White Lies

We hear that Imran Khan has hit upon a novel idea. He plans to raise money for the flood affected, motivate children and revisit past glory in cricket, if not in politics, all in one go. A story has it that The Khan is launching a campaign to sell booklets at Rs. 15,000 a piece, recruiting school children as his salesmen. The fund raiser will end with a mother-of-all cricket match in a Lahore Stadium where all 20,000 spectators will be children. However the real attraction will be the cricket team itself. One, we hear, will be a reassemble of the 1992 World Cup winning team. As for the opponents, we just have to wait and see. He has already promised to ‘clean bowl’ Zardari and Nawaz in one go. There are hints that this will be a celebrities-only telethon.

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Move over Hollywood, Pakistan has its own series of “Son of ….” and “The return of…”series and it is all to do with politics. Apparently, our parliamentarians are convinced that their off springs are the country’s greatest natural resource. We have the crown prince Bilawal, son of Zardari but also son of Bhutto knocking out son of another Bhutto in a duel that puts Hollywood and Bollywood to shame. Then there are the sons of Gilani, triplets that give that Amar-Akbar-Anthony flavour to a script. Definitely not in a supporting role are Hamza, son of Shahbaz Sharif and Moonis, son of Pervez Elahi both already in the boxing ring. Then there are the sons of Bugti, Marri, Magsi and Raisani. There is even a great grandson Hoti, from Khyber Pakhtunkhwas Bacha Khan Dynasty. However, none has had the financial kick-start as that of son Zulkarnain from AJK. This one has a Rs.80 million state bank rolled rental power plant which critic Faisal Saleh Hayat claims is actually a ghost project. However sonny boy has threatened to sue Faisal, claiming that this ship mounted rental power plant has been sighted near the Pakistani coastline. Ghost project, ghost ship or maybe not. We wait and see. But this son’s wife happens to be the sister of our first lady. We are assured that his political career and prosperity is fully insured for the time being.

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Word has it that a large collection of the late master painter Gulgee’s choicest canvases, nearly fifty in number, have gone missing. They were spread over three rooms in his cottage in Nathiagali when the master painter and his wife were brutally murdered in Karachi. The couple never returned to their summer home cum studio and the up-market property became the object of predatory moves by a corruption ridden Galliat Development Authority, its political backers and KP’s land mafia. What happened to the national treasures in the process remains a mystery. But who cares!

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