PARTLY FACETIOUS: Mullah kee daur masjid tak

“You reckon Nawaz Sharif sees the glass as half full?”

“I have told you many, many, times not to apply Western proverbs to the Sub-Continent. I mean take a glaring example, once bitten twice shy is a Western proverb, but us Pakistanis get bitten again and again and again and…”

“But I heard Nawaz Sharif is not happy…”

“Indeed, but his glass is not half full but completely it’s empty. Now they are saying that Shehbaz Sharif’s may be…”

“Stop making the brothers fight…anyway Nawaz Sharif is resident in one of the most expensive properties in London, he has enough resources to perhaps not rival MBS but certainly rival…”

“Zardari sahib?”

“That reminds me of an Urdu saying, Mullah kee daur masjid tak, or a Mullah will run to the mosque or in other words you are so limited…”

“Ha haha, just thought of a new proverb that The Khan would love, Mullah ki daur diesel…sorry, sorry, I apologise profusely anyway so I still say Nawaz Sharif’s glass is empty because luxury is not what he covets because he has it, it is the sycophancy and power and protocol and…”

“Ishaq Dar is with him so that takes care of his first need and back home there is The Man Without a Portfolio, power can be exercised within a family unit and there is no one but no one dares step in front of Nawaz Sharif in London — protocol you know.”

“Stop, he wants out and fresh elections and…and see Fawad Chaudhary of all people agrees with him: that Shehbaz Sharif-led government is limited to Islamabad territory and don’t you remember when Nawaz Sharif was Prime Minister he was ridiculed as the prime minister of local bodies and…”

“Right, but then the glass was full cause the Prime Minister’s House was his domain!”

“See the glass is not empty because what happened in the Judicial Commission of Pakistan on Thursday where all the nominees of the Chief Justice were rejected would not have been possible unless the coalition was in the Center.”

“Right and institutions come under the federal not the provincial government even if there are two provinces where The Khan rules.”

“Right and then there is the treasury — a lot can be done with it and for The Khan to reinvigorate the Ehsaas Programme surely he knows that 80 to 90 percent will have to come from the federally administered Benazir Income Support Programme…”

“Right, so if Biden is happy to rule the federating units, the states, then why isn’t the coalition?”

“Because they are taking untenable economic decisions and…”

“Which they are laying at the doorstep of each other — so we the public are being bitten not once, not twice but umpteen times on a daily basis and continue…”

“There I agree.”

Copyright Business Recorder, 2022