and other smaller dam projects that have been planned in the region.

Let’s remind the readers that Gilgit – Baltistan was a name suggested by the NALA, which has, now, been accepted by the federal cabinet.

This is not about Musharraf anymore. This is about clipping the wings of a strong Pakistani military, denying space for China in Pakistan, squashing the ISI, stirring ethnic unrest, and neutralizing Pakistan’s nuclear program. The first shot in this plan was fired in Pakistan’s Balochistan province in 2004. The last bullet will be toppling Musharraf, sidelining the military and installing a pliant government in Islamabad. Musharraf shares the blame for letting things come this far. But he is also punching holes in Washington’s game plan. This act of his, will lead him in a 6 ft ditch and no where else or may be in a pile of smoke and flames like his predecessor Gen Zia.

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan – On the evening of Tuesday, 26 September, 2006, Pakistani strongman Pervez Musharraf walked into the studio of Comedy Central’s ‘Daily Show’ with Jon Stewart, the first sitting president anywhere to dare do this political satire show. Stewart offered his guest some tea and cookies and played the perfect host by asking, “Is it good?” before springing a surprise: “Where’s Osama bin Laden?” I don’t know,” Musharraf replied, as the audience enjoyed the rare sight of a strong leader apparently cornered. “You know where he is?” Musharraf snapped back, “You lead on, we’ll follow you.” What Gen. Musharraf didn’t know then is that he really was being cornered. Some of the smiles that greeted him in Washington and back home gave no hint of the betrayal that awaited him.

As he completed the remaining part of his U.S. visit, his allies in Washington and elsewhere, as all evidence suggests now, were plotting his downfall. They had decided to take a page from the book of successful ‘color revolutions’ where western governments covertly used money, private media, student unions, NGOs and international pressure to stage coups, basically overthrowing individuals not fitting well with Washington’s agenda.

This recipe proved its success in former Yugoslavia, and more recently in Georgia, Ukraine and Kazakhstan. In Pakistan, the target is a Pakistani president who refuses to play ball with the United States on Afghanistan, China, and Dr. A.Q.Khan. To get rid of him, an impressive operation is underway:

A carefully crafted media blitzkrieg launched early this year assailing the Pakistani president from all sides, questioning his power, his role in Washington’s war on terror and predicting his downfall. Money pumped into the country to pay for organized dissent. Willing activists assigned to mobilize and organize accessible social groups. A campaign waged on Internet where tens of mailing lists and ‘news agencies’ have sprung up from nowhere, all demonizing Musharraf and the Pakistani military.

European- and American-funded Pakistani NGOs taking a temporary leave from their real jobs to work as a makeshift anti-government mobilization machine. U.S. government agencies directly funding some private Pakistani television networks; the channels go into an open anti-government mode, cashing in on some manufactured and other real public grievances regarding inflation and corruption. Some of Musharraf’s shady and corrupt political allies feed this campaign, hoping to stay in power under a weakened president. All this groundwork completed and chips in place when the judicial crisis breaks out in March 2007. Even Pakistani politicians surprised at a well-greased and well-organized lawyers campaign, complete with flyers, rented cars and buses, excellent event-management and media outreach. Currently, students are being recruited and organized into a street movement.

The work is ongoing and urban Pakistani students are being cultivated, especially using popular Internet Web sites and ‘online hangouts’. The people behind this effort are mostly unknown and faceless, limiting themselves to organizing sporadic, small student gatherings in Lahore and Islamabad, complete with banners, placards and little babies with arm bands for maximum media effect. No major student association has announced yet that it is behind these student protests, which is a very Interesting fact glossed over by most journalists covering this story.

Only a few students from affluent schools have responded so far and it’s not because the Pakistani government’s countermeasures are effective. They’re not. The reason is that social activism attracts people from affluent backgrounds, closely reflecting a uniquely Pakistani phenomenon where local NGOs are mostly founded and run by rich, westernized Pakistanis.

All of this may appear to be spur-of-the-moment and Musharraf-specific. But it all really began almost three years ago, when, out of the blue and recycling old political arguments, Mr. Akbar Bugti launched an armed rebellion against the Pakistani state, surprising security analysts by using rockets and other military equipment that shouldn’t normally be available to a smalltime village thug. Since then, Islamabad sits on a pile of evidence that links Mr. Bugti’s campaign to money and ammunition and logistical support from Afghanistan, directly aided by the Indians and the Karzai administration, with the Americans turning a blind eye.

For reasons not clear to our analysts yet, Islamabad has kept quiet on Washington’s involvement with anti-Pakistan elements in Afghanistan. But Pakistan did send an indirect public message to the Americans recently.

“We have indications of Indian involvement with anti-state elements in Pakistan,”

declared the spokesman of the Pakistan Foreign Office in a regular briefing in October. The statement was terse and direct and the spokesman, Ms. Tasnim Aslam, quickly moved on to other issues.

This is how a Pakistani official explained Ms. Aslam’s statement: “What she was really saying is this: We know what the Indians are doing. They’ve sold the Americans on the idea that [the Indians] are an authority on Pakistan and can be helpful in Afghanistan. The Americans have bought the idea and are in on the plan, giving the Indians a free hand in Afghanistan.

What the Americans don’t know is that we, too, know the Indians very well. Better still, we know Afghanistan very well. You can’t beat us at our own game.” Mr. Bugti’s armed rebellion coincided with the Gwadar project entering its final stages. No coincidence here. Mr. Bugti’s real job was to scare the Chinese away and scuttle Chinese President Hu Jintao’s planned visit to Gwadar a few months later to formally launch the port city. Gwadar is the pinnacle of Sino-Pakistani strategic cooperation. It’s a modern port city that is supposed to link Central Asia, western China, and Pakistan with markets in Mideast and Africa.

It’s supposed to have roads stretching all the way to China. It’s no coincidence either that China has also earmarked millions of dollars to renovate the Karakoram Highway linking northern Pakistan to western China.

Some reports in the American media, however, have accused Pakistan and China of building a naval base in the guise of a commercial seaport directly overlooking international oil shipping lanes. The Indians and some other regional actors are also not comfortable with this project because they see it as commercial competition.

What Mr. Bugti’s regional and international supporters never expected is Pakistan moving firmly and strongly to nip his rebellion in the bud. Even Mr. Bugti himself probably never expected the Pakistani state to react in the way it did to his betrayal of the homeland. He was killed in a military operation where scores of his mercenaries surrendered to Pakistan army soldiers.

U.S. intelligence and their Indian advisors could not cultivate an immediate replacement for Mr. Bugti. So they moved to Plan B. They supported Abdullah Mehsud, a Pakistani Taliban fighter held for five years in Guantanamo Bay, and then handed over back to the Afghan government, only to return to his homeland, Pakistan, to kidnap two Chinese engineers working in Balochistan, one of whom was eventually killed during a rescue operation by the Pakistani government.

Islamabad could not tolerate this shadowy figure, which was creating a following among ordinary Pakistanis masquerading as a Taliban while in reality towing a vague agenda. He was rightly eliminated earlier this year by Pakistani security forces while secretly returning from Afghanistan after meeting his handlers there. Again, no surprises here.

SMELLING A RAT

This is where Pakistani political and military officials finally started smelling a rat. All of this was an indication of a bigger problem. There were growing indications that, ever since Islamabad joined Washington’s regional plans, Pakistan was gradually turning into a ‘besieged-nation’, heavily targeted by the American media while being subjected to strategic sabotage and espionage from Afghanistan.

Afghanistan, under America’s watch, has turned into a vast staging ground for sophisticated psychological and military operations to destabilize neighboring Pakistan. During the past three years, the heat has gradually been turned up against Pakistan and its military along Pakistan’s western regions:

• A shadowy group called the BLA, a Cold War relic, rose from the dead to restart a separatist war in southwestern Pakistan.
• Bugti’s death was a blow to neo-BLA, but the shadowy group’s backers didn’t repent. His grandson, Brahmdagh Bugti, is currently enjoying a safe shelter in the Afghan capital, Kabul, where he continues to operate and remote-control his assets in Pakistan.
• Saboteurs trained in Afghanistan have been inserted into Pakistan to aggravate extremist passions here, especially after the Red Mosque operation.
• Chinese citizens continue to be targeted by individuals pretending to be Islamists, when no known Islamic group has claimed responsibility.
• A succession of ‘religious rebels’ with suspicious foreign links has suddenly emerged in Pakistan over the past months claiming to be ‘Pakistani Taliban’. Some of the names include Abdul Rashid Ghazi, Baitullah Mehsud, and now the Maulana of Swat. Some of them have used and are using encrypted communication equipment far superior to what Pakistani military owns.
• Money and weapons have been fed into the religious movements and al Qaeda remnants in the tribal areas.

Exploiting the situation, assets within the Pakistani media started promoting the idea that the Pakistani military was killing its own people. The rest of the unsuspecting media quickly picked up this message. Some botched American and Pakistani military operations against Al Qaeda that caused civilian deaths accidentally fed this media campaign.

This was the perfect timing for the launch of Military, Inc.: Inside Pakistan’s Military Economy, a book authored by Dr. Ayesha Siddiqa Agha, a columnist for a Pakistani English-language paper and a correspondent for ‘Jane’s Defence Weekly’, a private intelligence service founded by experts close to the British intelligence.

TARGET: PAK MILITARY

The book was launched in Pakistan in early 2007 by Oxford Press. And, contrary to most reports, it is openly available in Islamabad’s biggest bookshops. The book portrays the Pakistani military as an institution that is eating up whatever little resources Pakistan has. Pakistani military’s successful financial management, creating alternate financial sources to spend on a vast military machine and build a conventional and nuclear near-match with a neighboring adversary five times larger – an impressive record for any nation by any standard was distorted in the book and reduced to a mere attempt by the military to control the nation’s economy in the same way it was controlling its politics.

The timing was interesting. After all, it was hard to defend a military in the eyes of its own proud people when the chief of the military is ruling the country, the army is fighting insurgents and extremists who claim to be defending Islam, grumpy politicians are out of business, and the military’s side businesses, meant to feed the nation’s military machine, are doing well compared to the shabby state of the nation’s civilian departments.

A closer look at Ms. Siddiqa, the author, revealed disturbing information to Pakistani officials. In the months before launching her book, she was a frequent visitor to India where, as a defense expert, she cultivated important contacts. On her return, she developed friendship with an Indian lady diplomat posted in Islamabad. Both of these activities travel to India and ties to Indian diplomats – are not a crime in Pakistan and don’t raise interest anymore. Pakistanis are hospitable and friendly people and these qualities have been amply displayed to the Indians during the four-year-old peace process.

What is interesting is that Ms. Siddiqa left her car in the house of the said Indian diplomat during one of her recent trips to London. And, according to a report, she stayed in London at a place owned by an individual linked to the Indian lady diplomat friend in Islamabad .The point here is this: Who assigned her to investigate the Pakistani Armed Forces and present a distorted image of a proud an efficient Pakistani institution?

From 1988 to 2001, Dr. Siddiqa worked in the Pakistan civil service, the Pakistani civil bureaucracy. Her responsibilities included dealing with Military Accounts, which come under the Pakistan Ministry of Defense. She had thirteen years of rich experience in dealing with the budgetary matters of the Pakistani military and people working in this area. Dr. Siddiqa received a year-long fellowship to research and writes a book in the United States. .

There are strong indications that some of her Indian contacts played a role in arranging financing for her book project through a paid fellowship. The final manuscript of her book was vetted at a publishing office in New Delhi. All of these details are insignificant if detached from the real issue at hand. And the issue is the deionization of the Pakistani

Military as an integral part of the media siege around Pakistan, with the American media leading the way in this campaign.

Some of the juicy details of this campaign include:

• The attempt by Dr. Siddiqa to pitch junior officers against senior officers in Pakistan Armed Forces by alleging discrimination in the distribution of benefits. Apart from being malicious and unfounded, her argument was carefully designed to generate frustration and demoralize Pakistani soldiers.
• The American media insisting on handing over Dr. A.Q. Khan to the United States so that a final conviction against the Pakistani military can be secured.
• Mrs. Benazir Bhutto demanding after returning to Pakistan that the ISI be restructured; and in a press conference during her house arrest in Lahore in November she went as far as asking Pakistan army officers to revolt against the army chief, a damning attempt at destroying a professional army from within.

Some of this appears to be eerily similar to the campaign waged against the Pakistani military in 1999, when, in July that year, an unsigned full page advertisement appeared in major American newspapers with the following headline: “A Modern Rogue Army with Its Finger on the Nuclear Button.”

Till this day, it is not clear who exactly paid for such an expensive newspaper full-page advertisement. But one thing is clear: the agenda behind that advertisement is back in action. Strangely, just a few days before Mrs. Bhutto’s statements about restructuring the ISI and her open call to army officers to stage a mutiny against their leadership, the American conservative magazine The Weekly Standard interviewed an American security expert who offered similar ideas: “A large number of ISI agents who are responsible for

Helping the Taliban and al Qaeda should be thrown in jail or killed.

What I think we should do in Pakistan is a parallel version of what Iran has run against US in Iraq: giving money [and] empowering actors. Some of this will involve working with some shady characters, but the alternative-sending U.S. forces into Pakistan for a sustained bombing campaign-is worse.” Steve Schippert, Weekly Standard, Nov. 2007. In addition to these media attacks, which security experts call ‘psychological operations’, the American media and politicians have intensified over the past year their campaign to prepare the international public opinion to accept a western intervention in Pakistan along the lines of Iraq and Afghanistan:

• Newsweek came up with an entire cover story with a single storyline: Pakistan is a more dangerous place than Iraq.
• Senior American politicians, Republican and Democrat, have argued that Pakistan is more dangerous than Iran and merits similar treatment. On 20 October, Senator Joe Biden told ABC News that Washington needs to put soldiers on the ground in Pakistan and invite the international community to join in. “We should be in there,” he said. “We should be supplying tens of millions of dollars to build new schools to compete with the madrassas. We should be in there building democratic institutions. We should be in there, and get the rest of the world in there, giving some structure to the emergence of, hopefully, the reemergence of a democratic process.”
• The International Crisis Group (ICG) has recommended gradual sanctions on Pakistan similar to those imposed on Iran, e.g. slapping travel bans on Pakistani military officers and seizing Pakistani military assets abroad.
• The process of painting Pakistan’s nuclear assets as pure evil lying around waiting for some do-gooder to come in and ’secure’ them has reached unprecedented levels, with the U.S. media again depicting Pakistan as a nation incapable of protecting its nuclear installations. On 22 October, Jane Harman from the U.S. House Intelligence panel gave the following statement: “I think the U.S. would be wise – and I trust we are
• Doing this – to have contingency plans [to seize Pakistan’s nuclear assets], especially because should [Musharraf] fall, there are nuclear weapons there.”
• The American media has now begun discussing the possibility of Pakistan breaking up and the possibility of new states of ‘Balochistan’ and ‘Pashtunistan’ being carved out of it. Interestingly, one of the first acts of the shady Maulana of Swat after capturing a few towns was to take down the Pakistani flag from the top of state buildings and replacing them with his own party flag.
• The ‘chatter’ about President Musharraf’s eminent fall has also increased dramatically in the mainly American media, which has been very generous in marketing theories about how Musharraf might “disappear” or be “removed” from the scene. According to some Pakistani analysts, this could be an attempt to prepare the public opinion for a possible assassination of the Pakistani president.
• Another worrying thing is how American officials are publicly signaling to the Pakistanis that Mrs. Benazir Bhutto has their backing as the next leader of the country. Such signals from Washington are not only a kiss of death for any public leader in Pakistan, but the Americans also know that their actions are inviting potential assassins to target Mrs. Bhutto. If she is killed in this way, there won’t be enough time to find the real culprit, but what’s certain is that unprecedented international pressure will be placed on Islamabad while everyone will use their local assets to create maximum internal chaos in the country.

A dress rehearsal of this scenario has already taken place in October when no less than he U.N. Security Council itself intervened to ask the international community to “assist” in the investigations into the assassination attempt on Mrs. Bhutto on 18 October. This generous move was sponsored by the U.S. and, interestingly, had no input from Pakistan which did not ask for help in investigations in the first place.

Some Pakistani security analysts privately say that American ‘chatter’ about Musharraf or Bhutto getting killed is a serious matter that can’t be easily dismissed. Getting Bhutto killed can generate the kind of pressure that could result in permanently putting the Pakistani military on a back foot, giving Washington enough room to push for installing a

New pliant leadership in Islamabad.

Having Musharraf killed isn’t a bad option either. The unknown Islamists can always be blamed and the military will not be able to put another soldier at the top, and circumstances will be created to ensure that either Mrs. Bhutto or someone like her is eased into power.

The Americans are very serious this time. They cannot let Pakistan get out of their hands. They have been kicked out of Uzbekistan last year, where they were maintaining bases. They are in trouble in Afghanistan and Iraq. Iran continues to be a mess for them and Russia and China are not making it any easier. Pakistan must be ’secured’ at all costs.

This is why most Pakistanis have never seen American diplomats in Pakistan active like this before. And it’s not just the current U.S. ambassador, who has added one more address to her other most-frequently-visited address in Karachi, Mrs. Bhutto’s house. The new address is the office of GEO, one of two news channels shut down by Islamabad for not signing the mandatory code-of-conduct. Thirty-eight other channels are operating and no one has censored the newspapers. But never mind this. The Americans have developed a ‘thing’ for GEO. No solace of course for ARY, the other banned channel.

Now there’s also one Bryan Hunt, the U.S. consul general in Lahore, who wears the national Pakistani dress, the long shirt and baggy trousers, and is moving around these days issuing tough warnings to Islamabad and to the Pakistani government and to President Musharraf to end emergency rule, resign as army chief and give Mrs. Bhutto access to power.

PAKISTAN ‘S OPTIONS

So what should Pakistan do in the face of such a structured campaign to bring Pakistan down on its knees and forcibly install a pro-Washington administration in Islamabad? There is increasing talk in Islamabad these days about Pakistan’s new tough stand in the face of this malicious campaign. As a starter, Islamabad blew the wind out of the visit of Mr. John Negroponte, the no. 2 man in the U.S. State Department, who came to Pakistan last week “to deliver a tough message” to the Pakistani president. Musharraf, to his credit, told him he won’t end emergency rule until all objectives are achieved.

These objectives include:

1. Cleaning up our northern and western parts of the country of all foreign operatives and their domestic pawns.
2. Ensuring that Washington’s plan for regime-change doesn’t succeed.
3. Purging the Pakistani media of all those elements that were willing or unwilling accomplices in the plan to destabilize the country. Musharraf has also told Washington publicly that “Pakistan is more important than democracy or the constitution.” This is a Bold position. This kind of boldness would have served Musharraf a lot had it come a little earlier. But even now, his media management team is unable to make the most out of it.

Washington will not stand by watching as its plan for regime change in Islamabad goes down the drain. In case the Americans insist on interfering in Pakistani affairs, Islamabad, according to my sources, is looking at some tough measures:

1. Cutting off oil supplies to U.S. military in Afghanistan. Pakistani officials are already enraged at how Afghanistan has turned into a staging ground for sabotage in Pakistan. If Islamabad continues to see Washington acting as a bully, Pakistani officials are seriously considering an announcement where Pakistan, for the first time since October 2001, will deny the United States use of Pakistani soil and air space to transport fuel to Afghanistan.
2. Reviewing Pakistan’s role in the war on terror. Islamabad needs to fight terrorists on its border with Afghanistan. But our methods need to be different to Washington’s when it comes to our domestic extremists. This is where Islamabad parts ways with Washington. Pakistani officials are considering the option of withdrawing from the war on terror while maintaining Pakistan’s own war against the terrorists along Afghanistan’s border.
3. Talks with the Taliban. Pakistan has no quarrel with Afghanistan’s Taliban. They are Kabul’s internal problem. But if reaching out to Afghan Taliban’s Mullah Omar can have a positive impact on rebellious Pakistani extremists, then this step should be taken. The South Koreans can talk to the Taliban. Karzai has also called for talks with them. It is time that Islamabad does the same.
4. The Americans have been telling everyone in the world that they have paid Pakistan $10 billion dollars over the past five years. They might think this gives them the right to decide Pakistan’s destiny. What they don’t tell the world is how Pakistan’s help secured for them their biggest footprint ever in energy-rich Central Asia.

If they forget, Islamabad can always remind them by giving them the same treatment that Uzbekistan did last year.

A brigade of ANP ministers circling TV talk shows circuits, never miss an opportunity to pin the blame for the current national crisis — unfolding in the NWFP — on the Pakistani support of Mujahideen during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan.

For a moment, let’s overlook ANP’s usual rhetoric of racial victimization, its historical opposition to the creation of Pakistan and its socialist lineage, and focus on bud of its criticism; i.e. Pushtoon are paying through their blood for the Punjab hatched conspiracy of supporting the Americans against the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. Their rhetoric begs the question: what makes them think, Soviets didn’t had their eyes set on occupying Pakistan next?

Anyone cognizant of ANP’s habit of playing on both sides of fence (like the JUI-F) knows, had Soviets occupied Pakistan, ANP would have cried Bloody Mary over the spillage of Pushtoon blood, followed by signing a peace treaty with the Soviets; only to renounce it after a severe criticism. Then it would have blamed Ayub Khan’s government for the Soviet occupation, because Pakistan fought a war with India.

Ironically, both ANP and JUI-F who could have disrupted the Talibanization during its infancy, looked the other way and pretended everything was hunky-dory. Instead of dealing with the festering menace, both chose to concentrate on grabbing federal ministries and wasted their energies on inconsequential issues like renaming NWFP to Pushtoonkhawa. During their spare time or when Zardari asked, both bashed Punjabis. Of course, until the MQM and Sindhi Nationalists showed their true colors, Punjabis remained their punching bag.

Whether deliberately or otherwise both miserably failed to show the responsibility and leadership expected from them. Even when the monsters were knocking at their door they kept their heads buried in sand, or at best, chased federal ministries. When water ran over their heads, they ran pillar to post blaming any and everyone but themselves for their incompetence. For his part Musharraf with all of power and global support dealt with the Taliban with kids gloves.

Back to ANP’s current scapegoat; i.e. Zia-era support of Mujahideen against the angelic Soviets. Frankly, their rhetoric is plain and simple nonsense. The mistake wasn’t made when Pakistan joined CIA’s war; mistakes were made when every stakeholder disowned the Mujahideen immediately after the Soviets were defeated. Americans didn’t bother to say even goodbye, Saudis saw an opportunity to raise an unaccounted Sunni militia, Arab nations released their Jihadis into Afghan wilderness; and the Pakistanis occupied themselves with pulling legs of successive elected governments.

Instead of helping Afghanistan get back on its feet, whole world moved on to its business. Nobody bothered to rehabilitate the idly sitting army of Muslim fighters who were trained to fight guerilla warfare and nothing else. Not a single dime of financial aid was spent on social recovery projects, like building roads, hospitals or schools. Arab nations turned Afghanistan into a massive dumping ground for the banished, sort of Guantanamo prison on steroids. For example, Osama bin Laden was banished by the Saudis and Ayman al-Zawahiri was dumped in Afghanistan by the Egyptians. With no hope of returning to their native countries, the religiously charged extremists collaborated with the cash strapped locals to form their own style of government.

The dye was cast for the global terrorism. During the lost decade of 90s when Americans were basking in their sole superpower status and Pakistanis were experimenting with democracy, the forgotten religious zealists were looking for new enemies to fight. After beating the Northern-Alliance – raised and nurtured by the Indians, Iranians and Russians – the Taliban set their sights outwards to set the world straight according to their perverted vision. And rest is history.

No matter how hard we imagine: a problem sticks around till we fix it in reality too. The menace of Taliban is a manifestation of collective abandonment of people we used to fight our battles. Let the lesson be learned, never leave the battle ground without cleaning and restoring it first; or its ghosts will haunt, till the end of time. Why the architects of most productive Marshal Plan left the Afghans high and dry to fend for themselves is a trillion dollars question?

However, there is no sense in bickering over who should be blamed for the mess we created in Afghanistan. The responsibility to clean the mess falls upon whole civilized world. Sadly, there are no quick fixes to the problem. If today, we neutralize the Taliban leadership in concert with building roads, bridges, factories, electric power stations, hospitals, police stations, courts, city halls, airports, and most importantly, schools and universities, then hopefully 20 years latter, we could see the initial crop of civilized society in Afghanistan and Pakistani tribal belt.

If shifting blame could rescue the lost generation then there is no better party at the helm than the ANP. If it truly cares for the wellbeing of Pushtoon, then instead of hugging to the ministries tight and blaming whole world for their failures, it should start by bringing its leaders back to their constituencies. Then it should threaten to leave the Zardari coalition, unless the federal government guarantees unrestricted movement of the refugees throughout the Pakistan, including Karachi. Only opportunists take refuge behind racially loaded rhetoric.

I am daughter of Indus, I am daughter of Taxila, I am an heir of this 5000 years old civilization, the Benazir Bhutto who had lived and died for the well being of her beloved country Pakistan, had introduced herself. Benazir Bhutto was a strange leader; she became myth in her life like her assassinated in limitable father Z.A Bhutto. She was the most loved leader of the century and became the symbol of resistance, her politics merged with pain and love. She had faced every difficulty but had not bow before dictator Zia. She gave her life but could not keep herself away from the people of Pakistan. When the daughter of East, Indus and Taxila and the Queen of Tribal was killed in Rawalpindi, we understood who she was: ritualistic chest beating started in Parachinar, Kashmir, Northern areas and spread all over the world. Parachinar was on fire those days because of ongoing Zia given sectarian clashes who had lost thousand of lives. They had forgot their grieves and had wept for Benazir. The grief and reaction was exotic, from small villages and goths from Jam pur, Bhakkhar, Ghotki, Chagi, Qalat, Waziristan, kurram. Benazir Bhutto was a courageous and determined leader with a charming and highly intelligence, who was strong-willed in her ambition to bring democracy to her country and alleviate the suffering of the poor. She was a citizen of the world, an international leader, spirit of democracy and hope of future. Benazir was multi-talented leader that is not replaceable. She had loved the people of Pakistan in its true meanings. She was called Queen of Tribal in a grand Jirga by Pakistan Tribal area elders because she was the only leader who loved the people of tribal areas. She after her father is first who had visited Pakistan backward tribal areas as Prime Minster of Pakistan. Z. A. Bhutto in his speech at Parachinar had praised the beauty, talent and fertile lands of Parachinar and promised: “I will make Parachinar a piece of Heaven“.

Afterwards, the Zia regime gave the region a culture of war and terror and sectarianism. He pushed this beautiful area through ongoing sectarian clashes. From the time of Zia’s regime till now, thousands of people from both sides have lost their lives, many becoming homeless and disabled while in past the people had been living there with love, peace, affection and mutual understanding and respect since centuries.

Such black days ended when the golden days of Benazir Bhutto came. She as prime minister visited Parachinar, had women colleges opened and promised that she would improve the living standard of the people of this area. The unemployed were given jobs, roads were paved and extended, and a broadcasting station was opened and many more things were done. The words of Z.A Bhutto had repeated by her daughter there “I will make Parachinar a piece of heaven”.

Z.A Bhutto had opened Degree College for Men there and Benazir Bhutto had opened Degree College for Women there. Z.A Bhutto had opened Agency HQ hospital and Benazir upgraded it. For the elevation of poverty the unemployed were given job, sent abroad and for the upgrading of society schools and colleges had opened.

Benazir Bhutto was a true leader who had loved the people of Pakistan in very true meaning. She was above vested interests and had never played the politics of any specific region, language or province. For her all were same and of equal importance. Today when Pakistan is surrounding by multi problems and enemies are trying to declare Pakistan as a terrorist country but the slain leader Benazir brought a good image to Pakistan when UN conferred its top award on Benazir posthumously in recognition of her courageous struggle for restoration of democracy in Pakistan and for promoting human rights and fundamental freedoms. She was great messenger of democracy and peace. Benazir was determined regardless of the risks to her life to return as she believed Pakistan had a great future and she considered she had a major contribution to make in shaping a better future for her country. Today democracy is on its right track in Pakistan and a public government under the leadership of Asif Ali Zaradari is trying to its best to fulfill all the dreams of Z.A Bhutto and Benazir Bhutto Shaheed. These all are because of the sacrifices made by Benazir Bhutto for the restoration of democracy and for the well being of this country.
Benazir departed forever but she will live in our hearts forever.
May Allah rest her soul in piece..

When Pak President says that Swat deal for the enforcement of Nizam-e-Adl, was aimed for the provision of speedy justice, to some he is bemusing himself as Sufi Mohammed had no doubt at all that he has been given ‘carte blanche’ in Swat and thus he roared like a lion after the announcement declaring all infidels who are working under constitution other than Sharia. At the time of ordinance, in a rushed strategy rather than using this opportunity by extending political parties Act to FATA, Swat and other regions and bringing them all under one flag of constitution and jurisdiction of superior courts as was chartered in their 3D strategy in parliament, a new one sided ultra constitution court system was agreed.

A system where a judge’s quality was to be measured from the length of his beard than his intellect a mental capacity to administer justice. And hence some who do not wish peace in the region and has the capacity to call shots, pushed those disillusioned to advance on Buner and Dir district portraying a fear that soon Islamabad will be under those thugs, and questions on security of Atomic weaponry. To me they achieved desired results as in fear both a ‘half hearted pact’ and ‘ prospect of peace’ blown away. I will say, its haste, and poor negotiations on all fronts.

Army operation in any part of current Pakistan must be used as a last resort, due to variety of international vested interests in the region. It is open secret that no one can work at that length and breadth against Pakistan on its soil unless foreign money, weapons and money is involved. In Swat and other districts Pakistan army is not facing common criminals, the enemy has paid personnel alien to the concept of sympathy for locals, have heavy guns, latest wireless systems, intel and locations of pak forces and foreign currency. Pakistan is being cornered to a weaker kneeling position to barter. Any negotiated settlement which could bring calm to the area is not acceptable to those who matters, if it is made without their ‘nod’ people will start seeing videos of ‘whip lashing’, open court decisions shooting on site punishments and media avalanche against the myth.

As long as US forces are working in Afghanistan it is unthinkable that peace may return in the region unless a solution is achieved. When Mr. Zardari says, Pakistan Army was a “big institution and does have influence in the affairs of the country’ and that, the Army had now realised that its job was to defend the frontiers of the country and keep away from politics’ I think he still lives in Cukoo’s land. The whole idea is to sabotage that control and influence which hinders the greater goal and either finish it or coercively manipulate it for its own advantage. This Govt failed to eliminate, control or decrease that influence single handedly or by joint collaboration amongst political forces, though it tried to woo its main intelligence agency. West is now working on the second option which ha a history. Pakistan is facing a greater menace of a calculated and targeted campaign to keep its forces busy in those terrains.

It is ironic that groups like Bait Ullah Masud are working freely inside Pakistan and have the highly sensitive intel and appliances to create havoc, and are untouchables. As long as West does not realise that Pakistan needs to be aided militarily and otherwise to bring normality in that part of the land and that border security must be the prime concern for NATO with heavy walls, and mining the Durand line with security cameras and check post and army is provided watchdog heli’s and night goggles to combat to and from infiltration effectively to halve the attacks on each other’s forces. Army must be provided equipments to fight this war with intelligence sharing and joint collaboration without compromising each other’s jurisdiction and sovereignty and if both fight this war with mind rather than pride of might, there is a possibility to come close to a solution. We must not forget that wars are often fought on tables, going to battlefield is but to achieve that consulted and calculated target. The way it is fought now, is a way wire strategy. On top of it, Pakistan’s one sided hugs and kisses for India under pressure are embarrassing when the response to their zealous courtship wishes are returned by capturing its water with demands of the returns of the culprits of ‘bombay attacks’.

If Pakistan carrying on this adhoc policy of running the state of affairs on day to day basis , I am afraid its running short of time and fuel, however a concerted effort to keep federating unit intact with due consultation may be the ultimate solution to bring about peace and stability in Pakistan, in return in Afghanistan and the region. Pakistan is a small but a nasty piece of this big jig saw puzzle having the capacity, and geo strategic location. It can only safeguard its territorial integrity if it survives as winning is not on card, and survival is not possible if civil and military do not work together. As long as they can be divided, they can be ruled.

NATO and Pakistan must realise that ‘trust deficit’ between each other will cost both. This region, in particular Afghanistan has become a pivotal point for international experiments. China, Russia, Iran, India, and USA along with KSA have vested interests in the region due to close proximity or future scene of the globe. At present, world needs to focus on the 1.5 million refugees coming to cities of Pakistan from Swat. Pakistan is not new to this mass people movement. It could never return the same amount who came from Afghanistan during Russian invasion, with courtesy of USA who told Muslims how to do ‘jihad’ against infidels. Millions are marching again leaving their homes and what will happen to them if operation continues is any body’s guess, and again thanks to USA for being there to tell Pakistan that its their war, and extremism is a threat to them.

Swat operation is opening a window of international experiments in Pakistan and intl forces are frightening the country to come and do the job, unless they do it themselves. They want Pakistan to ruin itself first, so that they can aid later on receipt of disbursements, and as beggars can not be choosy so aid is not replaced with the slogan of trade. If army achieves the objective under civil, its fine, otherwise, people must be ready for a long haul as we are trying to crush a ‘myth’ not a visible enemy. A little weaker, Pakistan is used to the change of the chain of command in the middle of the battlefield

Saifai/Firozabad/New Delhi: One has to be a lowbrow, a bit of a murderer, to be a politician, ready and willing to see people sacrificed, slaughtered, for the sake of an idea, whether a good one or a bad one. A good politician is quite unthinkable as an honest burglar. So said American author and humorist Henry Miller of the BlackSpring fame once upon a time! Miller was an active member of Socialist Party in Manhattan, New York City and admired socialist Hubert Harrison., the foremost Afro-American intellect of his time. A seminal and influential thinker who encouraged the development of class consciousness among working people, positive race consciousness among Black people, secular humanism, modern thinking and intellectual independence!

Words of Miller and ideas of Harrison were tearing into my flesh when I was returning from Lahore and Islamabad after some interactive sessions with Imran Khan, founder-chairman of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf. Much before visiting Pakistan, while I was in London, I had decided to taste the bud of heat and dust of Indian Parliamentary elections in its own backyard and the opportunity was knocking at my door due to one magnificent contender who had offered the chance to observe the rites and rituals of World largest democracy from his own backyard.

Here I was in the Indian Capital, hurtling to the city of Taj Mahal on the way to Firozabad and Kannauj, the two Parliamentary constituencies out of 543 across the country where its chief contender Akhilesh Yadav was expecting me. Both his constituencies, Firozabad, city of glass ware and bangles and Kannauj, were going to polls on 7th of May, the very day India only Nobel Laureate in Literature Rabindra Nath Tagore was born over 100 years ago.
The journey from New Delhi to Agra is less than 300 kilometers by train. The sweltering heat of May evaporated in smoggy evening of the city of Taj Mahal when Rajeev Yadav, maternal cousin of Akhilesh Yadav, received me with open arms. A six feet tall, lean, urbane and genial countenance, Rajeev has striking resemblance with a metrosexual or ubersexual Indian youth. Yet, he is different so much as his political consciousness is vastly mature in comparison with young freaks languishing in the cool confines of Coffee Café Day of urbane hot spots across the country. Over the years, he has carved his niche in construction business, and takes pride in saying, “Someone in the family should earn to support the political ambitions of other siblings”.

It was Rajeev who picked me up from Holiday Inn in Agra and escorted to dusty stretch of Firozabad Government Higher Secondary School where a huge crowd of people, from all walks of life, had assembled to receive Akhilesh Yadav. Akhilesh alias Tipu as he is hailed in affectionate band of swarming supporters, was about to land in his choppers from Kannauj. Just about as the chopper begun its descent on the landing pad amidst rising pillars of dust-storm, excitement amongst the crowd goes wild. A vast army of teen-age supporters of Samajwadi Party (Socialist) draped in red cap and green-red flag of the party with its symbol-Bicycle emblazoned on its heart—get into their acts, pushing and shoving for the glimpse of their youth icon. Nudging and pushing turns into wild screaming when Akhilesh gets off the chopper. He is mobbed by the crowd of supporters, more than half of them apparently would not be allowed to buy a cigarette as their countenance suggest.

Firozabad is just a 45-minute drive east of the city of Taj Mahal by car. Nearly half the population profess Islam in this glassware capital of India, which tempts with its striking hues of glass bangles and bracelets. Tipu chose the constituency after Kannauj more out of empathy than proximity to his native village of Saifai (It is further 30 kilometers west of Firozabad). Hundreds of thousands of workers in 300 glass factories polish and paint the glass bangles in a wretched circumstance. There was a challenge before him inasmuch as there was flood of entreaties from the huge mass of affected people to usher them in a new era. Akhilesh threw his hat in the ring, with solemn promise of bringing revolutionary change to lives of people who ‘don’t breathe air, but glass’, as the legend goes.

In the previous Assembly elections which Samajwadi Party lost to Maywati, the party lost all the seven Assembly seats in Firozabad. Taking the plunge also allows Akhilesh to exact a stifling revenge from his father’s principal rival in political battlefield of Uttar Pradesh.

There is shyness cloaking a determination in him, but he is up for the challenge.

He is of average height, Salman Khan height, swarthy in complexion, nose shrapnel-like beak redolent of his father! Getting into brisk strides, his khadi shalwar kameez soiled by thousands of embraces, yet he smiles radiating hope and reason. His pair of black shoes are covered in thick speck of dust, and he gives damn to them. From a close quarter he would appear blushing, but it can be misleading. There is no flush or pride or ego in his demeanour as he goes about the business of entertaining his audience.

Born a Scorpio, he shares his zodiac with two great Indian Prime Ministers of yore, Indira Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru, and quite a galaxy of achievers, such as Pablo Picasso, Charles de Gaulle, Robert Kennedy, Theodore Roosevelt, Katharine Hepburn, Marie Antoinette and Richard Burton.

His father, once upon a time, was hailed as the Rafik-ul-Mulk for his unflinching defence of Muslim human rights in the face of relentless onslaught from fanatic Hindu hardliners. When Babri Mosque was demolished in the afternoon of 6 December 1992, Mulayam Singh Yadav had tears in his eyes, uncontrollable stream of tears. The secular press hurled upon him epithet of ‘Maulana Mulayam’.

Akhilesh is an environmental engineer by training. He learnt the green craft first at University of Mysore, and then at Sydney University, Australia. Ahead of entering the ramparts of university, he romanced with football and watermelon in orchards of Etawa, Saifai and green fields of Dholpur military school. In his political innings, he still has very green thumbs. He takes pride in producing some beautiful gardens, and loves to water with love and care in his white house at Saifai.

His father gave him a nickname—Tipu. Tipu hates to be rude, he loves people. Large crowds enthralls him as he breaks into his speech with all the gentle, easy manner of his father, working up the crowd in good-natured, pleasant accent of Awadhi. He doesn’t sulk. At times, he comes forth as incredibly naïve and gullible, but he talks his ear off. Like all love, beauty and sweetness and light, he throws the crowd in raptures when he roars in the Ferozabad town square meeting, “ A cycle can be found in every home of Firozabad and Kannauj, as much as in India, but an elephant will be luxury. Only a handful of privileged can afford them. In sizzling summer, all ponds are dry, so no lotus can bloom”.

His swinging of the metaphor drives the crowd crazy. Tipu is referring to election symbol of his party, Cycle, and then to his rivals, Elepahnt of Bahujan Samaj Party of Mayawati and Lotus- Kamal, of Bhartiyal Janta Party.

In the course of forty days of campaign trails, Akhilesh charmed the electorate by leading a cycle rally, with his young supporters of Samajwadi Yuvjan Sabha (youth brigade) leading the charge. In Firozabad, he was exasperated to find quite a few supporters cheering him on motorbike. His patience ran roughshod over their political in-correctness, as he takes them to task for breach of discipline. His cycle is not an ordinary cycle like hero ranger, but an imported Swedish one, which is quite a sight atop his Pajero when he is still ahead of hitting the roads.

As his caravan of cycle painted in red and green snakes through the lanes and bylanes of crowded bazaars of Firozabad, pints of perspiration hanging down his soggy head and heart doesn’t deter him from stopping on the way to hold a motley gathering of party managers and workers in tight embrace. The cavalcade of motor vehicles and bicycles is on its way to Saifai, his native village. The festering heat of May is enough to pickle one’s brains. Heat and dust of the campaign loses its slither and somber as Akhilesh enters the green environs of Saifai. Nowhere does the village looks like a village, as metalled road and row of concrete building belies the impression of a dusty village.

Saifai tells the tale of Samajwadi Party ascent into corridors of power over the years. The White House, a marble-stone structure with a sprawling green lawn which houses Akhilesh in his moments of recess is an architectural delight as much as it is environmental paradise. Under the horizontal foyer, a row of white plastic chairs are in place to seat the young contender for an audience with select group of party managers and a handful of journalists.

Unlike any other Indian politicians who have had a presence in Assembly or Parliament, there are no trace of scroungers and free-loaders in search of sweets and buns around Akhilesh. His poll managers and assistants are English speaking young guns, with laptop in tow to rattle out figures of every single booth out of over 3,000 going to polls. He doesn’t have stomach for gossip and tittle-tattle. With evening crimson sky fading away, cries of twittering songbirds-nightingale and cuckoo pierce the ears. Tipu enjoys the symphony as he points out he waits to hear the music in the early hours of dusk and the dawn. He has great appetite for these birds, just as he has for fluttering feathers of cranes (saras), the tallest flier who are disappearing fast from the wetlands of Saifai and adjoining regions.

Once upon a time the wetlands of Saifai and Etawa hosted almost sixty percent of the world cranes population. Alas, this tallest flying bird is an extinct species. Tipu feels this is another challenge to save the ecology and the environment in his hamlet, which has acquired fresh halo from its once non-descript existence. Farmers of the area consider cranes auspicious for their loyalty-unto-death to their partners, as the bird is still worshipped by newly-married couples. Cranes are glorious for living in pairs and never split till their death, nor do they change their partners.

Their story is quite dramatic in heart of political headquarters of India’s powerful Samajwadi Party and its heir apparent Akhilesh Yadav realizes the punch of simple, straightforward no-theatrics.

Akhilesh represents the New Democrats in the fast evolving politics of India in the New Century. Ideologically he can be a centrist and identifies more with more moderate social and cultural positions with neo-liberal fiscal values. Critics and admirers alike liken him to a perfect foil to rising Gandhi scion, Rahul Gandhi for the future battle of highest seat of the land. There are growing belly of undercurrents in UP politics, which suggest he is a contender to the throne and Congress general secretary will have to catch a tartar in him tomorrow. The only glitch is national awakening to the reality bites of Akhilesh Yadav style of politics, which can only be ensured with blanket presence of his Socialist party.

He doesn’t want to keep himself out of touch. He keeps himself abreast and in constant agitation to make sense of shift in economic policy and ideas of governance. Technology is no teaser, as he toys with the idea of wiring the party cadre. It was Akhilesh penchant for the software which put Samajwadi Party ahead of all the existing political parties in India in launching the web portals of the party in mid ‘90s though he was just a little over the age of a major. His party could beat even the BJP in putting its net act together and brighter, though the credit couldn’t go much to the party for apparent reasons.

He is his father’s son in many ways. He learnt his political craft under his shadow. However, Akhilesh swears by ideology of his idol, Ram Manohar Lohia, who enjoys exalted status in socialist folklore of India for moving the first no-confidence motion against the Nehru government, which had by then been in office for 16 years!

“My father initiated me into socialist ideals of Lohia since early days. It was my good fortune to contest my inaugural elections for Indian Parliament from Kannauj where from Ram Manohar Lohia was twice elected to Parliament”.

Tipu talks about the lethal influence Lohia has had on Indian psyche, espcially in the aftermath of Sino-India war. “He astounded everyone by calling for India to produce the bomb, after the Chinese aggression of 1962. He was anti-English, saying that the British ruled India with bullet and language (bandhook ki goli aur angrezi ki boli). High-caste, wealth, and knowledge of English are the three requisites, with anyone possessing two of these belonging to the ruling class can dream of utopian life”, beams Akhilesh, saying the definition still holds tight in modern India.

Lohia dreamt of a caste-free India, Akhilesh only feels more passion to carry the legacy forward.

Unlike Lohia, he would not want to abolish private schools. However, he would want to establish upgraded municipal (government) schools which would give equal academic opportunity to students of all castes. There is earnest desire in him to eradicate the divisions created by the caste system.

There was quite an uproarious scene in national media when election manifesto of Socialist (Samajwadi Party) was unveiled. The manifesto turned heads for comedy of errors where it was mentioned that the party wants blanket ban on use of computer and English education. It was a rude awakening to Indian middle class. Akhilesh was baffled over the printer’s devil impact. It was completely chaotic and nonsensical to band of critics. “The party is never against English education. I have studied outside, in Sydney University, know the importance of English. The party was only trying to underline that English shouldn’t become compulsory medium of instructions. Computer education is unavoidable, but it shouldn’t be at the cost of skilled labourers. I want uniform education policy for all Indians. Let all of them study the same medium, whether English or Hindi”.

The young Prince of Saifai is enamoured of The Third Way, a political position attempting to look beyond or transcend left-wing and right-wing politics, and rather advocates a mix of some left-wing and right-wing policies. Third Way represents a centrist compromise between Capitalism and Socialism or between market liberalism and democratic socialism.

Akhilesh claims, “Third Way represents a synthesis of these competing viewpoints, distinct from and superior to both of its sources, rather than simply a compromise or mixture”. The ‘Third Way’ approach has been adopted by social liberals and some social democrats in many Western liberal democracies

Like a Utopian Socialists, the one including Robert Owen, Tipu tries to find socialist factories and other structures within a capitalist society. He says Henri de Saint Simon, the first individual to coin the term socialism, was the originator of technocracy and industrial planning. The first socialists predicted a world improved by harnessing technology and combining it with better social organization, and many contemporary socialists share this belief. Early socialist thinkers tended to favor more authentic meritocracy, while many modern socialists have a more egalitarian approach.

He wants to improve the condition of every member of society, even that of the most favored. Hence, he habitually appeals to society at large, without distinction of class; nay, by preference, to the ruling class. Moreover, he wants gender equality to be supreme, with both men and women enjoying equal benefits and chance to harness their potential.

His public addresses in twang of local lingo talks about turning work into play. He envisages units of people based on a theory of passions and of their combination. Though his voice over phone sound a little silken, his silver tongues rolls in deep baritone over public address system. He speaks in husky tone and tenor. He is so glibly persuasive in crowd he can talk people into buying things they couldn’t possibly even use. He believes in laying his own foundation and building his own empire, major or minor as he didn’t solicit the support of his heavyweight father for campaigning in Kannauj and Firozabad. He walked straight with pride of building over two dozen bridges (The Bridge on the River Koli) and a state-of-the-art hospital in Kannauj where he won with over three lakh votes last time, enough to bring him glory, so has he been hassle-free in his thought of pulling off in Firozabad on his own.

He is consistent in reminding his people about his roots. More than his roots, he is very absolute in adhering to ideologies of his Socialist father and idols. He wish to imagine a society for his people where there is no money, no want, no poverty, no crime, no disease or ignorance in human society; virtually everyone works for the advancement of all humanity as well as the rest of the Federation.

In recent times, his party, Socialist Party, has earned some flak for its indiscriminate tilt towards glamour icons. Furthermore, quite a great deal of corporate influence is attributed to dilution in socialist agenda of the party. Akhilesh feels these are vagaries of changing times. Not much should be read into glamour spread, as nearly all the political outfits in India are vulnerable to the phenomena.

As a matter of fact, the original Socialist Party had its roots in the Congress Socialist Party (CSP), the socialist caucus of the Indian National Congress, which fused in 1948 with the Bolshevik-Leninist Party of India, Ceylon and Burma (BLPI). Hector Abhayavardhana of the BLPI became General Secretary of the new party. The Socialist Party was founded not long after India’s independence when Jayprakash Narayan, Basawon Singh, Acharya Narendra Dev led the CSP out of Congress. At the time, Congress’s leader Jawaharlal Nehru was a democratic socialist whose sentiments were widely admired by the rank and file of the CSP, but they objected to his apparent unwillingness to act decisively in favour of democratic socialism or to renounce his dependence upon the conservative Hindu wing of the party represented by Sardar Vallabhai Patel or C. Rajagopalachari..

Akhilesh swears to preserve the socialist and secular character of his party intact against all odds.

He treasures his maiden rendezvous with former US President Bill Clinton. “Meetign with Clinton was quite an experience. The Congress party launched an offensive campaign in order to dissuade Bill Clinton from visiting Uttar Pradesh. So much so that the party wrote a letter urging Clinton to boycott the visit, saying Samajwadi Party members are not good people. Clinton Foundation carried out its own research and agreed to visit UP. The people in Congress party were jealous. When Clinton learnt that I am a member of Indian Parliament, he was quite amused and surprised. He emphasized socialist politics is need of the hour”.

Being a youth icon and scion of a powerful secular leader of Uttar Pradesh, which is home to nearly half the Muslim population of India, he realizes he has greater challenges on hands. As the dust over Mumbai attacks settles down, he doesn’t fall in the trap of vilifying the Muslim community. Muslim youths adore him for his gentle manner and expressive personality. With Indo-Pakistan bilateral relation in the bind, he would like to do the needful to create the positive vibes. At a time when the world is watching with bated breath the mass exodus of people in Swat, Mingora and Dir, Akhilesh is warning the situation shouldn’t resemble that of Darfur and Rawanda, as it might affect our own shores.

In his techno-savvy style, as he maintains lively link with strangers and acquaintances rocking on social networking sites like Facebook and Orkut, not to mention his E 71 Nokia and Blackberry, the Generation Next in Indian democracy is looking up to his persuasive talks and debating skills to force more reason and hope in Indian Parliament. Akhilesh may have inherited wealth and political position and levers of influence, but he has seldom rested on his family laurels. He has proven he has the ability to stack up gold pieces on his own.

He is valiant and charitable in his socio-political pursuits without being naïve about them. At end of the day, he is a family man, as he prances around with his twin son-daughter duo, born out of his better half, Dimple, whom he married out of his choice. He has soft heart, but not soft-head. He dotes on legacy and memorials of Abhrahm Lincoln, the 16th president of America, and dreams of emulating his feats for millions of downtrodden who are still doomed to live like slaves in his state, let alone rest of the country, and who are called dalits. Like Lincolin, he is determined to fight fiercely for the cause. For him, dalits living in deprivation are heart of darkness, and it is his moral duty to wipe out these heart of darkness from not only Uttar Pradesh, but from entire country. He doesn’t tolerate people of low intelligence and limited compassion. Little wonder he is doing everything to bring shine to health and education barometer in his capacity.

Jahangir Siddiqui Group is one of the biggest financial services providers of Pakistan. This group is also the 2nd largest shareholder of the insurance company EFU. Jahangir Siddiqui was Pakistani Rags to Riches Business Tycoon, who founded JS group about 4 decades ago. The group comprises businesses with over 18,000 employees and profit after tax of $510 million in 2007

Overview
When most fourteen-year old boys were flying kites or playing cricket in their spare time, young Jahangir Siddiqui was busy running his business as a distributor of Coca-Cola in Hyderabad. Impressed? Well…there’s more. He also set up a swanky café in his father’s garage called Dreamland Cold Coffee Shop. Happily for him, it was adjacent to Firdaus cinema (owned by his uncle) and young Jahangir used to reap the benefits of customers pouring in during the intervals of three matinee shows.

“In the first year I made Rs.40, 000 and in the second year, I made around Rs.70, 000 which in those days was a lot of money,” laughs Jahangir Siddiqui. For a fourteen-year old, it still is a lot of money! Most young professionals have a starting salary of less than half of that!

Fourteen year old young boy, who is son of Govt. Servant, invested only Rs. 6000 in his Café Business at his father’s garage and distribution of Coca Cola in the 60s.

Many years on from Dreamland Cold Coffee Shop, Jahangir Siddiqui, the veteran stockbroker and pioneer in the development of Pakistan’s stock market is sitting at his desk in his modestly sized, sleek office in Karachi. He is impeccably well dressed in a suit and I am momentarily reminded of the elegantly attired JR Ewing from the 80’s hit series Dallas — minus the cowboy hat of course! But don’t get me wrong: JS is no JR. Far from it in fact. He was not born with a silver spoon in his mouth; he didn’t inherit a business empire from his father; he didn’t come from an incredibly wealthy family. No. Mr. Jahangir Siddiqui is a self made man. Despite the immaculate and formal suit, Jahangir Siddiqui is refreshingly casual and has a wonderful way of putting people at ease. He is jovial, chatty and remarkably frank.

Built over four decades, JS Group is one of Pakistan’s most diversified and progressive financial services groups.

Success Story

Born in Hyderabad, Sindh on 28 July 1948, Jahangir Siddiqui was the ninth of ten children — a big family even by the standards of the day. His father was a government servant and his mother a housewife. “I grew up in Hyderabad which in those days was a very clean city. In fact, in pre-Partition days, it used to be called the ‘Paris of the subcontinent’!” He laughs at my look of disbelief. “Really, it is true! I remember going for walks with my sisters on Thandi Sarak and the road was lined with trees. There is not a single tree there now though.”
A “reasonably religious culture” permeated the Siddiqui family. Jahangir Siddiqui’s father built a mosque which today stands opposite Sindh University’s city campus in Hyderabad. “We used to take care of the mosque and I remember once when there was no imam, my brother led the prayers. I used to collect donations,” reminisces Jahangir Siddiqui.

Every day after school, the young Jahangir would go the mosque for the afternoon or Asr prayer. He would not go home until he had also offered the sunset or Maghrib prayer. During the two-hour wait between Asr and Maghrib, Jahangir Siddiqui would pass the time with a friend of his who prayed at the same mosque. This friend owned a shop. “I used to sit in that shop and I’d see how many bottles of Coke they were selling on a daily basis and how much money they were making. I calculated all this and I thought to myself that I can start doing this business as well. All I needed to do was to make an initial investment of around Rs.6, 000.”

Showing an initiative and enterprise uncharacteristic of a fourteen year old, Jahangir Siddiqui decided to discuss the matter with his father. One can only imagine the father’s amusement when his fourteen-year old son told him that he wanted to start business immediately as a distributor of Coca Cola! “My father was a very straight guy,” laughs Jahangir Siddiqui, “but he never discouraged me. All he said was that ‘you don’t have the money.’ And that was the only thing he said.” The determined young boy took his father’s response to mean that his father did not disagree in principle with his son starting a business and the only problem was that his son didn’t have the money. Young Jahangir made up his mind to remedy that situation forthwith — by selling his father’s car.
“My father being a government servant went away on a four-day tour and I immediately called a kabari (second hand dealer) and told him that he could buy my father’s car,” says Jahangir Siddiqui. “What?” I exclaimed in disbelief.

“It was a standard vanguard car — a 1952 model,” he explains apparently oblivious to my concerns of the ethical question of selling your father’s car behind his back. “So what if it was?” I asked still reeling from shock. “I got Rs.1, 800 for it,” says Jahangir Siddiqui well humouredly.
“What! That’s nothing!” I didn’t know what worried me more: the fact that he sold the car or that he sold it and, to my mind, got practically nothing for it. “In those days you could buy a brand new Volkswagen for between Rs.5, 000 – 7, 000,” he smiles.

One had to admire his bravery – and nerve! I don’t think I would ever have the guts to sell my father’s car without him knowing! But then, I’m no Jahangir Siddiqui. Jahangir Siddiqui sold a lot of the coal and wheat stored in his father’s garage. “In those days there was no gas in Hyderabad so we used to use coal for fire and therefore there was a demand for coal. I sold all of it but I kept two sacks of wheat and coal for the house.” N He then cleared out the garage to make space for the café he would set up. “I needed a café or an outlet to sell cold drinks so I set it up in my father’s garage,” says Jahangir Siddiqui.

When his father returned home after his four-day tour, he was alarmed to see or rather, not see, his car. It was time for young Jahangir to explain himself: “I told him that I sold his car to raise money because I wanted to start my business and he had told me that I could do so only if I had the money. Well…now I had.”

Surprisingly, Jahangir Siddiqui’s father was not at all angry. “He laughed and gave me some more money because he knew that I was determined to start a business.” Jahangir Siddiqui’s father must have been a truly remarkable (and benevolent) individual! And two years later, Jahangir Siddiqui bought his father a brand new car —a Fiat 600.

Jahangir Siddiqui still remembers the day on which he started his business: “It was 15 May 1962,” he says. I would soon discover that Jahangir Siddiqui has a penchant for remembering dates.

Because he was doing so well in his business (he also was a distributor of ice cream and had a refrigerator shop) young Jahangir naturally lost interest in his studies: “Unfortunately, I was not able to clear two subjects in my Inter-Commerce examinations – I had lost interest in education.” His father was concerned. “My father was strict about education and he told me firmly but politely that he was not interested in my money making and that I had to study and become a professional.”

He may have been a willful child but he was certainly not disobedient: “I sold my business and gave my cold coffee shop on lease. As it is, the Coke distribution was automatically cancelled in 1964 because Coke set up its own factory in Hyderabad. I then started studying regularly just to please my father,” says Jahangir Siddiqui. The hard work paid off. He managed to complete his Inter-Commerce examinations and went on to do a B.Com in 1966 and secured a first division.

But during this time, he did not suppress his entrepreneurial instinct. He invested the money he had made from his business in two other businesses: “I invested some with a family friend to finance the purchase of a fishing trawler and the rest in the transport business of my elder brother. So that is how I became a private equity investor!”

In 1967, Jahangir Siddiqui started his training as a chartered accountant. He became an articled clerk to a firm in Karachi called Gangat & Co which was situated in the Securities & Safe Deposit Chamber on I.I Chundrigar Road in what is now the Al Falah Bank building. He used to go to work every day on a motorbike. But near his office was the Karachi Stock Exchange and one day, Jahangir Siddiqui decided to walk in.

During his student days in Hyderabad, Jahangir Siddiqui had bought a few shares in Adamjee Sugar Mills and Mirpurkhas Sugar Mills which he decided he now wanted to sell. The only trouble was that he didn’t know how to do it. Luckily, his friend’s brother was a member of the Karachi Stock Exchange (KSE) and he handed Jahangir Siddiqui two transfer deeds which he told him he was giving him free of charge. “I thought he had done me a great favour only to discover later that transfer deeds are always given free!” laughs Jahangir Siddiqui who didn’t even know how to fill out a transfer deed! However, with a bit of help from his friend, Jahangir Siddiqui managed to sell and transfer his shares.

Something about the stock exchange excited Jahangir Siddiqui. Perhaps it was the thrill? Perhaps the buzz? Perhaps the potential to make a quick buck? Whatever it was, the young articled clerk was enamored and found himself going to KSE everyday on his lunch break. He would wander around absorbing how things worked. He got to know some of the brokers who advised him on what shares to buy. Unfortunately, he did not have much money back then. But he did have some money coming in from his investments in the trawler business of his friend and the transport business of his brother. With that money he bought shares in Habib Bank for Rs.16 per share. He later sold these at a profit: some at Rs.22, others at Rs.23 and some at Rs.27 per share. He also bought shares at Rs. 28 each in Habib Insurance and sold them for Rs.45 and Rs.50 and received cash dividends of 80%. This was big money for an articled clerk and the thrill was intoxicating. In his first year at playing the stock market, Jahangir Siddiqui, made around Rs.200, 000. In those days, the salary of a director of a big multinational was around Rs.2, 500.

Jahangir Siddiqui celebrated his success by buying himself his first car — an Opel Rekord: “When I came to Karachi, I lived with my brother in Garden road and used to get around on a motorbike. Every day, I used to see the car of my boss, Mr. Ahmad Adam Gangat — he had an Opel Rekord and I wanted the same car as him. The car was delivered to me on 1 January 1968.”

Sadly, Jahangir Siddiqui’s father had died two days before on 30 December 1967 — the day that his new car was actually meant to be delivered. But the son never forgot his father’s advice and his success in the stock market did not mean that he neglected his studies and he managed to pass his chartered accountancy exams on the first attempt. “So long as my father was alive, he was genuinely concerned about my education and was always telling me to focus on my studies and get a professional degree. That is why I did chartered accountancy,” says Jahangir Siddiqui.

By 1970, Jahangir Siddiqui had made a fair deal of money on the stock exchange which he entrusted to a broker friend of his. “He was a dear friend of mine and all my securities and shares were lying with him. In those days there was no Central Depository Company so brokers would have custody of your shares.” Seven days before his final chartered accountancy examination, the said broker called Jahangir Siddiqui to his office and told him that he was unable to pay his debtors and was filing for bankruptcy.

“I asked him what happened to my money and he told me that it was all gone! He was really upset and he was feeling terrible that he had lost his friend’s money. I tried to console him but he was naturally devastated. While we were discussing this, he got a chest pain and had a heart attack so I immediately took him to the hospital. I spent the night there and the next morning I went to his office just to open it and all the creditors were there.”

A week later, the broker’s condition had stabilized and he told Jahangir Siddiqui to take his office in the stock exchange in consideration for that entire he had lost: “He was an honest and honorable person and he didn’t want to be indebted to his friend,” explains Jahangir Siddiqui. “He said that if he started afresh, nobody would come to him so it would be better if I started a business and he would work for me as an agent. So that is how a career in the stock market was imposed on me!”

Jahangir Siddiqui started a small company called Jahangir Siddiqui & Co which essentially comprised of four persons. Today, Jahangir Siddiqui & Co is one of the largest and well respected financial services companies in Pakistan with several subsidiaries which include Abamco, Pakistan’s largest non-government asset management company, Jahangir Siddiqui Capital Markets and Jahangir, Siddiqui Investment Bank.

The broker also sold Jahangir Siddiqui some shares in companies such as National Shipping Corporation, Megana Jute and others: “I bought these shares at a higher value just to let him know that he doesn’t owe me anything. I bought these shares in May 1971.”

But trouble was just around the corner for a few months later the 1971 war between Pakistan and India started and this heralded the start of one of the most difficult periods in Jahangir Siddiqui’s life. “The market was not behaving properly and most of my shares were in East Pakistan companies and these just became worthless pieces of paper. I could not get anything for those shares. Then Bhutto came to power and emergency was declared and the market closed. So, I couldn’t afford to pay salaries because there was no commission coming in. It was a very bad situation. Then Bhutto began nationalization and everybody was a seller in the market when it opened and there were no buyers. It was terrible— even when the market opened we were not able to generate Rs.300 a month in commission and there were expenses of about Rs.2,000 in salaries, rent, petrol etc. Those were really bad days right up till 1975 because there was constant nationalization.”

But Jahangir Siddiqui survived the hardships of that period through sheer hard work and ingenuity. “I thought to myself that now I have started this business, I can’t go back. That is not what Jahangir is. I was determined to fight it out. And I fought it out. I developed the fixed income business —selling and buying bonds and government securities. By the grace of Almighty Allah, in the 80’s, 75%-80% of the daily volume traded in fixed securities was ours. So I became a broker of fixed income securities and I have never looked back.”

But the stock market, dominated as it was by Memons, was difficult for a Sindhi to break into: “It was very difficult for a Sindhi to be a broker,” says Jahangir Siddiqui seriously, “It wasn’t so difficult for Punjabis as Khadim Ali Shah Bukhari was a Punjabi and was a highly respected broker. There were quite a few Punjabis but I was the only Sindhi. So I didn’t have a proposer or a secondary. My father was not a businessman and no company listed on the stock exchange belonged to a Sindhi so I couldn’t even become a consultant to an issue nor did I have a potential customer base as there weren’t many Sindhi businessmen. Even if I went back to Hyderabad to ask the Sindhi community to give me business, they wouldn’t have known what I was talking about! Most of them didn’t know how to spell ‘share’ and thought immediately of ‘sher’ as in a lion!”

Basically, Jahangir Siddiqui did not have the right connections. This disadvantage in the long run turned out to be an advantage as it prompted him to concentrate in developing institutional clients. He began networking with directors of small institutions who were impressed when they met him.

“I would meet the General Manager of Deutsche Bank or American Express and they became my clients. I started getting business from institutions which in those days were very small such as Investment Corporation of Pakistan and National Investment Trust. That is how I transferred myself from retail business to institutional business and into the business of fixed income. So although it was very difficult for me as a Sindhi, because I was educated (and very there were very few people in those days in KSE who could communicate with those sort of clients), I could develop institutional clients. What made it easier for me was that they were not investing in equities but in fixed income and that is how I started doing the business of fixed income rather than equities because it was very difficult for me to get a customer base in equities.”

Luckily, Jahangir Siddiqui managed to develop a niche for himself and from 1975 onwards, he was only dealing with banks and financial institutions and not with individuals.

Despite being a Sindhi, Jahangir Siddiqui was fortunate enough to find two Memon brokers who helped promote him in the KSE: Mr. Z.A Saya and Mr. Amin Tai. “Mr. Saya promoted me a lot,” he acknowledges, “I really respect Amin Tai — he is a genuine person who also helped me a lot. We became friends in an interesting manner. There was a case in the arbitration committee and I was a board member. I argued and Amin put his views forward and after that he came up to me and told me that he liked my idea and I also liked his idea. We became friends and I started to treat him as a senior who would give me the right guidance. That relationship continues to this day.”

In time, Amin Tai and Jahangir Siddiqui would also be known as “the original corporate raiders.”I asked Jahangir Siddiqui about this with some trepidation as it was a delicate question and I wondered how he’d respond. He gave a ironic smile.

“There are two ways of looking at it,” he began, “you may call it corporate raiding but I would refer to it as being a value investor. This was in fact the training I got from Amin Tai as he is a value investor. There were certain companies in which I and Amin Tai bought blocks and tried to turn them around. We used to pick up companies which were either under-performing or there was a lot of potential for them to grow. It was not hostile corporate raiding. I can give you two examples. One is EFU. It was a friendly type of investment — one of the families controlling the shares was selling it through their broker and I bought the lot for myself and a client of mine. Till today, I haven’t sold them. I am on the board of EFU and it is one of the finest companies. Another example was Nafees Cottton in which Amin Tai and I had substantial holdings. Initially the management didn’t like that and they were very uneasy with me. But now we have a very good relationship. The company has changed its name to Azgard Nine and it is one of the finest denim producers in the country and we are two of the largest shareholders in that company. So I cannot say that we were corporate raiders. I was buying for the value and trying to turn around those companies, give them guidance if I could and if the management was willing to listen.

“I came into contact with a lot of entrepreneurs who had their own philosophies. I told them that if you run a public limited company, you have to have a corporate culture. You cannot run it as a sole proprietorship. Some of them didn’t agree and didn’t like what I had to say.”

Things didn’t always run as smoothly as Jahangir Siddiqui would have liked. The management of some companies resented his presence and the owners of one particular company even threatened to have him murdered!
“It was not always easy,” says Jahangir Siddiqui trying to suppress a smile. “We did have trouble with one company. The management was very hostile to us and I kept on telling them that I was not out to destroy the company — I would have been a fool of the first order if I was because I had purchased the company’s shares from the market to make money. And I can’t make money unless the company is turned around. If you improve the company, the share value goes up. But the management was still very hostile and we were threatened with murder or kidnapping. I wasn’t at all afraid of any of these threats because as I told you, I come from a very religious family and I firmly believe that our time of death is fixed. When you have to die you have to die — nothing or no one can stop it. So I wasn’t at all intimidated. In those days my mother was alive and she would pray and read the Qu’ran and tell me that all would be well. I really believe in those things.”

Fortunately, Jahangir Siddiqui survived the threats and the company was turned around and the management is now on friendly terms with him. And, Jahangir Siddiqui does not appear to hold a grudge: he achieved what he had set out to achieve. “We sold our shares on the market and we made money. Our intention was always to improve the company.”

Boosting the performance of foundering companies was not the only area where Jahangir Siddiqui made improvements. His contribution to the development of Pakistan’s stock exchange has been outstanding and will no doubt earn him a place in corporate history…and Jahangir Siddiqui subconsciously appears to have quite a penchant for the historical. “I studied a lot of profiles of different people. I really feel that you should be on the top of any profession you are in. Take lawyers for example. Mr. Jinnah was on the top of his profession, so was A.K Brohi. There are certain professionals who have gone down in history. Based on this, I went into stock exchange politics and was promoted by Mr. Saya. I was a board member for 13 years and Vice President for two years. Whenever I travelled abroad to say, Sweeden, India, Amsterdam, I used to meet with people from the stock exchange. And I thought we could change the culture of the KSE — in around 1987 or 1988, I really felt that we needed to revolutionize the KSE. Initially nobody supported any of my ideas except for Nasir Ali Shah Bukhari who was a young boy in those days but he believed in me. He always calls me ‘Bhai Jan’ and he kept on telling me that I was right about corporate membership and that it was something that we should do. So we went to the president of the stock exchange and his attitude was ‘over my dead body!’”

This was not the sort of response that a man like Jahangir Siddiqui could settle for; particularly when he felt that he was right. He decided to fight it out. “I thought that I would have to fight it out myself, become the president of the stock exchange and change the culture.” And…he did.

Jahangir Siddiqui contested the December 1989 elections for the presidency of the KSE and won against Arif Habib (the current Chairman) by one vote. He was president between 1990-91 — a revolutionary period in the history of the stock exchange. “Within six months, we changed the entire culture of the stock exchange,” says Jahangir Siddiqui, “corporate membership rules were made as were rules for minimum qualifications of brokers; I set up a library; I asked Mr. Iqbal Ismail (whom he fondly refers to as the “Professor”) to conduct classes for the brokers and agents to educate them; I went to see IFC and we established CDC.”

But Jahangir Siddiqui is not one of those men that love “the chair.” After a year’s stint as president of the stock exchange, Jahangir Siddiqui decided that he had done enough. “I think that whatever I wanted to see changed in the stock exchange I had changed. That is why after 1991, I didn’t contest any election. You have to leave when you are on top.” Again that awareness of history displays itself.

Jahangir Siddiqui also made history as far as his company was concerned. Ignoring the advice of practically everyone in the market, in 1991, Jahangir Siddiqui & Co became the first corporate securities brokerage in the KSE. “Nasir Ali Shah Bukhari got his company listed before mine. We got listed in 1993. People kept telling me not to do it and that I was a fool. They kept telling me that you own 100% of your company —why do you want to dilute your ownership to 30%? But my argument was, would you rather own 100% of a company with equity of Rs.20m or 50% of a company with equity of Rs.3bn? If you need capital and if you want your company to grow, you have to go public and share your prosperity with small shareholders.”

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Jahangir Siddiqui & Co was also the first securities brokerage with a Wall Street stamp. “We joined hands with Bear Stearns, one of the largest and most respectable firms in New York,” smiles Jahangir Siddiqui. A joint venture with Bear Stearns was no mean feat. Among its many achievements, Bear Stearns issued the first sovereign bond for Israel. After entering into a joint venture with Jahangir Siddiqui, it can now also boast of the fact that in 1994, it issued the first sovereign Eurobond for the Islamic Republic of Pakistan in an amount of US$150m. The fact that Bear Stearns decided to do business with a Pakistani (and Pakistan in those days did not enjoy a good reputation in the international business world) speaks volumes about the faith they had in Jahangir Siddiqui. “I brought them to Pakistan, they bought 30% of my company and so the name was changed to Bear Stearns Jahangir Siddiqui and I was appointed CEO and Chairman. I was very touched at the faith they had in me. I mean, theirs was a US$55 bn company at that time and they lent their name to a company in Pakistan.”

Another landmark achievement was the establishment of Abamco in 1995, which is a subsidiary of Jahangir Siddiqui & Co. Abamco is a joint venture between Amvescap Plc (one of the world’s largest fund managers), IFC and Jahangir Siddiqui & Co. “I was told by the government that there is no private sector asset management company in Pakistan and there were no rules for this either. They said that they wanted to establish one and they wanted me to help. For three years I was in negotiations with people and I contacted Amvescap and they bought 30% equity in Abamco and they are joint venture partners with us till today in spite of all the difficulties Pakistan is facing.” Abamco is Pakistan’s second largest asset management company and the largest non-government asset management company. As at June 30, 2004, it managed approximately Rs.14 bn (US$ 240m) in assets.

More recently, Jahangir Siddiqui wanted to introduce another innovation into Pakistan’s capital markets: an electronic stock exchange. A company called Pex Ltd was formed for this purpose and was granted approval by the Securities & Exchange Commission to set up an electronic stock exchange. However, the boards of the Lahore, Karachi & Islamabad stock exchange created uproar notwithstanding the fact that the government had invited them and other brokers to establish such an exchange and they had been present in all the meetings in which the Pex Ltd matter was being discussed. All three stock exchanges filed a suit and went to court and obtained a stay order. The matter is still to be decided. As the matter is sub judice, Jahangir Siddiqui would not discuss it.

The ‘powers that be’ in the stock exchange are usually suspicious of and react strongly to change. “When automation of trading occurred,” says Jahangir Siddiqui, “they said that they would not allow it and they attacked the computer system of the KSE just to destroy it. And now, they cannot do without it. Similarly, they were not happy with the establishment of CDC, registration of brokers, capital adequacy rules, margin regulations. So, they don’t have a vision. That was the problem. They only realize the benefit of something after they have used it for a couple of years!”

But what would be the benefit of an electronic stock exchange? “The concept of a demutualized stock exchange needs to be there,” says Jahangir Siddiqui, “Demutualization is where the management of a company is different from the members who have trading rights. Presently, the stock exchanges do not have a demutualized system and the members are running it. In my opinion that is unfair — it is absolutely unfair. Let me give you an example. Think of the stock exchanges as a car. A car has four wheels. Now if you imbalance those wheels by making some bigger and some smaller, the car won’t run smoothly. Similarly, in any exchange, you have four prominent players: the issuer, the investor, the members (who are the brokers) and the regulator. If these four are not kept in balance, the car won’t run smoothly. What happens is that they are the judge as well as the jury as well as the prosecutors. Tell me: is there any representation of any issuer on the stock exchange? The answer is no. Tell me: is there any representation of any investor on any stock exchange? The answer is again no. But if you have a demutualized exchange you can have members representing the issuers, the trading community, and the regulator. What is the harm in it? Why do you want to manage the entire stock exchange yourself?”

I then asked Jahangir Siddiqui if he thought the three stock exchanges should be merged. “It’s a financial decision to be taken by the exchanges and they should do whatever is good for them. In my opinion, it is best to have competition. If, for example, all the telephone companies are merged into one, is it good or bad? It is certainly not good. You must have competition. Even if they do decide to merge, they should not stop anyone else from establishing a stock exchange. They shouldn’t merge simply to eliminate the competition. So if anyone is setting up an exchange, a merged stock exchange should not turn around and say that they will not allow another exchange.”

Our conversation then turned to the topical issue of mutual funds. “I think mutual funds are the future. We need to spend more time and energy on educating people about them. Individually, a person cannot invest in 700 companies, they cannot trade. With a mutual fund you just tell the fund manager your requirements i.e. whether you want a regular income fund, aggressive growth, a blue chip portfolio. Somebody else manages the fund for you. You don’t have time as an individual investor and you are at the mercy of brokers.”

Jahangir Siddiqui is so frank and forthright that I have difficulty reconciling his persona with the stereotypical image of a stock broker. Generally, people have very negative impressions about stock brokers and see them as wily people who can manipulate and “drop” the market as and when they feel like. For instance, if they don’t like the idea of CVT, they’ll protest by manipulating the market in such a way that it will ‘drop.’ Once again, a wry smile appears on Jahangir Siddiqui’s face. “It’s not that easy to simply ‘drop’ the market. I do tend to agree that unfortunately the perception of stock brokers is not that good. But not all brokers are like this —there are several good brokers. Of course, there are also so called ‘black sheep’ but you get those in every trade.”

Jahangir Siddiqui picked up on my passing reference to CVT and wanted to discuss it. “I entirely disagree with people who say that CVT is not good. I think CVT is one of the best solutions Shaukat Aziz has given in the budget. CVT is 0.01% — what is the total impact if you are buying shares of PSO? 3 paisas only. So are you really going to stop doing your business for 3 paisas? And if you are paying those 3 paisas to the government you are helping them to do a lot of projects and reducing the budgetary deficit. That is not a bad thing.”

“Your son disagrees with you,” I pointed out remembering that Jahangir Siddiqui’s son Ali wrote an excellent article for Blue Chip disagreeing with the imposition of CVT. Jahangir Siddiqui gives a broad grin.

“You know, we father and son are both independent people,” he says good humouredly, “I have always tried my level best to ensure that both my sons, Ali and Ali Raza should be independent and I am pleased that Ali has the courage to state his own opinions. If they don’t agree with me, I am fine with that. I have never imposed any decision big or small on either of them. I listen to them and if I have a different point of view, I argue with them and either I’ll be convinced or I’ll try and convince them.”

Jahangir Siddiqui has two sons: Ali and Ali Raza. Ali is a director of Jahangir Siddiqui & Co and is already making waves in Pakistan’s business scene a “I have the best of relationships with my sons” says Jahangir Siddiqui proudly. “When Ali decided to come back to Pakistan after his studies and join the group, I resigned as Chairman and director because I felt that if I remained, it would not be possible for him to grow. Smaller trees do not grow in the shade of larger trees. And Ali has grown the business far better than I could have done.”

Smaller trees do not grow in the shade of larger trees. His son has grown the business far better than he could have done

It is said that behind every successful man there is a strong woman and in this respect, Jahangir Siddiqui is no exception. He readily acknowledges that his elegant wife Mahvash has been a towering pillar of support. “Mahvash has done a lot for the family,” he says smiling. “We got married in 1975 and she is solely responsible for bringing up the children. I used to come home from the office very late – sometimes as late as 8.30pm and then straight away we’d have to go out for dinner. Ali and Ali Raza have good manners, good education and outlook and that is all because of their mother. She is a wonderful companion. She never complained that I didn’t give enough time to her or the children which I do realize now. In earlier days, I’d spend most of my time at the office and frankly speaking, up until about the year 2000, I wasn’t giving them enough time. Of course, I’d take them on vacation. They’ve traveled with me a lot and seen the whole world.”

Suddenly, his eyes light up. “Did you know that Mahvash was a professor of English? She was head of the English department at Khatoon-e-Pakistan College which is just opposite Agha Khan Hospital. She used to take the kids with her to lectures when they were young. So from a young age, my kids knew all about Shakespeare!”

These days, Jahangir Siddiqui comes to the office between 9.30 – 10.30am. He spends his first 45 minutes reading the newspaper clippings that the relevant department in his office has cut out for him to read. Now that he has retired as Chairman and director of the Jahangir Siddiqui group, he devotes a lot of his energies to the companies of which he is a director. “I do enjoy working on different boards,” says Jahangir Siddiqui, “I normally read the entire agenda before a meeting!” Jahangir Siddiqui is currently on the board of SMEDA, Gwadar Port Authority and various charitable foundations.

In the little spare time that he has, he likes to watch films. However, his choice of film depends on whether or not his wife is with him. “When I am alone, I watch a lot of films. You won’t believe this but my favorite ones are the Indian movies that come on Zee TV!” He laughs heartily. “I’m being completely honest with you! You see, there are many channels and Indian movies and Pakistani songs are the only things I like because you can enjoy them even if you catch those 30 minutes after they have started. They follow the same formula. But if Mahvash is with me then I watch what she likes. She is very fond of English movies — and if we are abroad, we go to the theatre.” He also has a small collection of coins. “It’s a small collection of coins of the subcontinent. Collecting those is a part time hobby of mine. I also have an old Qu’ran collection. When I was young, I used to collect stamps. I have quite a lot of stamps actually!”

I asked him if he was fond of reading. “No. I’ll be very honest with you,” came the reply. “The only reading I do,” he said picking up a bunch of papers on his desk, “is commercial reading.” I admired Jahangir Siddiqui’s confidence in him. He is proud of what he is and he does not try and pretend to be something he is not. There are no airs and graces about him; there is no arrogance or false pride that one so often finds in other businessmen. He exudes confidence but it is a confidence tempered by humility. This didn’t surprise me. Men of achievement, that is, real achievement, are also men of great humility.

Before ending our chat, I asked him what moments in his professional life he looked back on with pride. “As a stock broker, I did some work for a huge foundation who was investing a lot in the stock market. In 1979, we were closing down our equity section and concentrating more on fixed income. I wrote them a letter setting out this position. Our equity section then closed and didn’t re-open until 1991. When we resumed it, I called them and asked if they would like to give us business and they said that the original trustee had died and that when our company stopped doing business in equities, they passed a resolution saying that they would not do business with any stock broker but Jahangir Siddiqui. I became so emotional. I still become emotional when I think about that.”

Today’s JS Group

JS Group has grown from its roots in Pakistan’s financial services industry. JS Financial operates market-leading companies in asset management, investment banking, securities brokerage, commercial banking, insurance and trade finance.

Your browser may not support display of this image.The group also includes five vertical businesses: JS Industrial, JS Infocom, JS Property, JS Resources and JS Transportation. They believe each of these sectors, in itself, offers an exciting and attractive long-term investment proposition in Pakistan. Their diversification across these sectors allows JS to ride out each sector’s individual business cycle and take a long term approach to investing in and building their businesses. They started from stock trading and now Pakistan’s most diversified business group with Interest in Telecom, Media, Energy, Financial services, Real Estate, Transportation, and Industries.

The group has offices throughout the major cities in Pakistan and manages its international operations from its London and Dubai offices. The group comprises businesses with over 18,000 employees and profit after tax of $510 million in 2007.

JS Group Portfolio:

They owned and partially owned Al Abbas Industries, Al Abbas cement, Azgard-9, PICT, Dadex Eternit, TRG, Eye Television (Hum TV), Pak American Fertilizer Company, JSDL, JS Property, Sprint Energy, Hascombe Oil, AirBlue, JS Air, Accor Group – Hotels, Allianz – Insurance, Dubai Bank – Islamic Banking, Experian – Consumer Credit Bureau, Global Investment House – Securities Brokerage, International Finance Corporation – Asset Management, Ulker – Food, JS Financial, Jahangir Siddiqui & Co. Ltd, JS Global Capital Limited, JS Bank Limited, JS Investments Limited, EFU Insurance Group, and Bank Islami.

Success Analysis By: Salman A. Sheik

• He grew drastically because he had no family’s responsibility as majority of young entrepreneurs have.

• He invested Rs. 6000 in 60s that seems very small amount these days but it had huge worth those days.
• He started from humble beginnings and grew gradually, but majority of Young ENTREPRENEURS want to become business tycoon overnight. It concludes that Business has no shortcuts; everyone can’t become visionary Bill Gates.
• He had no formal business training but he was enthusiastic enough to learn business, so he learned gradually from his seniors in the business field.
• He was real genius and has immense intellectual level and analytical skill.
  As we know that smaller trees do not grow in the shade of larger trees, so Jahangir Siddiqui had no limit of his experiences and entrepreneurial spirit.
• He didn’t leave formal study for his business, and achieved Chartered Accountancy, which opened new horizons in Capital Markets.
• He became President of KSE by his strong leadership abilities.
• I noticed that Children of Employees have more potential than children of Businessmen, because Children of corporate class have all material goods.

Source: The Blue Chip Magazine

Elections are going on and results are knocking on the doors. Future will say who will be the next PM of India. Congress and BJP are fighting hard to get their holds. However, there is another front who are also fighting to establish their presence. The coined name for them is “Third Front” mainly led by the Communist party Of India (Marxist) and Communist Party of India, Telegu Desam Party (TDP), Janta Dal-Secular (JD-S), RSS, Forward Bloc, AIADMK, Telangana Rashtra Samiti and the Bahujan Samaj Party.

Both Congress and BJP are promising for a secular and stable government; however The Third Front questions about the failure of successive governments in the field of economy and its various problems confronting the country. H.D Deve Gowda, once PM of India and now chief of JD-S urged citizen of India to vote for a democratic and secular government. CPI-M GS Prakash Karat addressed:

“This is a historic get-together of all the democratic, secular and Left parties to declare that we are all coming together to constitute a third force in this country,”

He added that a Non-BJP & Non-Congress government will bring a stable and secular government addressing all the issues of economic standouts and would fight for social justice and beneficiary interests of the large mass of Indians. He added “Today, we have come together because the country needs a new alternative”. CPI-M withdrew its support from the congress during the treaty of nuclear deal in July last year.

It raised the failure of the government in BPL area (Below Poverty Line), adding various statistical data like since, Independence 230 million people were suffering in poverty, 40 percent of children below three years did not have enough to eat, 50 percent of women were anemic and 39 percent of the people were illiterate.
It’s a definitive idea to have at least a Non-Congress government. The Third Front can be a deal. A BJP led government can bring religious disturbance or a Non-Secular government whereas economic threats are livelier in Congress regime. Industrial lockouts, Unemployment, detoriating condition of People Below poverty line are some issues that the present government is unable to address. (Survey “What People Want”).

Speaking of Industrial lockouts Prakash Karat said while speaking to CNN-IBN live

“Perceptions will change. In states where our coalition is running governments much development has taken place and industry has grown. I don’t see why industry or corporate should feel that this coalition will be less favorable or hostile to them” . Previously in an addressing session, Congress claimed the 9% growth in industrialization. This statement was attacked by Mr. Karat in an impressive way. He said “What does 9 percent growth mean for common man? We still have farmers committing suicide. We have shortage of food items, which makes life miserable for common man.”

Mr. Karat also added

“The government has been unable to tackle the growing crisis of economic slowdown. The Congress has failed to meet the aspirations of people. Under Congress rule the rich have become super rich and poor more poorer”

Criticizing the Third Front Ghulam Nabi Azad of Congress said that this Third Front would not stay alive in a long term since everybody in this front wants to become Prime Minister.

“I don’t think there is any leader or party in the Third Front who would not want to be PM. When the time comes to select the PM candidate, the Third Front will split.”

On this, Third Front Leaders like A.B Bardhan of CPI and H.D Kumarswamy expressed that “We would select our PM candidate later on “. However, Miss Mayavati is the most probable candidate for PM from the Third Front side.

TMC’s Mamta Baneerjee added,

“I request all the regional parties that they should not ally with CPIM as they are oppressors and they would finish the country so let them stay in their own grave.”

This fighting and collisions will go on and on. Every Front be it third front or BJP or Congress are trying to prove themselves. As a journalist, I want to remain neutral in this blog, but I would like to ask these parties can they address:
1. Secular and a stable government?
2. Economic growth benefitted by all?
3. Employment.
4. Food and education for all?
5. Protection to minorities?
6. Opportunity for all irrespective of their cast and creed and religion?
7. Education and improvement of Women conditions?
8. Fighting for Terrorism?
9. Maintaining good relations to neighbors?
10. Kashmir issues?
If they can address some of the above issues, then that front is the real front and really deserves to come into power . Otherwise in Hindi there is an old saying “Lanka main jo ae wahi Ravaan”

Three and a half years ago we had the most disastrous natural calamity. 73000 people were reported to have died and millions displaced. At a time when the nation was shattered and mourns were in the air all around, my nation responded to the calamity as huge and united as the calamity itself was. I feel really proud to have said my nation. I feel the power of those words when I actually say them and remember those times.

Today we are again at a stage where we are experiencing the worst possible times of our history. In these 62 years of our independence the nation has seen a lot. There we times when we were absolutely shattered and the anti Pakistan slogans were all over the place, than there were times when we lost the half of our country and were almost on the edge of losing the other half too but the nation stood fast. They had a leader to lead them, guide them and rescue them by than. Mr. Zulfiquar Ali Bhutto the leader of the masses was a real gem that we lost but he changed everything around him. He gave the dieing nation a new hope and a new vision and a dream that Pakistan can be the leader of the Muslim World. We had the potential but all that we were lacking was the awareness and believe in ourselves and Mr. Bhutto was the one who ignited the fire power hidden inside us.

A nation half cut than went on to became the first ever Islamic atomic power of the world; than we had our good times, when the slogans all around were of Pakistan Zindaabad. Pakistanis as a nation have gone through a lot. But in response we have shown the world too that with such limited resources even, what we are capable off. Our faith in ourselves and believe in the fact that only Almighty Allah has the power in the universe to make impossible possible. But remember “God Helps Those Who Help Themselves.” In October 2005, when we had that shattering earth quack, the nation stood united. Every single one of us was determined to stand up and bear the load on our shoulders to help our brothers and sisters in the effected areas rebuild their life again. The world saw it all happen. From every single corner of the country the help arrived, the people arrived as volunteers. Doctors, Nurses, Technicians, Engineers and people from every walk of the life came to help.

Today as I write these words I want you all the please stand up again. The time has challenged us again. We are at war today; a war that we are fighting for our survival, war that is important for our integrity and stability. We as a nation are up against the wildness of the nature again. We are experiencing one of the biggest displacements of our history. Our brothers and sisters in the area of war are having extreme difficulties in surviving. The number of refugees is so big that no provincial or federal government without the help of the people can achieve the goal of rescuing them and providing them the basic needs of life as long as they don’t get back to their respective homes safely. Below here I am attaching a few pictures courtesy to the different media sources around the globe, see them and try and understand a feel the pain they are going through.

Stay United. Stay Safe. Come together and help our bothers and sisters. They are looking towards us and the governing authorities. In a time like this, forget everything else just come together and help them as much as possible because together we can and we will defeat all our difficulties and challenges and survive as victors as always.

Proud to be a Pakistani

May God Bless Pakistan

(No Hard Words No Harsh Feelings for No one at All.)

Pakistan Zindaabad.

Few days back I and my mother were returning from market when we noticed a contented family riding on a Gadha Gari (Donkey Cart) along with their baggage including trunks, bales and few of kitchen utensils; for sure they were going for long stay. My mother appreciated and said in Punjabi “kuj v hovey, swari apni honi chahdeay aey”(Whatever the circumstances are; one should posses at least own conveyance). This sense of belonging- element of human instinct probably was the impetus behind the introduction of property rights in capitalism. Human beings are born to dream; dream about their own homes; their own businesses; their own properties; their futures; their writings and all the material they can proudly introduce as their belongings.

In my school days; I read a story subjected “Katba” (epitaph or plaque) in my Urdu Text Book. Writer elaborated the optimism of a man who bought a marble plaque from shop where old things were sold where second hand things were sold. He yearned for positioning it on the door of his house he; whole of his life endeavored to construct. But in end same plaque with his name engraved on placed on his grave for identifying him.
I watched 1 million people migrating to safe areas leaving their houses, their crops their animals and probably their future; vacating Malakand soon after prime Minister announced a decisive ascendency against the militants in this region. I felt dreams of these people were trampled on every step taken towards Lower districts including Mardan, Peshawar and rest of the country. Their houses were built by their forefathers with dreams of having generations dwelling and chirping in the courtyards. They were trudging with the burden of those dreams.

Every family traveling from Malakand division to the other parts of country has a distressing story to tell. Thousands of them probably have traveled for the first time in their lives. Regardless of individualistic quandaries; afflictions of leaving a complete civilization is becoming a dilemma. Besides re-habitation and rehabilitating these people is biggest issue; government is confronting these days. Moreover victims are not habituated with the hot weather of Punjab and other areas.

They repositioned themselves for saving their lives on the instructions of government to vacate Malakand division; where security forces are battling to curb militants and has been declared a War Zone. I do not want to discuss the reason of the militancy but I want t draw attention towards the upcoming liability of government towards these people. Who; though; are clear about this Military operation against the miscreants but long for safe returns to their homes.

The day Prime Minister announced ascendancy against militants; he should have perceived the idea for the civilians residing in conflict area. Parliament was not consulted before announcing this operation; had this operation been delayed till these evacuees reach safe places where sufficient facilities could have been given to them; would have added laurels in government’s crown. However in wake of being a third world country; we once again have started begging alms from America, West and rest of the world to donate for these self-restraint victims who probably have never thought of having Sadqa (giving alms in the name of Allah) in their whole lives are now dependent upon the assistance from those who are responsible for their sufferings. Several NGOs and semi-governmental organizations, chambers of commerce and alliances UN agencies, Red Crescent and many others are collecting money and important things required to help IDPs. Relief activities are continued and similar touching scenes are being noticed that helped Pakistan and Pakistanis to cop up 2005 earth quake. I request overseas Pakistanis to help their suffering brothers and sisters rather than begging from others. Once again Pakistan is in dire need of support from inside. Regardless of what government is doing it is responsibility of every Pakistan inside or outside Pakistan to step forward to help kids, old aged people, women and displaced men. Today we need fortitude that was shown by Muharjreen-e-Makkah and congeniality and selflessness shown by the Ansaar. All political parties should forget their conflicts and should pay consideration to the major problem nation is facing.

Meanwhile Prime Minister of Pakistan has approved an amount of Rs. 508 million for rehabilitation, provision of shelter and 5000 ration packets for Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) of NWFP. Emergency Relief Cell (ERC) of Cabinet Division has released Rs. 500 million and cheque has been dispatched to Government of NwFP which has been received by the Provincial Government. In his addressed to nation he reiterated his commitment to help these people saying Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) would be supported under Benazir Income Support Program and a Cabinet Committees would soon be constituted for day to day monitoring of the IDPs issue and also for areas where action is being taken. The Prime Minister held out an assurance that there would be total transparency for utilization of the funds to be received for relief and rehabilitation of the IDPs, reconstruction of affected areas and capacity building of the law enforcing agencies. America has announced US $49 million for helping these IDPs. Similarly many other countries would come forward to help Pakistan including its friend countries.

It is difficult to hunch how long this war will last and what repercussions it is going to bring; but what I am sure is these victims have lost their identification and now labeled as IDPs Internally Displaced People. I agree challenge in front of government is big; but it is advisable for the government to deal with it as soon as possible because a long treatise of Muhajir coming from India and Bengali Muhajir are still Muhajirs. People from the Bajaur and Afghanistan are also Muhajirs. Pakistan cannot afford another muhajir community.

It is desirable that before the dreams of these people die; government should find a solution of this problem… otherwise a plaque might have been waiting for it to be placed on its grave.