Is there any thing common in spoons, envelopes and washing pots? Nothing, apparently; but come out of the limited domain of English and you'll instantly see the strong link that binds a chumcha, a lota and a liffafa together. These popular folk signifiers of our socio-political discourse have rather problematic though tantalising metaphoric roots.

Let us take the case of the chumcha first. It would be instructive perhaps to place this article of cutlery in the hierarchy of utensils, and then try to determine its characteristics which make it so unique. Interestingly enough, chumcha, though perhaps the humblest member of the crockery family, has the singular, but alas an unsung, honour of being the only universal carrier of food from the stately containers like cauldrons to troughs, plates, saucers, bowls and finally to the eager human mouths (forks, and chopsticks, are severely handicapped when it comes to soups and other liquid foods).

The ubiquitous attendance of the chumcha is that of a go-between, unrecognised and yet indispensable item; all the time facilitating, helping, accommodating the primitive relations between the edibles and the eaters, and modulating so skillfully the multi textured foods into the acceptable receptivity of its master's mouth. No mean job, is it? But the height of it, bearing all along the stigma of being a mere chumcha. Well, anthropomorphise the culinary predicament of the situation and you will be moved by the forlorn existence of a chumcha.

A chumcha's only reward is the moment of recognition and acknowledgement by the eating master of its instrumental indispensability as a negotiator of palatable and nourishing comestibles: the corollary being that the glory of the chumcha is directly proportional to the gluttony and the greed of the master.

Lota on the other hand is a far more sinister kin of the poor chumcha, given its devastating gyratory potentials. Its origin could be the Urdu phrase 'Be-painday ka lota' -- a bottomless pot, but interestingly enough, 'bottomless-ness' has come to be accepted as an essential attribute of lotas in general without regard to their actually being with or without a bottom.

It was interesting to note during my recent visit to the National Art Gallery in Islamabad that a special corner has been dedicated to a post-modern 'lota installation' in which dozens of complete lotas -- their bottoms intact -- are arranged into a structure that looks like a big lota itself. From some more distance and a different angle the installation looks like a throne, a seat of power.

When I was about to leave the gallery, an American tourist caught my attention: she had long been gazing at the installation with some bewilderment. Just by way of helping a foreigner, I approached nearer and explained it to her that lota was not merely a washing pot, but has deeper cultural, political and moral connotations.

"This is funny," she said, after listening to my Lota-Chumcha comparison patiently for more than 10 minutes, "I could visualise the use of a lota, but I assume that the meaning is similar to the term 'brown-nose', which implies that an ass-kisser is so assiduous that he goes right into the kissee's ass. The lota's spout would perform the same act as the brown-noser's nose. Is that right?"

No, it was not right.

Ignoring as beside the point the converse and yet complementary relation between chumcha and lota; one the initiator and the other the eliminator of the surplus aftermath of the gastronomic process, it is the metaphoric significance of lota's effortless rotary, and spinning capacities, which give it an ascendancy over chumcha. A human personification of lota has no scruples; no ideological constraints, no principled stances, no moral hangovers. Fixity of standpoint is not the bane of his 'political struggle', a scheming turncoat, a deserter or a defector as the situation demands... a true Machiavellian. A lota may adopt chumcha-geeri (the art and craft of being a chumcha) as a well-timed strategy, but that does not exhaust the variety of his arsenal of treachery.

On the other hand, a chumcha can't hope to be a successful lota by remaining a mere chumcha; that is why I find it exceedingly difficult to agree with our American friend's understanding of Lota, as somebody very much a chumcha in almost a quantitative sense: A 'brown-nosed' person, substituting the all too human nose of flesh and bones, with a heartless metallic spout and performing the act of ardent admission into the rectal regions of the kissee. Notwithstanding the gory consequences for the victim of such a Lota, the audio effects too, would be a 'far cry' from the domain of the chumcha. I think inter-cultural metonymic confusion has caused some misunderstanding; anyway the issue remains open for further deliberation.

Finally, the liffafa. The term became popular in the Nawaz Sharif days, and it referred to a traditional brown envelope in which the graft money was handed over to the relevant authority. 'Lotay aur lifafay' was in fact a derogatory journalistic term for the Nawaz Sharif cronies.

Liffafa is far less complex than the lota or the chumcha in its composition -- yet a quintessential liffafa male specimen would beat both of them hands down in the game of winning short to long term gains. He must not be mistaken as 'anybody' accepting bribes, for compromising on any lawful position. The reality may be more poetic. He is often characterised as a predatory animal with a profoundly evolved mechanism for at once assessing the financial health and the need magnitude of his victim. Liffafa instinctively makes a laser sharp move preempting the victim's situation and ensures that it squashes off the victim, the maximum of fuel and filling to fill his essential hollowness.

Some liffafa critics describe his acts as parasitic preying on others' vulnerabilities: exploitation, extortion, while others might like to dwell on this phenomenon as a highly developed most intelligent beings' basic existential need to fill the vacuum in their lives. What is your view?

Book: Sach ka Suraj

Author: Vakil Anjum

pp.543

Published by Takhliqat

Price Rs. 450.00

The presidential reference against the Chief Justice of Pakistan Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry earlier this year evoked a countrywide reaction. For the first time, in many years, it dispelled the impression that the people of this country are indifferent and depoliticised as assumed by so many of us. The chief justice's 'no' to the president-in-uniform resulted in a spontaneous reaction in the form of anger and disgust expressed through street agitation. The reaction was most visible among the lawyers' community. Moreover, the post-March 9 actions by the establishment also invited universal criticism from lawyers and rights bodies across the globe.

During and after the so-called 'judicial crisis' -- a consequence of the presidential reference against the chief justice -- many writers and journalists have tried to make sense of the events in the form of articles and even book. 'Sach ka Suraj' (The Sun of Truth), the book under review, is one such attempt at recalling and recording the post-March 9 events and the people who contributed towards a public cause. It especially focuses on the role of the judiciary, lawyers, media, political parties and the establishment.

Vakil Anjum, the author of the book, is a well known journalist and has authored books like 'Siasat key Firaun' (The Pharaohs of Politics) and 'Siasat danon ki kalabazian' (The Sommersaults of Politicians) which became extremely popular and household names for people interested in Pakistani politics. The books also revealed the author's ability to dig deep and support his assertions with available sources.

The author of the book under review does not attempt to hide which side of the fence he sits, which is very clear even before one opens the book and only looks at the title. This should also mean that no pretence of a dispassionate analysis or description of events has been made. Any writer would do so at the risk of appearing biased. However, in the given circumstances and in the short term, there is indeed very little room for trying to be a neutral observer, and the author does not waste any time on that. The question, as far as this book is concerned, has been reduced to its simplest form; you are either with the people or not.

Sach ka Suraj is a detailed account of the eventful days following the filing of the presidential reference on March 9 2007 against the chief justice. Spread over more than 500 pages, it literally gives a day-to-day account of all the major events that ultimately led to the reinstatement of the chief justice by a unanimous decision of the apex court on July 20. In describing the events the book has successfully captured the sense and the mood in the court room and the street alike.

The role of the chief justice's lawyers including senior advocates of Supreme Court Ali Ahmed Kurd, Hamid Khan, Tariq Mehmood and Aitzaz Ahsan has been given prominence of heroes. Aitzaz Ahsan's role has been duly highlighted in a separate chapter. Political parties' strategy during this period has also been discussed. All the details are well supported by newspaper and other media reports and/or personal observations of the author. The May 12 incidents of violence in Karachi on the occasion of the chief justice's visit to the city and the role of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement have been discussed at length including the reactions and reports appearing in the national and international media.

The book is dedicated to those who died in the lawyers' movement referring to May 12 violence and the bomb attack on the chief justice's rally in Islamabad in July. In its introduction the author says that the book is written not only to acknowledge the role of Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry who when time came followed his conscience, but also as a reference to remember the 134 days of jabr (oppression). He is also of the firm belief that after the restoration of the chief justice the doctrine of necessity has been buried forever and it will never be used again to validate the usurpation of power.

The book was written and published soon after the July 20 decision when the reference by an all-powerful president in-uniform was thrown out of the windows by a defiant judiciary and the sense of people's power was being strongly felt.

However, the imposition of martial law in the garb of emergency on November 3 and the following issuance of Provisional Constitution Order (PCO) and forced deposal of independent judges of superior courts has put to question the conclusion reached by many, as well as the author, if indeed the doctrine of necessity was ever buried. Will not the handpicked PCO-judges revive it once again? Will not the people have to fight many more battles before they reach anywhere close to achieving the democratic ideals and an independent judiciary?

These are valid questions but the fact that this time round the power usurpers had to invent new techniques to sideline judiciary, majority of which has stood its ground, seems to be a step forward. Only time will tell which way we move as a nation. That time may not be too far.

I wrote sometime ago that I wouldn't be surprised if an omnibus edition of Ken Tynan's works appears in the next few years. That edition hasn't turned up but wandering through 'Waterstones' last month, I was lucky enough to come across a volume of his selected 'Theatre Writings', which has just been published.

Every page of 'Theatre Writings', selected and carefully edited by Dominic Shellard, contains at least one phrase that bowls you over with its sharpness and its luminosity: "It would be easier to strike sparks off a rubber dinghy than off Sir Ralph as Macbeth." (Sir Ralph was Sir Ralph Richardson, one of the famous trio of actor knights: the other two being Sir John Gielgud and Sir Lawrence Olivier) and this about the beautiful and celebrated Viviene Leigh as Cleopatra: "She picks at the part with the daintiness of a debutante called upon to dismember a stag."

We -- novice actors, drama students -- quivered with delight, though not without a sense of guilt, when we read such lines because they referred to the theatrical icons of our times. Some of our teachers were enraged at what they regarded to be an effrontery.

Reading them now I smile ruefully. Most of the actors who received dismissive reviews from Tynan were known to me -- and they have all gone. It was not just the knights and seasoned leading men (and women) who became victims of Tynan's scathing wit. Joyce Readman was an up and coming actress -- she went on to play many leading parts in the West End -- when she played Cordelia to Olivier's Lear. I shudder to think what she felt when she woke up one morning to read: "Joyce Redman tried unwisely to make novel use of her buxom build and strident voice by playing a strong commanding Cordelia. Her best time came after she was dead. She lies quite loose and limp while Mr. Olivier practices on her the most brutal enormities of artificial respiration, coiling her about him and pounding breast, belly and rump. Her inertia in this scene was profoundly moving."

Tynan wrote this in 1946. Olivier had not yet been knighted and Tynan was only 19 at the time.

At the time that Tynan took to writing drama reviews, the theatrical scene in London, apart from the usual Shakespearean diet, was dominated by inane drawing room comedies. Tynan dubbed them as the 'Loamshire play.' This is how he described it:

"...survey the peculiar nullity of our drama's genre, the Loamshire play. Its setting is the country house on what used to be called Loamshire but is now, as a heroic tribute to realism, sometimes called Berkshire. Except, when someone must sneeze or be murdered, the sun invariably shines. The inhabitants belong to a social class derived partly from romantic novels and partly from the playwright's vision of the leisured life he will lead after the play is a success -- this being the only effort of imagination he is called on to make. Joys and sorrows are giggles and whimpers: the crash of denunciation dwindles into 'Oh stuff, Mummy' and 'Oh really, Daddy!' and so grim is the continuity of these things that the foregoing paragraph might have been written at any time during the last thirty years."

Tynan was tireless in his efforts to remind his readers that there was nothing in the London theatre that "one dares discuss with an intelligent man for more than five minutes." Theatre, he urged, must question, must widen its scope and broaden its horizon. He moaned that London blithely ignored the new imaginative and exciting European and American dramatists -- Giradoux Sartre, Camus, Beckett, Brecht, Miller, Williams -- and continued to be enamoured of plays in which the only question asked was, 'Anyone for tennis?'

The 'Observer' and the 'Sunday Times' -- the posh papers in John Osborne's coinage -- were read by those interested in books, theatre, off-beat films and a sober assessment of the week's events. The 'Observer', with its non-conservative stance appealed to the growing number of middle and lower middle class people who, in the post-war years, had become disenchanted with establishmentarian views. Prodded by Tynan, the theatre-going audience, a minority then, as now, began to expect something more from the theatre than mere amusement. Tynan's reputation as a critic grew day by day, partly because of his gift for describing what he saw, but largely because of the cryptic manner in which he could dismiss the humbug which prevailed in the West-End drama.

Thanks to a visiting Indian top executive, I was once invited to the opening night of a play called 'Tabitha' at the Duchess theatre. It was meant to be a thriller laced with comedy, a typical West End play of the mid-fiftees. My host enjoyed it hugely; I feigned a polite interest in case I was considered to be snooty.

Tynan disassembled the play with clinical precision the following Sunday. It was such an excellent piece that I cut it out and kept it in my drawer. I still have it. It was a pleasant surprise to find the review included in his 'Theatre Writings' under the heading: 'A Tynan Demolition'. For your edification I quote a few passages.

"There is a kind of Englishman, who regards all drama that is powerfully exciting as a gross invasion of his privacy; who likes his plays eked out with long stretches of eventless time in which he can meditate undisturbed on the nature of his destiny. For such playgoers Tabitha might have been written. At discreet intervals a 'plot point' is made; between points, the characters brew tea, drink whisky and chat quietly among themselves. During these intervals, I submit, it would be a courtesy on the part of management to turn on the house lights and serve tea to the audience, but I suppose one cannot have everything.

With the plot I shall not long detain you. It rears its head only intermittently signalling for attention like the hamburger stands that enliven one's journey across the baking plains of Arizona.

Anne Leon zestfully plays an ingenue of the breed which, American columnists are wont to describe as 'veddy veddy British'. The authors, Arthur Riddley and Mary Cathcart Borer, show an interesting ineptness in the management of entrances and exits, but by these technical matters only specialists are likely to be absorbed. For the most part, the audience is left to its own devices."

Ken Tynan's penetrating eye missed nothing. No critic, to my mind, has been able to deploy his wit with such speed and precision to convey the flaws of a production. Theatre criticism, in the last half century has continued to be honest, passionate even, but there has been no successor to Ken Tynan. Reading him is even more pleasurable than sitting in a wayside cafe on an idyllic Autumn evening in Santa Monica, and sipping Chateau Margaux.