Men, Matters & Memories
M L Kotru
Mian Nawaz Sharif will by now have renewed his tenancy of Islamabad’s picturesque Prime Minister’s House, dominating one of the hilly features of the Pakistani capital. During one of his previous stays- this is his third time there- I had occasion to visit the Prime Minister’s House, ostensibly for an interview for a TV channel with which I was briefly associated, only to be told on arrival that the interview was off. PTV had very kindly agreed to provide me with a crew to record the “non-interview”; thanks to the dog-in-the manger stance of Mushahid Hussain, a former Editor of the Muslim of Islamabad, who was then the information boss of Sharif dispensation, the interview was a non-starter.
“I am sorry, the Prime Minister’s programme has undergone a change, and in fact, he is on his way out for a pre-scheduled meeting; Insha Allah, we will make it some other time,” that was Mushahid’s brush-off to me. With no option left, since I was booked to leave for Lahore the next day, I chose to hang around, long enough for the Prime Minister to emerge from the huge side-door.
I offered a quick greeting, expressing my disappointment at the cancellation of my interview. To my surprise he asked me weather I was from Kashmir. An affirmative answer and his hand drew me towards the door he had entered from. Before the information boss could intervene he offered me a cup of tea ……… And that’s how we sat down in the very large living room as he ordered “Kashmiri Nun Chai” (salted tea). We were joined by another worthy, a bearded man in his late 40s, who also turned out to be a Kashmiri.
With the TV crew sent away by Mushahid we settled down to an exchange of pleasantries in between sips of the cup of “Kashmiri” tea. The Prime Minister was in a jolly mood and inquired if I did speak Kashmiri. I had barely said yes when he asked his military secretary to dial a Lahore number with the suggestion that I tell him (Nawaz Sharif) if the person at the other end could speak in Kashmiri. I got talking on the phone and after some two minutes, he asked, curiosity writ large on his face, ‘what’s it?’ I replied “yes”, surely she does speak Kashmiri but with an anglicized accent. Thereupon he took the phone from me to tell the person at the other that “you have passed the test, I have an authentic Kashmiri-speaking man with me and he has okayed your Kashmiri”.
Nawaz Sharif suggested we forget the interview for the movement. We would do it tomorrow in Lahore. “I go to Lahore every Thursday afternoon to play some cricket for my club; you join me on the flight and watch the cricket; after that we will have the interview”. I told him I was already booked for Lahore by the morning flight, to which he replied that I should in that case meet him at the ground in Lahore. Our conversation meanwhile had lasted a full 45 minutes much to Mushahid’s chagrin.
We spoke about Kashmir, about Delhi and, of course, Lahore, his beloved city. Nawaz Sharif was fond of Delhi adding that on one of his earlier trips he had stayed at the Oberoi; on my telling him that I was living in the same neighbourhood he said “ah that must be across the Golf Club”. Which indeed it was. He spoke of his Kashmiri connexion, his ancestors had probably moved from there to Amritsar and thence to Lahore. I am not sure ( am recalling an informal conversation more than a decade and half old) but my recall has him talking of a grandmother being from Kashmir. That was perhaps where the salted tea originated. We did speak of Indo-Pak relations etc but that was, the whole of it, off-the-record not because of its content but only to maintain the informality of a conversation over “nun chai”. I left the Prime Minister’s House in Islamabad soon thereafter with the promise to meet in Lahore the next afternoon.
I was at the cricket ground that Thursday afternoon watching along with some 150 odd spectators a game in progress. The Prime Minister arrived at around 3:45 p.m., changed into his cricket gear and then made a loud inquiry “where is my journalist friend from India”. Nobody was aware of my presence as I rose from a back-seat to announce my presence. “Chaliye,” he said as he walked towards the crease, a bat in hand waiting for one of the wickets to fall. How come cricket?, I asked. He was very fond of the game and “do remember, that I represented the Pakistan Cricket Board President’s XI in a match against the West Indies”. “Yes, I could have played for Pakistan ……… but there is so much politics in our cricket…………. And so here I am”.
Cricket it appeared continued to be a passion with him; but that was not all. A fiery a quick 40 odd runs and Nawaz Sharif rushed to the change room and was back like a breeze. “Come on,”he told me as we walked to a biggish station wagon-like car. He took the wheel himself, the chauffeur in the back-seat and the security detail trailing.
Soon we were in a plush Lahore House. “Yeh hamare dost ka ghar hai; aapke Tata jaise hein Pakistan mein.”
I met the Sehgals, husband and wife, in their massive drawing room. Obviously the Prime Minister was expected. Sherbets and lassi came as if on a cue as did the snacks. Mr. Sharif turned to the lady: “He is the man who tested your Kashmiri yesterday. I brought him along to confirm it……… ha, ha, ha ….”
Turned out the lady belonged to one of the most respected Kashmiri Muslim families of Srinagar. In fact I did recall meeting her father, a senior bureaucrat and a former Indian Ambassador to an important Asian capital. The daughter complained that she had insisted on her Baba coming over to Lahore to stay with us but he wouldn’t listen. “Yes, we are in constant touch etc. etc. (Mind you this is nearly 16-year-old story and memories to get blurred with age).
The lady apparently was an accomplished entrepreneur in her own right and her husband a major industrialist and obviously a generous host. He objected to my staying in a hotel and offered me guest accommodation in one of his other residences. “Next time you come to Lahore call me or send a fax message,” he urged. Mr. Sharif took time off in between to join the Sehgals at evening prayers in their prayer room.
It was past 9 p.m. when we reached Punjab State guest house in Lahore; the TV crew was already on hand. We sat down for the much anticipated (by me) interview and that’s when I discovered that I had left my notebook at the hotel. Regardless, we spent another half hour in a recorded banter which -frankly, when I look back- did not amount to much apart from the questions which you would routinely expect in a banter that had lost the professional edge. May be I should have met him the next day, minus the diversions. That would have meant a return to Islamabad.
Post- script: Don’t expect miracles or fancy gestures from Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. On Indo-Pak relations he may have appeared very reasonable by harking back to 1999 and his rapport with Atal Bihari Vajpayee; he may also have affirmed his belief in picking up the broken threads of negotiations from that time onwards. That’s good, as far it goes. But think of the domestic problems, ranging from Pakistani Taliban to deep-rooted sectarian divisions and violence which need his immediate attention. Then, there is the emergence of a post-American Afghanistan where the Pakistani stakes are quite high. The Army surely has its own view of Afghanistan and could well unsettle the balance. Indian concerns in Afghanistan may indeed be there but of not much concern to him right now.
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