An open letter to Imran Khan

Tuesday, August 07, 2012 - Let me state that my children boys and girls, collected donations when you were building the Shaukat Khanum Hospital. I used to accompany them on their rounds. I don’t know and I do not care to know , the amount that very small amount they had managed to collect . However , the Hospital and the University in Mianwali are the pride of Pakistan . Indeed you had become a trendsetter in this field .

However, I am writing this to Imran Khan the politician and not to Imran Khan the philanthropist. I am at the end of my life and I have no worries which party is ruling the country or will rule in the future. I have no trust in the established parties .As a new party, you are also losing the public trust rapidly. However, I have no means of knowing whether your popularity graph is ascending or descending. My source is the discussions, I have seen on TV channels.

In the mid sixties, I attended a talk given by then famous journalist, Mr. A.B.S. Jafri . One sentence was ‘politicians tend to talk tall: not only here .But everywhere’. While other parties prepare a manifesto, whether or not they abide by it, your party has apparently no programme but to seize control of the country at the opportune time. The people of Pakistan have become aware of their problems and possible solutions . What you do plan to ameliorate of the living conditions of the people? Pray what is the difference between other and your party .

What are your plans to provide protection to life , property and honour of common people instead of a handful of sacred cows ? What are your plans to provide justice in this corrupt set up ? How would you restore ‘hope’ among the people when hope has diminished. What are your plans to restore peace in Balochistan , Karachi , Quetta and other places ?

You have gathered around a motley crowd called the ‘ electables’ . You know very well those ‘electables’ are notorious for changing parties. Shah Mahmood Quershi’s father was the Governor of the Punjab in General Zia ul Haq’s days. He first joined Nawaz Sharif in the Punjab Cabinet. He then joined the PPP. As a Foreign Minister, he was reputed to travel by chartered flights (news reports said that).

Having and traveled to the West, you must be aware that there is a shadow cabinet or a Government in waiting. Who are the members of your shadow cabinet? The same faces Khurshid Mahmood Kasuri, Shah Mahmood Qureshi, Azam Swati, Sardar Asif Ali, Pervez Khattak? Will there be places for Asif Zardari, Khurshid Shah, Ch Pervez Elahi, Maulana Fazal ur Rehman if they want to join it? Will there places for old hands of the party viz Asif Alavi, Justice Wajiduddin? I fear there will be difference between the old parties in power and your party.

After two big public meetings, where is your so called ‘tsunami? Your so called ‘tsunami’ has proved to be damp squid. In a recent uproar of your alleged of your wrongdoing with Zakat money of Shaukat Khanum Hospital’s .It is heartening to read rejoinder to Khwaja Asif issued by Imtiaz Hussain Hydery , Executive Vice Chairman, HBG, my old friend and class fellow. In the 1990s, too, there were allegations of your fathering a child out of wedlock. I thought you were then young and many youth sow wild oats. But this is more serious. And why the Government is supporting you?

A couple of months ago, there were news reports of allegations of land grabbing against some office bearers of your party. What action did you take against them? Of course those reports died down a week later. In March 2009 in the long march for the restoration of the judiciary, it was being said that you hid yourself for fear of arrest.

—Islamabad