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Camel tours Launched on the Mall Road, Daachi Express currently offers a nightly tour of the historical buildings lined on either side of the road to the public at affordable rates By Haroon Akram Gill All of us are familiar with camel rides, but no one knew the humped desert animal could be made to parade the streets of the city while pulling a cart loaded with people. The inventors of ‘Daachi Express,’ as the ride is called, have done the uncommon. Initiated by the City District Government Lahore as part of its Rs100 million Dilkash Lahore project, Daachi Express is sure to give the conventional camel ride a new meaning. TNS learns that the ride has been launched on the Mall Road and currently offers a nightly tour of the historical buildings lined on either side of the road to the public at affordable rates. MOOD
STREET Town
Talk An
international movement
Camel tours Launched on the Mall Road, Daachi Express currently offers a nightly tour of the historical buildings lined on either side of the road to the public at affordable rates By Haroon Akram Gill All of us are
familiar with camel rides, but no one knew the humped desert animal could
be made to parade the streets of the city while pulling a cart loaded with
people. The inventors of ‘Daachi Express,’ as the ride is called, have
done the uncommon. Initiated by the City
District Government Lahore as part of its Rs100 million Dilkash Lahore
project, Daachi Express is sure to give the conventional camel ride a new
meaning. TNS learns that the ride has been launched on the Mall Road and
currently offers a nightly tour of the historical buildings lined on
either side of the road to the public at affordable rates. So far, the project has
met with an overwhelming public response. Because it is more of a
family/group affair, people turn up in throngs, most of them with
children, from different parts of the city, around 10 in the night,
expecting to catch an amusing camel ride. “I really enjoyed the
camel cart ride,” says nine-year-old Waleed who is from Ichhra. The project has proved
to be a cost-effective entertainment for the low-income class. A middle
aged labourer Muhammad Bilal Bhatti, who is seen accompanying his three
kids to the ride, says the children have become “addicted” to Daachi
Express. “It’s for the third time that I have brought them [here] and
my kids never seem to grow tired of it. Their faces glow as just as they
spot the camel. And, I am also happy because it doesn’t cost much to me;
only Rs5.” Mrs Rukhsana Amjad, wife
of a rickshaw driver, joins her two little kids for a ride, the children
cheering on. Misha Fatima, a Grade IV
student at a local school, says she was going back home with her parents
after eating out when she spotted the camel cart; she was hooked. For most onlookers, it
presents a strange sight and people stop to take a good look. Some of the
motorists like to drive along, As of now, the Daachi
Express starts off at the Istanbul Square which is surrounded on the one
side by the historical Town Hall and the Punjab University on the other. Anarkali Bazar is the
first station of the Express. Tollington Market, which has now become the
Lahore Heritage Museum, is another milestone on the way. Daachi Express also
passes by Neela Gumbud, GPO, Lahore High Court, State Bank of Pakistan and
the mighty Cathedral church. The ride ends at Charing Cross, in front of
the Provincial Assembly building, the Baba Dinga Singh building, Ahmad
Mansion and NICL which have been restored to their original structure,
design and plan under the Annual Development Project. As with every
international tour ride, narrators have been deputed on the carts who give
details on history and heritage on view. “The Daachi Express has met
with success beyond our expectations,” says District Coordination
Officer, Lahore, Nasim Sadiq, talking to TNS. “As many as 1,600
children took the ride in one day alone. We are now working to expand the
route towards downtown.” The DCO also says that
an important element of Lahori culture, tonga, is also being included in
the larger plan. But a single ride of tonga is likely to cost Rs400.
Besides, a tonga can only carry up to eight persons whereas the camel cart
can accommodate 30 people. The children are also
given small gifts for every ride they take. “We have jokers to amuse
[the children] with their gestures during the ride,” says Nasim Sadiq.
“The activity shall not only help the children learn about the city’s
history but also promote art and culture of the provincial capital, its
folk songs and music.” Rao Javed Iqbal, a
researcher at Dilkash Lahore, says that so far two camel carts have been
fielded. Their timings are: 10pm to 1am. “800-1,000 people, including
children and adults, are taking a ride daily,” he reveals. “Each cart
costs the CDGL Rs2,500 a day to operate.”
Then they came for him... By Sardar Hussain It was about 10
O’clock in the night. I was about to go to sleep when I got a call from
a very dear friend based in Multan. Happy to see his name flash on my
mobile screen, I picked up the phone instantly. I sat up as I heard the
very first word — “Hello!” Unlike his usual,
giggle-infested exchange of pleasantries, he sounded panicked. “They
(the dominant right-wing students’ organisation) are planning to take
out a protest rally against me tomorrow morning… They are distributing
pamphlets against me at the [university] campus. The VC has asked me to
immediately leave and go in hiding. He says ‘they’ have decided to
charge me with blasphemy…” His voice trailed off. Sensing the sensitivity
of the situation, I asked him to immediately come over to Lahore. Knowing
that he liked to defy the dangerous situation, I made him realise the
impending danger. When he finally gave in
to my persuasion to just leave the city immediately and not try to prove
his innocence, I lay down on my bed, imagining ways in which I could help
him out once he was here in Lahore. Early next morning, I
called him again, to make sure he was on his way. I was furious to know
that he was still hanging in there. He told me he was trying
to contact different people to clarify how he was being ‘fixed’ and
how the right-wing teachers (in majority) in the English department (where
he had recently joined as a faculty member after availing the Fulbright
Scholarship) had been tightening the noose around his neck. Forcing him again to
promise that he would leave for Lahore on the double, I sat perched on my
room chair, hearing the clock ticking at the break of the dawn. I don’t know when I
fell asleep again, but when I got up, it was a full bright day already. I
reached for my phone to call up my friend. His mobile was switched off. I have never heard from
him again. ****************** I met him at the King
Edward Medical College’s hostel canteen. A topper in FSc from the DG
Khan Board, he always wanted to be a medical scientist. Latter, realising
that it was not his true calling, he turned to Liberal Arts. He was an avid reader of
books from across disciplines. He commanded great respect among senior
academics. His ingenious heart, life-enriching laughter and a general
compassion for all endeared him to everybody wherever he went. After he was taken into
police custody that day — I found that out from another friend — the
people who knew him in different capacities tried to do something for him.
But soon there was a general ‘agreement’ that it was good for him not
to speak for him and to let the matter cool down. It has been over a year
since he disappeared from the public gaze. I keep hearing friends
‘alluding’ to him as a precedent ‘they’ set for those who defy
‘their views on life.’ He was also very popular
on Facebook discussion forums. Even his FB profile has become silent for
now. We, his friends,
sometimes ask each other, as to how and where would he be, in one or two
lines, and that’s it! The irony is that I can’t even name him in
public, lest it should ensure silencing of his voice. It is merely a reluctant
whisper from a friend for another friend gone missing. “First they came for
the Socialists, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a
Socialist. Then they came for the
Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a
Trade Unionist. Then they came for the
Jews, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me
— and there was no one left to speak for me.” —Martin Niemöller
* ‘Naql-e-Makani,’ a
satirical play, based on a short story by Rajindra Singh Bedi, one of the
greatest 20th century progressive writers of Urdu fiction, opens at Ali
Auditorium on Oct 4 through Oct 6. It’s a three-act performance,
produced in collaboration with Rabtt, a yout * ‘The Musical Outro,’
a Redingote Entertainment event, brings up-and-coming musicians on stage
at Ali Auditorium on Sunday (today). Time: 6:30pm. The young, talented
musicians on the list of performers include Abdullah Qureshi, Jhol, LUMS
Music Society and Minahil Cheema (of LSE). * ‘Hues of Fall,’ a
fashion exhibition of prominent as well as new brands, to be held on Oct 4
and 5. Venue: Tehxeeb, 164-P, Gulberg II. The visitors can expect “a
diverse range of trendy clothing collections to suit your mood for this
fall.” * ‘Lal Ki Sada,’ an
exhibition of paintings by Ali Abbas, ends Sep 29 (today) at Ejaz Art
Gallery.
theatre Shah Fahad has a
penchant for allegories. But, the interesting part is that his allegories
come in a (weirdly) comic package deal. Having scripted — and directed
— Innuendo-The Musical (2010’s award-winner at LUMS’s drama
festival) where he also played the inimitable Fear (a la The Dark
Knight’s Joker?) and, more recently, Akkar Bakkar, which bordered on
black comedy, Shah is veritably an old hand at creating social satires
where human characters become metaphors for abstract qualities. It is in
this context that his latest theatrical production Social Pagal may be
looked at. Produced under the
banner of Dramaducation, an amateur theatre group headed by Shah, Social
Pagal was recently performed at Alhamra The Mall, for five consecutive
nights, to an audience comprising mostly the young and the school-going.
It had been advertised as a charity event, the proceeds from the tickets
going to Shaukat Khanum Memorial Trust Hospital. Again, in Social Pagal,
Shah stretches the genre of allegory to incorporate funny one-liners in a
variety of lingos — from ‘desi’ to ‘Minglish’ to ‘filmi’
and, at places, gibberish — coupled with acts of buffoonery and complete
inanity to achieve the comic effect. The purpose in all this, however, is
to make a comment on the ills of the society. The young
actor-writer-director from FAST also introduces elements of immersion
theatre before the start of the play, when the proverbial ‘fourth
wall’ is removed and a number of characters creep up to the audience
from behind the curtains. This adds an amusing prelude to Social Pagal
which was originally performed over a year and half ago, without the
segment. The setting of Social
Pagal is a lunatic asylum where six main characters — namely Monday,
Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Holiday and Pakistan Day — along with a few
minor ones, are kept under the care of a Madam DP. The asylum has three
guards Rajab, Sha’baan and Ramzan (obviously named after the months in
Islamic calendar). When the play opens,
Madam DP is offering the lunatics — or “social pagals,” as the
narrator reminds us intermittently — a As with most allegories,
Social Pagal allows each of its main characters at least one dark
soliloquy that is more of an internal monologue and meant to provide a
context to the characters’ present state of mind. For instance, when
Friday, the young girl with burns on her face, breaks into a spiel on how
her obsessive lover threw acid on her because she had refused to become
“his possession,” the pun in her name (“Friday is a day of
purity,” she says at one point in the play) becomes all too obvious. It turns out that all
the inmates have a traumatic past. Thursday, we are told, lost his mind
after his mother was murdered right before his eyes by his father;
Wednesday had a nervous breakdown after her son was killed in a road
accident; and Pakistan Day, the civil servant, lost his family to mass
violence in Karachi. The soliloquies are full
of pathos and the effect is never lost on the audience when you have a
brilliant set of performers. Kudos is due to Shah Fahad and his entire
team of actors, especially Sana Jafri (as Friday), Sarmed Aftab (Thursday)
and Abuzar (Pakistan Day). Even Alee Hassan Shah displays perfect comic
timing as a TV journalist who is out to hunt the ‘breaking news.’ PAC student Hassan
Rasheed (his last work was Avanti-The Musical) makes his no-nonsense,
back-to-work Monday simply come to life with a very believable
performance. Sarmed’s drunk Thursday is curiously reminiscent of
Bollywood’s olden Keshtu Mukherjee and gets the maximum laughs from the
audience. Besides the main
characters, the minor ones also have similarly harrowing experiences to
share. The bearded maulvi, interestingly named Ras Gulla, relates how he
was accused of blasphemy by the landlord just so that the latter could
grab his land, while Amrati (the old woman) is said to have lost her
senses when her children left her in an old people’s home. The play’s superior
comment is clearly that in this part of the world, we are producing
neurotics. At one stage, Holiday also declares, “Sanity is highly
overrated.” The play also deals in
paradoxes as Monday, the stiff-necked and stout army officer who is always
talking about sifting “mard” (men) from the boys, betrays his actually
predominant feminine side. “I have been acting all my life,” he
murmurs. The audience cannot but put their hands together. Last but not the least,
there is Politician who is on all fours and always found barking. Funnily,
he considers himself a dog that can only be ‘tamed’ by an army
officer. At the end of the play,
Holiday succeeds in freeing all the lunatics from the asylum by the force
of a ‘toy gun’. On a personal level, he has managed to fulfill his
long cherished dream of producing and acting in a play. Though it may be
coincidental but Social Pagal has resonances of 20th century American
novelist Ken Kesey’s classic One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest and also
our very own Aashiqo Ghum Na Karna, adapted into Punjabi by Sohail Ahmad
in the 1990s. For their part, Shah
Fahad and his co-producer Daniyal Naeem Dar do well to keep the freshness
of the script intact. The set, designed by Sana Jafri, complements the
evocative mood of the play and so does the makeup by Depilex.
An
international movement The
smoke-emitting van takes a sharp turn along the bend and comes to an
abrupt halt outside a small roadside restaurant. Passengers start
disembarking without delay and head to their destination. Among them there
are two young boys who are teeming with energy and seem extraordinarily
excited to reach the place. They reach out to a fellow passenger and seek
directions before heading to their ultimate destination. The point where they
have disembarked from the van is called Brewery Chowk. Named after the
colonial-era building of Murree Brewery, which is hardly half a kilometre
away, this place is frequented by a large number of students every year.
Many of them who take up this journey change vehicles here and take the
road that goes uphill towards Lawrence College, Ghora Gali. But their destination is
not the elite public school. They get off the vehicles half way to reach
the place which they have aspired for long. It’s none other than the Boy
Scouts Summer Training Centre of Punjab, also known as the Boy Scouts
Nasheman, which attracts thousands of youth every year. The two boys mentioned
above are also going to the Centre to join their schoolmates who are
already there. They will spend an entire week at the place, live in tents,
take part in different exercises, learn life skills and benefit from
trainings which will enable them to face the challenges of life
effectively. The boys are so excited that instead of taking a van they
decide to walk all the way. On the way, the boys
take an occasional breather to view the majestic hills, valleys and pine
trees and they inhale fresh air which they can hardly find back in the
cities where they come from. They ultimately reach
the amazingly beautiful scouts training centre, situated about 6,500 feet
above the sea level and spread over an area of 150 kanals. It is hardly eight
kilometres away from Murree and, hence, a dream place for a large number
of boy scouts coming from relatively poor families as well as those from
the affluent ones. While the former get a chance to visit a cherished
hill-station almost for free, the latter enjoy the independent life they
live here and the adventure that awaits them. This is the minimum that
scouting has to offer to the school-going youth of the country, says Syed
Zameerul Islam Bukhari, Commandant of Boy Scouts Summer Training Centre of
Punjab. Bukhari tells TNS that
scouting is an international movement and it trains and disciplines youth
in an excellent manner. The activities organised for them are endless and
can be modified according to the needs of time. The activities arranged
for the scouts at the Centre range from hiking, sports, study of nature,
compass reading, giving first aid, map reading, traffic control, hospital
service, building of small bridges and firefighting to carrying out
vaccinations, shooting at target, kitchen gardening, swimming, riding and
so on. “It has been observed
that the students become totally changed individuals once they pass
through the rigorous training they get at the Centre,” he adds. This leads to the
question about the purpose of investing so much time and money. Besides,
one seeks explanation as to why scouting is now limited to a few
government schools and the private sector is fast opting out. The answer comes from
Adnan Khan, a former boy scout who is now teaching at a local college. He
says, “There is a saying that ‘once a scout, always a scout.’ This
means a true scout will remain committed to the cause which he vowed to
serve throughout his life.” Citing an example, Adnan
says there are endless scouts organisations formed by ex-boy scouts who
stay connected to each other and immediately come into action in times of
need. In such occasions, they
are unmatched for being volunteers, committed, trained and locals of the
place they serve. Unlike the paid workforce employed by the government,
their priority is to serve the masses and manage difficult situations with
missionary zeal. To quote Adnan, “there are thousands of scouts who take
care of people affected by disasters of various kinds, the injured and
hospitalised, manage crowds at fairs, religious festivals and professions
and extend helping hand to government department. One can recall how more
than 10 scouts sacrificed their lives at the Ashura procession to save the
mourners, says Adnan, adding that these fearless scouts were the ones
leading the procession. “Their services are required in the event of a
plantation drive, a distribution of food to the needy, in awareness
campaigns on health and hygiene, urs celebrations and so on.” On the schools’
decreasing interest in the activity, he says it’s a pity that the youth
of today have become lazy and are addicted to television, films, internet
and video games. “There are many better
opportunities available to them such as sports, recreational clubs,
excursions arranged by schools. But all these are not comparable to what
they can learn at scouting,” he asserts. “Scouting teaches self
discipline, situation management, service of mankind, planning skills,
humility and humanity and what not.” However, an official in
the school education department, which oversees the scouting activities,
cites another reason why the level of interest in the activity is on the
wane. He says that the scouting camp is located at a prime location and
there are forces trying to sell out this land some business group. He tries to substantiate
his claim by saying that acres of land belonging to the boy scouts
association were occupied in Walton, Lahore, to construct Bab-e-Pakistan. When asked about the
same, Bukhari claims there were issues with locals over land but they are
being sorted out. The Centre administration has carried out some land
transactions including the acquisition of the property once owned by
Murree Brewery. A few of these had issues with them but on the whole
situation is under control, he says.
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while
others with children stop their cars and buy tickets for the ride. 
h
social initiative that aims to promote independent and critical thinking
through educational camps, bringing together students and mentors from
different classes of society. Time: 5pm. 
chance to prove their sanity within the next 30 minutes under a
surveillance camera. From this point onwards, the audience is witness to a
kind of a play-within-a-play as Holiday (Shah Fahad) suggests to his
fellow inmates that they should develop a plot for a drama which shall
speak for their sanity. 
