The whole point of starting this discussion was to condemn the PM’s poor choice of words; somehow it got into some personal explanations and counter arguments. One shouldn’t be proud of picking up instances from the past where either Bureaucrats or administrative authorities have ridiculed or disrespected us. This is no pride that you say why didn’t you say nothing to him when he said this at that time. God knows better what were the conditions then and also the context. Here one man (not an ordinary citizen-a person who has run the country thrice) uses a language to which some of my friends named..cracked a joke with poor sense of humour. Come on, let’s not be in any delusion that he did it on purpose; because it doesn’t suit the Prime Minister of Pakistan with poor sense of humour to crack a derogatory joke in a large public gathering. Finally, proficiency in Urdu is not the criterion to judge people of Pakistan thus talking about someone’s linguistic abilities in such a manner is highly insulting and condemnable. As a matter of fact, our PM speaks Punjabi at home.
hanifmuhammad says
Mr Irfan you should be clear I am no namak halal of any MNA, what I am saying is lets not get too big for our boots. The prime minister has come thrice to Chitral. He did not come for a picnic. He restored funding for the Lowari tunnel which for five years after general Musharaf had been held back and he and increased it manifolds to help complete it. He announced funds for our major roads. He could have spent this amount in Lahore and gained many National Assembly sets. He visits the house of a poor Chitrali out of respect for the work the work this man does for him. No one is detracting anything from the work of General Musharaf. But Musharaf is history he is not going to come back as a politician. In the election the entire country voted one way and we voted the other way. What do we want our MNA to do. Should he keep quite singing the praises of General Musharaf while there is an earthquake or floods? When that happens all of us are running around criticising the elected people for not doing anything. When they do something we criticise them because we cannot understand simple sentences and misquote them and state them out of context. We should give up this habit which will cost us a lot. When Begum Bhutto was elected from Chitral and was MNA for a few months before resigning her seat we started criticising and abusing her for being arrogant. When Nasirullah Babar who conducted the campaign finished the campaign and became a MInister in the Cabinet we started abusing him because he could not give us all the time to hear our stories. We invited Allana to come and stand in an election from here and then humiliated him. We do this to all leaders without realsing that we as Chitralis. As one of my friend said we do not even raise our voice when our daughters are married down country and humiliated. Just a few weeks back some of my friends were criticising Imran Khan for being arrogant and not shaking hands with all the people in his party. How long is this going to go on. If a Chitrali does something good lets applause him. There were thousands of people at the Junali the largest ever crowd in Chitralis political history.They cheered and clapped for the prime minister because he announced something good for Chitral. Lets not criticise for changing sides in Pakistan. What did Bhutto do to his God father? What did Zia do to the man who appointed him Chief picking him over many other deserving people. What did Musharaf do to Nawaz Sharif who he picked from nowhere to make him Chief. This is the nature of Pakistani politics. For us Chitralis its important to remember we are few our territory is very large and we have to win our share in the nations pie through strong personal relationship. Instituions were there in British times, the subcontinent history has not example of institutions. So we will be dependent on individuals and their personal relationship. Some even mind that
Shamrez says
A former deputy commissioner to Chitral Javed told a journalist during an interview published in this very online newspaper that “You can find very good servants in Chitral but finding an educated man is uphill task”.
Chitralis must accept that they don’t speak good Urdu which could be judged from their gulabi Urdu. Even those bashing the prime minister are here think they are very good at English but in fact their English is as weak as Nawaz Sharif. Some even claimed of being highly educated but they English he had written was completely opposite.
It is fact that Chitralis are good for nothing. They are just over confident.
I have a question for all those who are defending the PM’s derogatory remarks. But before that let’s not compare the PM with other leaders as he is not even in the race. The question is whether NS can ask the same question in Kohistan, Dir, Mardan, Charsadda or for that matter at any place with Pashtu speaking people in majority? Why he did this twice in Chitral? Once you give it a deep thought, you will also get upset and angry so please stop defending a man who doesn’t have any respect for you.
Irfan Ullah says
i am not surprised to see some of the writers trying their best to defend an un-defendable mistake. some say it was a bit of humour, was it? if so, that was a terrible piece. we do realize that we are not good at speaking Urdu but that’s fine because Urdu is our second language and second language has never got perfect with anyone in the whole world. just think for a moment, Pathans are much weaker than us at speaking Urdu or any other language. Does anyone remember MS or any other leader making test of their language skills. come on folks, don’t try to make fool of people, rather of yourselves. in fact, MS has never given respect to us Chitralis. he thinks we, who are from Chitral, are fools. and that’s why he is trying his foolish jokes at us every time he visits us.
also, many people argue that he announced mega projects of billion of rupees. i have two points here; first, these are just announced. we are well aware of what happens to such announcements. second, PM is not basically supposed to around announcing projects. for that there should be institutions which MS type of leaders never allowed to grow.
finally, i feel most of the defender writers are actually the associates and beneficiaries of our MNA sahib. these type of people never talk of common interests, they have to ‘Halal the Namak’. mr. hanif has been quite efficient to dig out Khatak’s speech. i agree with you that most of our brothers prefer to servants in down country. but make it a note that this is the result of the tireless efforts of your LOTA leaders, including your current one and his great father, who did not left any party to join for their vested interests but never tried to alleviate the poor conditions of fellow chitralis.
hanifmuhammad says
Mr Shamrez the older people recall that once Mr Khattak while he was the Governor of KP came to Chitral and addressing the crowd said that he knows the Chitralis very well. They are wonderful people whom he trusts. He said he has had four servants from Chitral!!! So dont blame MNAs and MPAs who if they do not do any other thing well at least speak Urdu well. Its the ordinary people who rush to work in the households in all the cities who give Chitral its name good or bad. We prefer to go and become a cook or a servant in Peshawar rather than working with our hands in Chitral. Peshawar and Islamabad and Karachi are full of people. Dont you see the way the khojas of Karachi treat our people of the north as second class citizens in their own institutions and dont we see every person asking for a Chitrali servant in Peshawar and Islamabad. From here they learn how we speak Urdu…….Bumba hey, the joke on the TV we all recall. Even Mr shariff thought it prudent to visit an ordinary Chitrali who worked in his house!!!!!
We should draw a balanced view of the PM,s joke about the standard of Urdu amongst the Chitralis. Here the bad luck goes to our political leaders,who on the first stage,can not speak Urdu well,leave alone fluency,although despite claiming high degrees and good exposures.These leaders are indicators of our culture and social milieu.Secondly,the people who are closely connected to the PM should have had briefed him, even not to use mild derogatory words as public resentment and reaction was witnessed in past too,when he joked about one crore.As far ZAB and BB shaeeds and Musharaf were concerned they are more cautious and groomed in interpersonal and communication skills.However,we should wait for the announcements of mega projects by the PM to be materialized.If got materialized then this would be a generosity on his part keeping in view his party poor performance in the elections and ill-treated reception given in the distant past.
hanifmuhammad says
Our brother Shams really gets things mixed up. Everyone gives credit to Pervez Musharaf for initiating the Lowari project. He was brave in initiating this project and kind to our plight. The project was estimated at Rs 7 billion then. The Chinese completed a similary project at Atabad in Gilgit in one and a half year. The Lowari project got delayed because Mr Gilani during his prime ministership diverted the funds to his home constituency. Mr Sharif was kind to release funds for this project on timely basis and in large instalments. Anyone who visits the project would acknowledge that. So while giving General Musharaf credits lets also salute Sharif for his contribution to the effort. The costs of this project is estimated at 27 million. The brother also gets his fact wrong when he talks about the mega project of road in Chitral. This project was built through a special area development project whcih was taken as a loan by the government of Pakistan from Asian Development Bank. There was no NGO involved in it and NGOs dont do projects of this size. The area development project was conceived by the government of General Zia to support the development of Chitral and it was a loan. As for the defence of Chitral lets not exaggerate our strengths. When the wicked Maulana of Swat had captured Swat with his so called Islamic movement one of the first to send him a message to come to Chitral were our leaders over here. We are so lucky the Pakistan army was moved into valleys stretching from Arandu to Boomboret which has protected us from the mad people residing in Afghanistan. We do not have a history of defending our borders except for a few tribes, the rest of us strongly believe whoever marries my daughter is my son in law and whoever takes my country is my mehtar.
amun baig says
Lot of politicians in Chitral seem to be licking their wounds. They did not expect the Prime Minister to come to Chitral to announce important projects. They want to manipulate the people of Chitral the way the local bodies election were manipulated using the money of the provincial government. Their chamchas cannot see success and are jealous of it. The biggest crowd in Chitrals history cheered the prime minister but these people trying to mislead others by twisting his words. Words always have a context in which they are spoken. Sadly for them the entire speech of the PM is available on the web so they cannot lie. But the Prime Minister was kind and generous in coming to Chitral and announcing projects for the people of Chitral. The people of Charsadda, Mardan, Upper and Lower Dir, Shangla and so many other have similar rights but through the enterprisng work of our MNA we have been able to persuade the Prime Minister to focus on our problems. The people who cannot understand simple jokes need to improve the quality of their humour. The Prime Minister appreciates Chitralis. A poor man works in his house and he has the generosity and kindness to fly to his house to thank him for his work.
Hakim says
BEHISTI KOE SOLIK CHEEZ NHI HE JO NAZAR AYE ,ISKO FEEL KIA JATA HE , YE US BANDE KI MINDSET KO REFLECT KR RHA HE , TV CHANNELS HAZARO PATHAN ANP PPP,PTI ,PLMN K LOG BAT KRTE HE ,PHATAN SAHAFI BT KRTE HE UNKI ACCENT DIFFERNT HE UNSE JO AHLE ZABAN HE , KHUD PANJABIO KI accent kafi different he karachi walo se , to kisi leader ko hum ne nhi suna k awam se aise khitab krte hue ..ye pata nhi khud ko kia samjte he tax choor . Waha pe mawjood logo ko kuch reaction dikhana chahie tha , giderl ki sow sala zindagi se sher ki ik din ki zidagi behter he..our jinko feel nhi horha he wo talian bajaye
Dr. Zubeda Sirang says
Even if we agree that Mr.Sharif was trying to be witty, it was a very poor attempt. One can’t be humorous by hurting someone’s feelings and it hasn’t happened for the first time. Nawaz Sharif is famous for his disrespectful speeches in Chitral and that’s not acceptable.
Murad Akbar says
I was expecting such a non-sense from him- and he came up with my expectations. This is the bad time we Pakistanis are passing through. Once our fellows in Punjab start using their brains, we will for sure get rid NS and company. This has now clear that even after 17 years NS has learned no lesson. I think most of him time is spent on thinking what to eat over the next table………no time to know about people, culture and all that. As musharaf said,at the end of his last address to the nation:” Pakistan ka Khuda Hafiz”.
Shams says
This mistake is repeated for the second time, this is not the mistake of PM but is the mistake of those people who are associated with PMLN. Before his arrival, PM should be briefed about Chitral, its culture, education level etc. As we compare Chitral wit other districts of Punjab, it is totally different, PM should not compare Chitral with Kasure, Jhang, Pakpatan etc. We are poor people but we know how to get respect and whom to give respect. We never compromise our values for getting monetary benefits, PM should understand it clearly. If someone gives us respect we can maintain that respect for centuries, the live example is our association with Bhutto family and Pervez Musharaf.
After partition, Chitral state had decided its affiliation with Pakistan without any deal, similarly Chitral is a part of Pakistan, if any government official whether it is PM, CM or any party representative providing development fund for Chitral then it should be considered the right of the inhabitants of Chitral. PM should realize that Chitral has a long boarder with Afghanistan, since partition people of Chitral have maintained the security of boarder otherwise, like Kargil, government will spent million of funds to maintain the security in the boarder. On security point of view, Lawari tunnel is the need of the day, this tunnel has been initiated by Bhutto and Parvez Musharif, other parties are requested not to get credit of this project. If they have initiated and completed other projects in Chitral then the credit goes to them but till now no visible project has been completed in Chitral during the last 40 years as I remember. the only mega project is blacktopping of Chitral Booni road that was completed by an NGO. Can PM and other parties justify this step-motherly behavior with Chitral?
Sr Khan says
Actually Nawaz Sharif mostly interacts with some political leaders from Chitral, so his perception of the language skills of the people is a direct result of Urdu spoken by (some of) these local politicians and his commments are probably a reflection of the education of some of these Chitrali politicians.
Shamrez says
SR Khan has rightly pointed out that his remarks about Chitral came after interaction with MNA, MPAs, district nazim as none of them are neither good at Urdu nor English.
Basharat Hussain, Charun Oveer, Chitral. says
Your write-up has compelled me to listen to prime minister speech, which I had actually missed. I did not find the speech as insulting as you have described it. The prime minister rightly said, when he came to Chitral twenty years ago no was able to speak urdu properly. Why cannot we accept it that we our urdu speaking skill are not upto the mark. There is no shame as we have our own culture and language and prime minister should not expect us to speak urdu eloquently as native speakers. I agree that prime minister’s rethoric on Chitralis urdu speaking skill indicates his lack of understanding of the area and its culture. Over all it was positive and I give him benefit of doubt.
hanifmuhammad says
If the Prime Minster cracks a joke, with his poor sense of humour, we mind it!!. We give no credit to the Prime Minister for announcing funds to meet our urgent needs. These funds could have gone to Dir or Laki or DI Khan. But they went to a District which has only one seat in NA.We raise our voice about the PMs joke but our righteous friend don’t ever feel ashamed for all the young Chitral girls being sold in name of marriage down country; we do not raise our voice where our only district hospital does not have even basic facilities; we do not cry when areas like FATA have seats in the civil services and our children have to compete to find a job; we do not cry when all our forests and mineral wealth goes away without any income to us; we don’t cry when Mohmands come and buy our best lands cheaply because we need the cash to meet our needs. We do not cry when for many years a Waziristani sat in Chitral as DC becausee of political connections messing our development projects. But we will cry when the country’s prime minister gives us respect and criticise him because we lack a sense of humour or our miserly because we can’t give credit where it is due
Ashraf says
Agree with hanifmuhammad. PM was trying to crack a joke only. We should not make that an issue. Talk about other relevant issues.
Basharat says
How many Chitralis have far been able to make an appearance on tv talk shows with their fluent Urdu.? Truth is bitter.. It is true that we are not good at Urdu..gulabi urdu to hr koi bol leta hy bhai… The intention of pm was not to hurt us but was in a good humour…
Bakhsh says
Excellent brother your thoughts reflect emotions of all of us right now
The whole point of starting this discussion was to condemn the PM’s poor choice of words; somehow it got into some personal explanations and counter arguments. One shouldn’t be proud of picking up instances from the past where either Bureaucrats or administrative authorities have ridiculed or disrespected us. This is no pride that you say why didn’t you say nothing to him when he said this at that time. God knows better what were the conditions then and also the context. Here one man (not an ordinary citizen-a person who has run the country thrice) uses a language to which some of my friends named..cracked a joke with poor sense of humour. Come on, let’s not be in any delusion that he did it on purpose; because it doesn’t suit the Prime Minister of Pakistan with poor sense of humour to crack a derogatory joke in a large public gathering. Finally, proficiency in Urdu is not the criterion to judge people of Pakistan thus talking about someone’s linguistic abilities in such a manner is highly insulting and condemnable. As a matter of fact, our PM speaks Punjabi at home.
Mr Irfan you should be clear I am no namak halal of any MNA, what I am saying is lets not get too big for our boots. The prime minister has come thrice to Chitral. He did not come for a picnic. He restored funding for the Lowari tunnel which for five years after general Musharaf had been held back and he and increased it manifolds to help complete it. He announced funds for our major roads. He could have spent this amount in Lahore and gained many National Assembly sets. He visits the house of a poor Chitrali out of respect for the work the work this man does for him. No one is detracting anything from the work of General Musharaf. But Musharaf is history he is not going to come back as a politician. In the election the entire country voted one way and we voted the other way. What do we want our MNA to do. Should he keep quite singing the praises of General Musharaf while there is an earthquake or floods? When that happens all of us are running around criticising the elected people for not doing anything. When they do something we criticise them because we cannot understand simple sentences and misquote them and state them out of context. We should give up this habit which will cost us a lot. When Begum Bhutto was elected from Chitral and was MNA for a few months before resigning her seat we started criticising and abusing her for being arrogant. When Nasirullah Babar who conducted the campaign finished the campaign and became a MInister in the Cabinet we started abusing him because he could not give us all the time to hear our stories. We invited Allana to come and stand in an election from here and then humiliated him. We do this to all leaders without realsing that we as Chitralis. As one of my friend said we do not even raise our voice when our daughters are married down country and humiliated. Just a few weeks back some of my friends were criticising Imran Khan for being arrogant and not shaking hands with all the people in his party. How long is this going to go on. If a Chitrali does something good lets applause him. There were thousands of people at the Junali the largest ever crowd in Chitralis political history.They cheered and clapped for the prime minister because he announced something good for Chitral. Lets not criticise for changing sides in Pakistan. What did Bhutto do to his God father? What did Zia do to the man who appointed him Chief picking him over many other deserving people. What did Musharaf do to Nawaz Sharif who he picked from nowhere to make him Chief. This is the nature of Pakistani politics. For us Chitralis its important to remember we are few our territory is very large and we have to win our share in the nations pie through strong personal relationship. Instituions were there in British times, the subcontinent history has not example of institutions. So we will be dependent on individuals and their personal relationship. Some even mind that
A former deputy commissioner to Chitral Javed told a journalist during an interview published in this very online newspaper that “You can find very good servants in Chitral but finding an educated man is uphill task”.
Chitralis must accept that they don’t speak good Urdu which could be judged from their gulabi Urdu. Even those bashing the prime minister are here think they are very good at English but in fact their English is as weak as Nawaz Sharif. Some even claimed of being highly educated but they English he had written was completely opposite.
It is fact that Chitralis are good for nothing. They are just over confident.
I have a question for all those who are defending the PM’s derogatory remarks. But before that let’s not compare the PM with other leaders as he is not even in the race. The question is whether NS can ask the same question in Kohistan, Dir, Mardan, Charsadda or for that matter at any place with Pashtu speaking people in majority? Why he did this twice in Chitral? Once you give it a deep thought, you will also get upset and angry so please stop defending a man who doesn’t have any respect for you.
i am not surprised to see some of the writers trying their best to defend an un-defendable mistake. some say it was a bit of humour, was it? if so, that was a terrible piece. we do realize that we are not good at speaking Urdu but that’s fine because Urdu is our second language and second language has never got perfect with anyone in the whole world. just think for a moment, Pathans are much weaker than us at speaking Urdu or any other language. Does anyone remember MS or any other leader making test of their language skills. come on folks, don’t try to make fool of people, rather of yourselves. in fact, MS has never given respect to us Chitralis. he thinks we, who are from Chitral, are fools. and that’s why he is trying his foolish jokes at us every time he visits us.
also, many people argue that he announced mega projects of billion of rupees. i have two points here; first, these are just announced. we are well aware of what happens to such announcements. second, PM is not basically supposed to around announcing projects. for that there should be institutions which MS type of leaders never allowed to grow.
finally, i feel most of the defender writers are actually the associates and beneficiaries of our MNA sahib. these type of people never talk of common interests, they have to ‘Halal the Namak’. mr. hanif has been quite efficient to dig out Khatak’s speech. i agree with you that most of our brothers prefer to servants in down country. but make it a note that this is the result of the tireless efforts of your LOTA leaders, including your current one and his great father, who did not left any party to join for their vested interests but never tried to alleviate the poor conditions of fellow chitralis.
Mr Shamrez the older people recall that once Mr Khattak while he was the Governor of KP came to Chitral and addressing the crowd said that he knows the Chitralis very well. They are wonderful people whom he trusts. He said he has had four servants from Chitral!!! So dont blame MNAs and MPAs who if they do not do any other thing well at least speak Urdu well. Its the ordinary people who rush to work in the households in all the cities who give Chitral its name good or bad. We prefer to go and become a cook or a servant in Peshawar rather than working with our hands in Chitral. Peshawar and Islamabad and Karachi are full of people. Dont you see the way the khojas of Karachi treat our people of the north as second class citizens in their own institutions and dont we see every person asking for a Chitrali servant in Peshawar and Islamabad. From here they learn how we speak Urdu…….Bumba hey, the joke on the TV we all recall. Even Mr shariff thought it prudent to visit an ordinary Chitrali who worked in his house!!!!!
We should draw a balanced view of the PM,s joke about the standard of Urdu amongst the Chitralis. Here the bad luck goes to our political leaders,who on the first stage,can not speak Urdu well,leave alone fluency,although despite claiming high degrees and good exposures.These leaders are indicators of our culture and social milieu.Secondly,the people who are closely connected to the PM should have had briefed him, even not to use mild derogatory words as public resentment and reaction was witnessed in past too,when he joked about one crore.As far ZAB and BB shaeeds and Musharaf were concerned they are more cautious and groomed in interpersonal and communication skills.However,we should wait for the announcements of mega projects by the PM to be materialized.If got materialized then this would be a generosity on his part keeping in view his party poor performance in the elections and ill-treated reception given in the distant past.
Our brother Shams really gets things mixed up. Everyone gives credit to Pervez Musharaf for initiating the Lowari project. He was brave in initiating this project and kind to our plight. The project was estimated at Rs 7 billion then. The Chinese completed a similary project at Atabad in Gilgit in one and a half year. The Lowari project got delayed because Mr Gilani during his prime ministership diverted the funds to his home constituency. Mr Sharif was kind to release funds for this project on timely basis and in large instalments. Anyone who visits the project would acknowledge that. So while giving General Musharaf credits lets also salute Sharif for his contribution to the effort. The costs of this project is estimated at 27 million. The brother also gets his fact wrong when he talks about the mega project of road in Chitral. This project was built through a special area development project whcih was taken as a loan by the government of Pakistan from Asian Development Bank. There was no NGO involved in it and NGOs dont do projects of this size. The area development project was conceived by the government of General Zia to support the development of Chitral and it was a loan. As for the defence of Chitral lets not exaggerate our strengths. When the wicked Maulana of Swat had captured Swat with his so called Islamic movement one of the first to send him a message to come to Chitral were our leaders over here. We are so lucky the Pakistan army was moved into valleys stretching from Arandu to Boomboret which has protected us from the mad people residing in Afghanistan. We do not have a history of defending our borders except for a few tribes, the rest of us strongly believe whoever marries my daughter is my son in law and whoever takes my country is my mehtar.
Lot of politicians in Chitral seem to be licking their wounds. They did not expect the Prime Minister to come to Chitral to announce important projects. They want to manipulate the people of Chitral the way the local bodies election were manipulated using the money of the provincial government. Their chamchas cannot see success and are jealous of it. The biggest crowd in Chitrals history cheered the prime minister but these people trying to mislead others by twisting his words. Words always have a context in which they are spoken. Sadly for them the entire speech of the PM is available on the web so they cannot lie. But the Prime Minister was kind and generous in coming to Chitral and announcing projects for the people of Chitral. The people of Charsadda, Mardan, Upper and Lower Dir, Shangla and so many other have similar rights but through the enterprisng work of our MNA we have been able to persuade the Prime Minister to focus on our problems. The people who cannot understand simple jokes need to improve the quality of their humour. The Prime Minister appreciates Chitralis. A poor man works in his house and he has the generosity and kindness to fly to his house to thank him for his work.
BEHISTI KOE SOLIK CHEEZ NHI HE JO NAZAR AYE ,ISKO FEEL KIA JATA HE , YE US BANDE KI MINDSET KO REFLECT KR RHA HE , TV CHANNELS HAZARO PATHAN ANP PPP,PTI ,PLMN K LOG BAT KRTE HE ,PHATAN SAHAFI BT KRTE HE UNKI ACCENT DIFFERNT HE UNSE JO AHLE ZABAN HE , KHUD PANJABIO KI accent kafi different he karachi walo se , to kisi leader ko hum ne nhi suna k awam se aise khitab krte hue ..ye pata nhi khud ko kia samjte he tax choor . Waha pe mawjood logo ko kuch reaction dikhana chahie tha , giderl ki sow sala zindagi se sher ki ik din ki zidagi behter he..our jinko feel nhi horha he wo talian bajaye
Even if we agree that Mr.Sharif was trying to be witty, it was a very poor attempt. One can’t be humorous by hurting someone’s feelings and it hasn’t happened for the first time. Nawaz Sharif is famous for his disrespectful speeches in Chitral and that’s not acceptable.
I was expecting such a non-sense from him- and he came up with my expectations. This is the bad time we Pakistanis are passing through. Once our fellows in Punjab start using their brains, we will for sure get rid NS and company. This has now clear that even after 17 years NS has learned no lesson. I think most of him time is spent on thinking what to eat over the next table………no time to know about people, culture and all that. As musharaf said,at the end of his last address to the nation:” Pakistan ka Khuda Hafiz”.
This mistake is repeated for the second time, this is not the mistake of PM but is the mistake of those people who are associated with PMLN. Before his arrival, PM should be briefed about Chitral, its culture, education level etc. As we compare Chitral wit other districts of Punjab, it is totally different, PM should not compare Chitral with Kasure, Jhang, Pakpatan etc. We are poor people but we know how to get respect and whom to give respect. We never compromise our values for getting monetary benefits, PM should understand it clearly. If someone gives us respect we can maintain that respect for centuries, the live example is our association with Bhutto family and Pervez Musharaf.
After partition, Chitral state had decided its affiliation with Pakistan without any deal, similarly Chitral is a part of Pakistan, if any government official whether it is PM, CM or any party representative providing development fund for Chitral then it should be considered the right of the inhabitants of Chitral. PM should realize that Chitral has a long boarder with Afghanistan, since partition people of Chitral have maintained the security of boarder otherwise, like Kargil, government will spent million of funds to maintain the security in the boarder. On security point of view, Lawari tunnel is the need of the day, this tunnel has been initiated by Bhutto and Parvez Musharif, other parties are requested not to get credit of this project. If they have initiated and completed other projects in Chitral then the credit goes to them but till now no visible project has been completed in Chitral during the last 40 years as I remember. the only mega project is blacktopping of Chitral Booni road that was completed by an NGO. Can PM and other parties justify this step-motherly behavior with Chitral?
Actually Nawaz Sharif mostly interacts with some political leaders from Chitral, so his perception of the language skills of the people is a direct result of Urdu spoken by (some of) these local politicians and his commments are probably a reflection of the education of some of these Chitrali politicians.
SR Khan has rightly pointed out that his remarks about Chitral came after interaction with MNA, MPAs, district nazim as none of them are neither good at Urdu nor English.
Your write-up has compelled me to listen to prime minister speech, which I had actually missed. I did not find the speech as insulting as you have described it. The prime minister rightly said, when he came to Chitral twenty years ago no was able to speak urdu properly. Why cannot we accept it that we our urdu speaking skill are not upto the mark. There is no shame as we have our own culture and language and prime minister should not expect us to speak urdu eloquently as native speakers. I agree that prime minister’s rethoric on Chitralis urdu speaking skill indicates his lack of understanding of the area and its culture. Over all it was positive and I give him benefit of doubt.
If the Prime Minster cracks a joke, with his poor sense of humour, we mind it!!. We give no credit to the Prime Minister for announcing funds to meet our urgent needs. These funds could have gone to Dir or Laki or DI Khan. But they went to a District which has only one seat in NA.We raise our voice about the PMs joke but our righteous friend don’t ever feel ashamed for all the young Chitral girls being sold in name of marriage down country; we do not raise our voice where our only district hospital does not have even basic facilities; we do not cry when areas like FATA have seats in the civil services and our children have to compete to find a job; we do not cry when all our forests and mineral wealth goes away without any income to us; we don’t cry when Mohmands come and buy our best lands cheaply because we need the cash to meet our needs. We do not cry when for many years a Waziristani sat in Chitral as DC becausee of political connections messing our development projects. But we will cry when the country’s prime minister gives us respect and criticise him because we lack a sense of humour or our miserly because we can’t give credit where it is due
Agree with hanifmuhammad. PM was trying to crack a joke only. We should not make that an issue. Talk about other relevant issues.
How many Chitralis have far been able to make an appearance on tv talk shows with their fluent Urdu.? Truth is bitter.. It is true that we are not good at Urdu..gulabi urdu to hr koi bol leta hy bhai… The intention of pm was not to hurt us but was in a good humour…
Excellent brother your thoughts reflect emotions of all of us right now