|
|
|
|
 |
 |
  
|
policy
policy Switzerland has always been
and still is a paradise for tourists as long as one does not hold a Pakistani
passport. Situated in the heart of Europe, it represents a fantastic blend of
German, Italian and French culture, cuisine and custom. But it is the
neutrality and the friendly nature of Swiss people that is overwhelming. And
yes! It is an undisputed land of milk, cheese and chocolate. The majestic
Alps soar into the blue skies of Switzerland creating gushing streams, trout
filled rivers, alpine meadows, velvet green valleys and pristine lakes. The
fragrance of wild flowers fills the air while the sound of cattle bells
provides nature’s orchestra where ever you walk into the countryside. The
sidewalk cafes that serve affordable food are as hygienic as the five fork
restaurants serving ruby red wines. World renowned designer’s clothes,
jewelry, diamonds, watches, shoes and bags are all there for the richest of
the rich but even people with shallow pockets can also shop with dignity. And
that is the beauty of a tourist destination. People on a modest budget can
buy Swiss knives, cuckoo clocks, swatch watches, cattle bells, cheese,
chocolates and bundles of finger thin twisted cigars. In 1967 I hitch hiked to Chambers, a tiny mountain village on the bank of Lec Lema (Geneva Lake) in Switzerland. I was then a student at the Punjab University and a week-end free lance tourist guide to collect some extra money for this long journey. Choice of Switzerland as a destination was not accidental but planned because of my childhood friend Akbar Rizvi, the eldest son of famous singer Madam Noor Jehan. He was there for his summer vacation with his Swiss wife Simon, a girl from that village. I obtained my Swiss visa, now an impossible task, from the Swiss Embassy in Tehran. Akbar organised a party at Simon’s house where I met miss Elisabeth Rinsoz and miss Chantal who were so keen to polish their English that they stuck to me like glue and offered to take me to south of France for holidays. Those days a lot of Swiss girls travelled to England to learn English. In fact Simon too was in England to learn English when she met Akbar Rizvi and got married to him. No wonder Elisabeth and Chantal were keen for my company to learn English while on the other hand I was excited to have my first Gori girl friends and immediately agreed to accompany them to Cote D’Azur, the French Riviera. This was the golden era of Field Marshal Ayub Khan and Pakistanis did not require visa to visit most countries, including France. The French Riviera from
Monte Carlo to Marseilles offers fascinating beach holidays for all classes,
age groups and budgets. We camped on a beach near a fishermen’s village
called La Lounde. I, a desert dweller, kept a safe distance from the sea but
did not miss the opportunity of making a quick but risky buck by assisting
the fishermen on their fishing voyages to the high seas. During the summer
vacations, students from all over Europe head towards south of France, partly
to make holidays but mainly to work in vineyards to earn some pocket money.
While I was helping my Gori girl friends in polishing their English my main
focus was shifting to vineyards to earn some money for the homeward journey.
Working in vineyards is fun. Collect grapes during the day, put these in a
massive pot and then the whole army of youngsters from different
nationalities join in to mash the grapes under their feet. Later everyone
sits around a campfire, eats, drinks and enjoys. After two weeks of vacation
my friends had to return back to their jobs in Switzerland while I stayed on.
A few weeks later I realised that my visa for Switzerland had expired and I
had to get an extension to return back to Chexbres. I mailed my passport to
the Swiss Consulate in Marseilles and within a few days got back my passport
with a new visa. That is how efficient and helpful Swiss consulates and
embassies are known to be. In the last 44 years I have made frequent trips to Switzerland to promote tourism business between our two countries. Silk Route (Karakoram Highway) through Pakistan into China, before 9/11, was one of the most favourite trail of the Swiss tourists and all important Swiss companies were selling this popular tour. Apart from the regular Silk Route tours we organised two very interesting safaris: one a Harley Davidson Motor Bike Rally and the other a 4X4 Vehicle Rally from Lausanne in Switzerland to Beijing in China. Interestingly, Fort Munro, near Dera Ghazi Khan, turned out to be the mid-point between these two cities. Margrith Sengupta of Indoculture tours Zurich organised an exclusive women’s tour “The World of Purdah” to the remote regions of Cholistan, Tharparkar and Balochistan. We have been handling tourist from all nationalities but found the Swiss tourist to be most friendly, respectful to our culture and considerate to our traditions. It really has been a two way channel because I have also been taking groups of Pakistani tourist to Switzerland. Swiss Embassy has always been most helpful in providing correct guidance and issuing tourist visas for our groups till my recent encounter. I was asked by a reputed organisation to organise a family incentive group tour to Switzerland for their dealers. Most of the European embassies now have appointed M/S Gerry’s FEDEX International as their Visa Drop Box to facilitate the general public and save them from making trips to Islamabad. Unfortunately getting into the Visa Drop Box office of this Pakistani company in Lahore is more cumbersome than getting into any embassy in the Diplomatic Enclave in Islamabad. In our case the Fedex people knew that for big groups we will have to deal directly with the embassy yet they collected our documents, courier service charges and Swiss Visa Fee amounting to a total amount of Rs.609140. In a matter of days they returned back the documents but not the money and asked us to contact the Swiss Embassy directly. Their information is poor, their service charges are four time more than any other courier service and their refund policy, in general is not to give back any money and if pressed hard take months. This is a big scam and the embassies concerned must take a serious note of this. They are rightly called visa drop dead policy. I next contacted the Swiss
Embassy in Islamabad, which was time consuming but finally met the Pakistani
official of the visa section. He handed over a long list of supporting
documents to be attached to each passport. Since our group members were
genuine tourists travelling to Switzerland on an incentive tour we got all
the necessary documents like property papers, bank statements, dealership
certificates, personal undertaking, sponsorship letter from the organisers,
health insurance, flight booking, hotel (Carlton Europe in Interlaken and
Crown Plaza in Zurich) and other land arrangement confirmation from our
Zurich based partner, Best of Switzerland Tours, an officially registered
company with Swiss Tourism. Finally after four trips to Islamabad our cases
were accepted on the 14th of March, 2011. Although we had already paid the
visa fee to the Swiss Visa Drop Box facilitators in Lahore yet we had to pay
the visa fee once again for the same persons. We however were assured by the
visa section staff that our previous fee would be refunded soon. Normally the visa processing time is 30 days but in this case the Swiss Visa Consular took only 3 days and on the 17th March refused all the visas. The reason for refusal was: “the information submitted regarding the justification for the purpose and conditions of the intended stay was not reliable”. This is absurd and it clearly shows a mind-set to refuse visas to Pakistanis on one pretext or the other. The refusal is also surprising because I had taken similar groups on a similar tour the previous year. Switzerland has emerged, over the last few years, as the most popular tourist destination in our part of the world mainly because of hit songs of Indian films shot on Swiss locations featuring super stars like Shah Rukh Khan, Kajol and others. In fact Interlaken is known as the Bollywood city because a lot of films have been shot in and around this town. What better purpose of tourism can one have than visiting a tourism paradise? And as far as reliability of the intended stay is concerned it can be checked from the hotels mentioned above. Moreover, we were travelling with the families of well established and well respected people of our society who are used to travel to different parts of the world and can easily afford to pay for four to five star hotels. In this case however the entire tour was sponsored by Pak Elektron, a leading house appliances company of Pakistan. One wonders if it is the stated policy of the Swiss Government, a change of heart, a change of mind or just a change of Visa Consular with a changed attitude that Pakistanis are not to be given visas. Every one in Pakistan knows about the Swiss cases and the 60 million dollars. Are the Swiss interested only in that kind of tourists and that kind of money? Diplomatic missions build bridges of peace and friendship between nations and respect the human rights of the host country. Such arrogant attitude and undiplomatic action nullify the very purpose of diplomatic missions.
|
|
