THIS IS MY STORY—38
MY JOURNEY THROUGH THE ERA OF AYUB KHAN TO THE TIMES OF IMRAN KHAN.
GHULAM AKBAR
The Structure Of Kohistan
My Uncle Nasim Hijazi was Chairman and shareholder of 30% shares. Enayatullah Sahib was Managing Director. Among other directors were Hameedullah Sahib, Mian Rasheed, Raja Zauq Akhter, Murad Khan Jamali, Aslam Khan Jamali and Khan Wali Khan. I was to be added to the Board of Directors in the subsequent months on Enayat Sahib’s proposal.
The paid-up capital of the company was Rs 250000/- only During the expansion period through which the newspaper was passing, the additional required funds were provided by Mir Murad Khan Jamali, Mian Rasheed and Khan Wali Khan in the form of loans. The company had also acquired a substantial loan from PICIC to import printing machines from Germany. Kohistan in fact was the first newspaper of the country to shift to offset printing process. I think the first colour picture in a Pakistani newspaper too was published by Kohistan.
Let me state here that it was in that period that Hameed Nizami Sahib had passed away, and his younger brother Majeed Nizami had flown from UK to take over as Editor of Daily Nawai Waqt. Rivalry between Kohistan and Nawai Waqt had been intense before Kohistan sprinted away from Nawai Waqt’s reach in 1962.
Kohistan had begun to be regarded as a direct threat now to the supremacy of Mir Khalilur Rahman’s Jang which had knocked out its old rival Daily Anjam from the competition.
It was the 10th of April 1962 when soon after lunch our Consul Cortina left Lahore.
We had a stop for that night in the office of Kohistan Multan. Naseer Awar was our Multan’s Resident Editor, and my cousin Khalid Nasim Hijazi was stationed there as incharge of the newspaper’s newly installed press.
I remember Khalid’s sarcastic remark to me that night.
“You have been bought over by Enayatullah, Akbar….”
I was stunned by his unkind words. It was infact the first time that I came face to face with the under-currents of conspiratorial rivalry underneath a seemingly smooth veneer.
The late Khalid Nasim Hijazi as the eldest of the great man’s sons regarded himself understandably a logical heir. And even though we had been friends from our childhood, he wasn’t happy at my instant rise in the cadres of management.
It was unfortunately he who in the months to follow was to sow the seeds of discord between Mamoon Jan Nasim Jijazi and his old friend Enayatullah.
“Khalid,” I replied to him after a short pause. “Rest assured I will never come in your way. But you are utterly wrong about Enayat Sahib. If Mamoon Jan is the spirit of Kohistan, Enayatullah is the brain. I have known him for only few months, but I can tell you, he is Mamoon Jan’s most loyal friend. He has chosen me for this job not because I have any blood relation with him but because I belong to his best friend’s family, and he rightly or wrongly believes I have the guts to meet the challenge head on.”
