Here's ptv , There's the News

THIS piece, I must warn you at the outset, is going to be repetitive. If PTV  can do it to you might after night, why can't I? People up there at Television think they hold a monopoly in boring people to death. Today, they have a strong rival in me.

          I am homoeopath which is to say I treat like with like. I seldom get to tune into Khabarnama --PTV 's main night bulletin; because I usually go to sleep after offering my morning prayers, and since PTV is the most effective sleeping pill invented by man, I avoid it like the plague. Who can afford to hit bed midway through Khabarnama ?

          On Monday night though, since history was being made in South Africa , I wanted to know what was the latest there. So I put on my television set a minute before 9. It is an old, battered, 12, inch thing and is averse all channels except Lahore . It has one great advantage; on its small and hazy screen, the Prime Minister  looks a lot less obvious than she does on a 24- inch colour thing.

          But to return to the Khabarnama . I was certain in my mind that South Africa  would be the main story. Nothing doing. I salute PTV 's editor, director, director-general news, or whatever. He certainly has a sense of history. Here's how Khabarnama went that Monday night in descending order:

1. Sheikhupura bypass. The Prime Minister , of course.
2. The Punjab  Governor 's dinner for the President .
3. The President  saying something or the other about computers.
4. Ambassadors of Turkey and those of two other countries present their credentials to the President . All three were shown inspecting guards of honour on arrival at the President's House. [Power breakdown for a while]
5. A harangue against the opposition, needless and untimely. And provocative.
6. The new Azad  Kashmir  Cabinet with names and portfolios.
7. Azad  Kashmir  Assembly summoned to meet on such and such date.
8. Kashmir  conference to be held in Muzaffarabad .
9. J. Salik on population control.
10. Something or the other on fruit exports.
11. Turkish  General  calls on Mirani .
12. Frontier Governor  speaks at Fazl-e-Haq College  in Mardan .
13. Fazl-ur-Rahman (the Maulana who heads the NA Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs) opens two public call offices somewhere or the other.
14. Naseerullaha Babar speaks on development projects in Nowshehra.
15. The Federal Ombudsman  holds open Kutchery  in Multan .
16. Speaking in Jahanian, Shah Mahmood Qureshi  says work on 164 development projects has started.
17. Swift-II, and State  Life  ads.
18. (Power breakdown once again)

          Since there was a fleeting power breakdown after item No 4, I have reason to suspect that poor Nelson Mandela  might have been given a second or two during the blackout. And oh, I forgot. Between that thing on fruit export and the Turkish  General  calling on Mirani , PTV  telecast an interview with Makhdum Shahabuddin  after his ba-maqsad aur kamyab visit to the United States .

          I did not give up. On Tuesday I tried again, and this time a lot earlier. The 7 p.m. English  language bulletin gave South Africa  sixth place after such momentous happenings as:

1. The meeting of the Economic Coordination Committee, presided over by the Prime Minister  (as if I could do that!)
2. The President  speaking at some holy conference at Sheranwala  Gate  in Lahore .
3. The President  conferring the Nishan-i-Imtiaz on a Turkish  General .
4. The usual on Occupied Kashmir .
5. Someone or the other saying that the prospects for peace in Afghanistan  had brightened (tell me another).

Now, I am nothing if not tenacious. I tried the Khabarnama  again. South Africa  was there but after PTV  had reported the following earth-shaking events:

1. The Prime Minister  presides over a meeting of the Economic Coordination Committee.
2. The President  at the convocation of a religious institution in Lahore .
3. The president  meets the Press  in Lahore .
4. The President  opens a 66-kanal (8.250 acre) private school in Lahore .
5. The President  confers the Sitara-i-Imtiaz on a Turkish  General .
6. Kashmir : the same as usual.
7. Prospects for peace in Afghanistan .
8. South African developments.

I forget now at which stage the horrendous events in Karachi  were reported but they were. I distinctly remember having seen the carcass of a burned down bus, and a policeman or an army jawan behind a lot of sandbags.

          Now here's a warning: I may not have a dish antenna, but a large number of people have it, and they are not watching PTV  any more. This is what happened to Radio Pakistan  and this is what will, sooner than the Ministry of Information thinks, happen to PTV. As I say: Here's PTV, there's the news. "There" means BBC -TV, Doordarshan, and CNN. Soon enough, viewers will have access to other networks around the world. Watch out, PTV, Pakistan may be the Mohatarima's personal fief but the rest of the world is not.

          And now to return to A Brief Account of the History and Antiquities of Lahore , written by an unknown Englishman in 1860, parts of which I have been sharing with you over the past few weeks.

          After a series of battles between the Sikhs  and the British  in 1845, "sorrow was silenced and the Sikh  Empire became a story of the past" as a ballad written at the time puts it. It was a lengthy poem, parts of which are reproduced here:

The Queen  Mother [Rani Jindan ]

Cried out from her inner chamber

What will become of me?

Ye clamour for high pay. O Khalsa.

But take ye the pay of former days.

The Sikhs  said No! And straight took counsel

To destroy Delhi  at a blow;

But God  careth not for the design of man,

He heedeth no one!

Then cried the Sikhs -"make ready your powder

First destroy Ferozepur,

Then loot gold and hang long long earrings in your ears,

Yea, right big ones!"

So amid the neighing of colts and mares

They commenced their march

Few patriots and many plunderers

Burning for pillage

Then said the Jats

The huge-thighed, stout limbed Jats,

"We are the falcons, the Ferengis our quarry,

Bring them to us!"

But when they crossed the ford,

Lo! A mighty host;

Balls fly thick in the air,

This was the style of warfare.

Then fought the Sikhs  and the dark Purbeahs;

The bracelet, the necklace, and the earring

Were blended together in close conflict

All was confusion.

Then the Sikhs  fled to their tents,

But they set up a good watch:

They wrote down the names of the dead,

And said: "We will fight again!"

"Mark out a boundary, O Khalsa!

Call in the runaways!

Yea, we will fight again!"

Then wrote they to the Raja  [Gulab Singh ],

"Come thou and command us

Our honour is not lost

Lead us and we conquer."

But the Raja  replied with sarcasm:

"Do as you think best;

First conquer Hindustan ,

And then, perhaps, I'II come."

The Khalsas, alas, could not conquer Hindustan , and so was "sorrow silenced and the Sikh  empire became a story of the past." Whatever will be will be.

Friday, May 6, 1994