During my student days back in the 1950s, common utility items were very cheap and living was not so difficult for a middle class person or even for a poor man as it is today. A person drawing Rs 500 pm was considered a rich guy and would say “Money is no problem”.
Coming to the present era, money has become a problem not only for a poor man but even for an upper middle class family. An honest person, whether a salaried person or a business man having a small family, cannot make both his ends meet when he caters for the education, health and clothing of his children.
Ever increasing inflation rate, sky rocketing prices of food and other items with no relief in sight is really hitting the common man hard. Thus nowadays, “Money is a great problem” for the middle and poor classes of the society.
On the other hand, the same common man sees his rulers living a lavish life, traveling abroad and within the country at will in personal jets, wearing designer suits and living absolutely free at the government’s expense i.e. free transport, free telephone, free food and free furnished houses etc. So the common man feels “Money is no problem” to them.
This gap between the ruling/rich class and the poor is increasing at a very fast rate which should ring alarm bells for the government. It is so because the ruling class and the other well connected industrialists/ land lords do not pay their due taxes to be spent on the welfare of the common man. The taxes which are collected are used for the luxuries of the ruling elite.
The other reason is massive corruption in every department. You name any department and there you find a big scandal where billions of rupees have been either misappropriated or pocketed.
Lower level officials get apprehended and punished. But at the higher level, they are either suspended (and after some time re-instated quietly with arrears for suspended period paid in full) or posted abroad for a better appointment.
This gap between the rich and the poor is one of the biggest social ills and it is time that our ruling classes stopped flaunting their opulent lifestyles (that too on state expense) in the face of an impoverished public.
MUHAMMAD AZHAR KHWAJA
Lahore
