It was a surprise more than anything, but Pakistan has actually managed to win a gold medal at the Olympics, Of course, now that Arshad Nadeem has won, a lot of people will take credit, even though the only contribution the country has made is giving a flag to compete with. It might not be much but it’s crucial. After all, our previous athlete, Subedar Muhammad Younas, couldn’t go to the 1976 Montreal Olympics even though he was the reigning Asian Games gold medallist.
Athletics have never been much of a passion for us, even though they’re instinctual. I mean, seeing who can run faster is something children automatically seem to do. Even more complicated games, like hockey or cricket, involve running around, as well as throwing things. The javelin throw is a remnant of the military, for the distant past when soldiers actually carried javelins into battle, and throwing javelins. The other type, you see, are the stabbing javelins, their names having survived in the various Lancers regiments. They’re all tank regiments now, but that’s another story, and we’ll speak of it another time.
The best sport we had at Partition was hockey. Even Roshan Khan and Hashim Khan, those illustrious predecessors of Jahangir Khan and Jansher Khan. Even cricket took a little while putting together, but by the late 1970s, it was all coming together.
Until 1992, when we were world champions in cricket, squash and snooker. By then, hockey had slipped, and our defining moment seems to have been a decade earlier, when we were both Olympic and World champions.
Athletics? Not a sign. Now, though, that might have changed. Just to add interest to Arshad’s contests, his main rival is Neeraj Chopra, who is from Haryana, and who is in the Indian Army. Maybe Arshad should be inducted in the Army, so that the credit of defeating an Indian JCO does not go simply to some civilian.
Arshad’s winning has complicated matters, though. Bangladesh seemed to be showing the way. With student protests against quotas turning into protests against the government, the Army did the patriotic thing and took over. She had won their election in January, though in the teeth of an opposition boycott, and without a caretaker government.
There are curious parallels between the countries. After 1971, both saw their PMs deposed by military coups. In Bangladesh, Sh Mujeebur Rehman was gunned down, in Pakistan Zulfikar Ali Bhhutto was hanged. Both were succeeded as party chief by their daughters. Bangladesh introduced the concept of a caretaker government, which its military used to rule indirectly. Any resemblance to Pakistan’s recent experience are, of course, purely coincidental.
Now we have a military takeover, but a caretaker government headed by a civilian. As I said, sheer patriotism. Or perhaps some soldiers may have wondered why they had to kill people to keep someone else in power. No one is being shot to keep the military in power.
Or rather, Dr Yunas in power. He was surrounded by a barrage of charges by the outgoing Hasina government, making him stay abroad, because she suspected him of political ambitions. Well, at 86, his primary ambition would be to stay around. His second would be to appeal to the youth vote, like our own Imran Khan and the USA’s Donald Trump.
Dr Yunus gave us an idea. He was picked because he’s Bangldesh’s only Nobel Peace laureate. Well. we’ve got one of those, in the shape of Malala Yusufzai/ In fact, we’re going to have her for a long time. And she’s an Oxford graduate, like Imran, which makes her a good choice for coming on the same page.
In fact, that lack of an Oxford degree is something that might cost Arshad Nadeem the privilege of getting on the same page, not to mention he’s from Mian Channu, which is not the centre of the Universe. Its previous most famous on was Ghulam Haider Wyne, who migrated there at Partition from Amritsar, and who became Punjab CM.
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