One who created PAL has been trashed!

ISLAMABAD: It was not too distant in history that legendary poet Faiz Ahmed Faiz recommended the then Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto to create institutions like the Pakistan Academy of Letters (PAL), the Pakistan National Council of Arts (PNCA) with the Lok Virsa (National Institute of Folk and Cultural Heritage) as one of its wings, and the National Book Foundation (NBF).

And it was a few days ago that an arrogant bureaucrat, no less than a Secretary to the Government of Pakistan, all of a sudden realised that persons like not only Faiz Ahmed Faiz, but also those like Asaduallh Khan Ghalib, Ahmed Faraz and even the most revered mystic poets were not worth the display of their portraits in the PAL and ordered their portraits being taken off the gallery and be left with the portraits of Allama Sir Muhammad Iqbal and Father of the Nation Muhammad Ali Jinnah.

We would not like to discuss the literary credentials of the secretary concerned and would be least interested to know if he can recite a couplet of Ghalib, Mir, Faiz or Faraz, leave alone understand and explain one, but we indeed do have a right to know as to what were the reasons behind his sweeping administrative order to remove the portraits of legendary poets and intellectuals from the gallery of the PAL!

Were these administrative orders to immediately remove the portraits of all those legendary poets and intellectuals from the PAL gallery of honour were aimed at embarrassing the sitting government or does he harbour some personal grudge against all those legendary figures of literature?

It was a horrendous and arrogant act on part of the secretary to issue such orders, which has hurt the feelings of literature and poetry lovers all over the country.

Somebody said the federal secretary concerned was a learned person and had done a couple of PhDs in linguistics and culture, but does that mean that during the course of his research, he had developed bias against these legendary men of literature? Kishwar Naheed, a poetess and writer of international repute who once had been the Director General of PNCA, was shocked to learn about the federal secretary’s action.

"It is absolutely beyond me as to what the 'honourable' federal secretary has ordered and why. It is simply mind-boggling and absolutely incomprehensible as to why a person like the federal secretary has issued such orders to remove the portraits of legendary figures of literature from the gallery of PAL. It is simply shameful on part of the federal secretary. And if he has done this on directions under the political influence of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) government, then we need to know what Imran Khan or the influential PTI members have against these legends of literature that they went to such an extent," Kishwar Naheed said.

She said it was not a trivial issue to be brushed under the carpet. “This issue has to be probed to the core and the reasons behind the move must come to the fore as to why an officer of the level of federal secretary to the Government of Pakistan stooped so low as to issue such orders. We have heard recently that a number of federal secretaries have been issued 'Red Notices' for underperforming. We need to find out if this particular federal secretary also is part of the clan. But my concern is that at least they should have spared literature, art and culture. That is our treasure and we should protect, preserve and promote these, not throw them in the trash," Kishwar said.