The Age of Miracles
By N.A. Bhatti
“ They
say miracles are past.”
- William Shakespeare in All’s Well that Ends
Well
While browsing through
my Titbits File the other day, I came across a clipping
from a national English daily. An advertiser invited
applications from suitable candidates for posts,
among others, of Electrical Foreman having a Diploma
in Electrical Technology, with at least 15 years
experience in the maintenance of airport electrical
equipment. Age: 20-35 years.
I took particular note of the lower age limit and
started doubting the validity of the popular notion
that the age of miracles had passed. If England
produced Lord Kelvin who matriculated at the age
of ten years, Pakistan was about to achieve nothing
less than a miracle. After all, hadn’t the
press reported the news a few days earlier about
a Pakistani genius who had invented a motor-cycle
that ran without petrol or gas?
I kept thinking about this while lying in bed until
I drifted into dreamland. I fantasized a bright
young lad seated across the table from the Director
(Administration) interviewing candidates for the
post of Electrical Foreman.
“You are a little over 20 years old, isn’t
it?”
“Yes, Sir.”
“You have at least 15 years experience in
airport electrical equipment, I presume.”
“No doubt about that, Sir.”
“That means you started your career at the
age of five.”
“So it would appear, Sir.”
“Considering the fact that it took you three
years to earn your diploma, you must have matriculated
at the age of two years!”
“Elementary maths, Sir!”
The Director picked up his red telephone, the hot
line to his Director-General.
Director: “Breaking news, Sirjee! We’ve
a candidate here who matriculated at the age of
two years!”
DG: “Raja Sahib! You feeling all right?”
D: “Fit as a fiddle, Sirjee! I’ll put
up a draft for your approval.”
DG: “What the hell are you babbling about,
Raja Sahib? I know this weather is intolerable but
you seem to have gone cuckoo!”
D: “I mean to say we should get on to the
Guinness people. This is the first 21st century
miracle and it’s going to bring us on to the
world map in a big way, Sirjee!”
DG: “And if I retain my sanity, it’s
also your last day in office, Raja Sahib!”
The DG slammed the hot line telephone with a crash
loud enough to waken me from my reverie. I opened
my eyes and found the morning newspaper (The News,
June 9, 2005) lying on my bedside table.
Shahid Salim’s letter in News Post caught
my eye and I read it through thrice. His ‘Family
budget’ hit the nail on the head and was a
perfectly accurate diagnosis of the crime and corruption
rampant in Pakistan. If our ‘Islamic Welfare
State’ can, given the data in Shahid Salim’s
letter, ensure a bare livelihood for its people,
Shakespeare stands refuted as miracles are not over,
at least not in The Land of the Pure.
I was discussing the so-called awami budget 2005-2006
with Chaudhry Sahib the day we both read the News
Post. He is getting on in years but possesses quite
a fertile brain. He doesn’t indulge in negative
criticism only but suggests positive steps as well,
no matter how wacky they seem. With his permission,
dear readers, I have the honor to unveil his solution
of the awam’s financial ills.
The minimum basic necessities of all human beings
are food, clothing and shelter. As far as food is
concerned, scientists tell us that in the not too
distant future, the universal food for human beings
will be algae, that green stuff you see floating
on stagnant ponds. It is formed with the simplest
and cheapest of Nature’s free gifts: water,
air and sunshine. If you live within easy access
of the sea, you may be happy to know that the largest
animal in existence is the blue whale. The biggest
of them, 107 tons, lives on krill and plankton in
seawater. What’s wrong with Pakistan being
the pioneer in this scheme of popularizing universal
consumption of algae and plankton? Food problem
solved!
It is vital for clerks to be smartly dressed if
they want good ACRs (Annual Confidential Reports).
However, the prices of cloth and tailoring charges
having soared sky-high, clerks should ensure that
they are born in families of tailors. They should
also be married into taxi drivers’ families
so as to ensure punctuality in their offices and
avoid messing up their clothes by commuting in what
pass as buses in Pakistan.
Accommodation should be no problem even though he
is 25,000th on the waiting list. With the thousands
of trenches left uncovered after utilities like
electricity, water, gas and telephones have been
laid, a large tarpaulin shouldn’t be too big
an investment for a chap who wouldn’t mind
living like his remote ancestors did in prehistoric
times. In any case, there is no dearth of spacious
habitable caves in all our mountains and hills.
Then there are those millions of open uncovered
manholes in which a small family can safely take
protection.
Chaudhry Sahib is planning to write a book: “How
to live in an Islamic Welfare State on Rs.3000 a
month.” It will include the formula for getting
rid of the excess baggage in the shape of extended
families in vogue in Pakistan. Patricide and matricide
are no problem, neither are infanticide, fratricide
or sororicide (no such word but you know what I
mean). Suicide with insecticide is no big deal either.
Leaping off the roof of Posh Plaza is a trifle messy,
though.
I am with you, Chaudhry Sahib, and I look forward
to participating in your book-launching ceremony.
With your genius, we can all see the light at the
end of the tunnel leading from grinding poverty
to the genuine Islamic Welfare State envisaged by
our financial wizard who laid down the amount of
Rs.3000 as the minimum wage. A miracle! He was after
all following the footsteps of his Grandpa whose
forthcoming posthumous bestseller includes the fairy
story of how Pakistan’s military budget for
the 1965 war with India was only Rs.20,000. Another
miracle! Shakespeare stands refuted.
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