THIS IS MY STORY—54
MY JOURNEY THROUGH THE ERA OF AYUB KHAN TO THE TIMES OF IMRAN KHAN.
GHULAM AKBAR
The Rise Of Mashriq
Looking back 52 years into the week when Daily Kohistan was virtually re-launched after a ban of forty days, I can’t help feeling some measure of satisfaction over the way we succeeded in regaining a lot of ground that had been lost to Mashriq. Though we never reached our peak of eighty thousand copies a day after the jolt we had received because of the ban, both Sheikh Hamid Mahmood and Mamoon jan Nasim Hijazi were jubilant at the results our hard work produced in the wake of Mashriq’s onslaught. Mashriq was decidedly a superior newspaper. It had the advantage of being in ‘ Jahazi size’. This phrase was coined to promote Mashriq through posters and all other available means of advertising. The second advantage Mashriq had, was in the number of pages. Mashriq readers were getting 12 pages of quality reading material in ‘Jahazi size’ for 20 paisas——the same price as that of Kohistan in 8 pages of smaller size.
Still we went ahead of Mashriq in not many days, and stayed ahead for months to come despite the conspiratorial atmosphere that had suddenly been created by the grumbling of some directors close to Mamoon Jaan. Mian Rasheed and Raja Zauq Akhtar were in forefront of sowing the seed of discord in the new setup that had been established after the exit of Enayatullah Sahib under the pressure of these directors, Mamoon jan was reluctant to appoint Sheikh Mahmood formally as Managing Director. For such an appointment it was necessary that he be awarded qualification shares and directorship.
I suspected even at that time, and my suspicious were proved right later, that my cousin Khalid Nasim Hijazi was somehow behind the move to get rid of Sheikh Hamid Mahmood.
I suddenly realized that I was not only witnessing but also was a part of a power tussle in the country’s second largest circulated newspaper.
As Sheikh Hamid Mahmood was relying heavily on my capabilities and support, he was unconsciously annoying those to whom my rapid rise in the newspaper hierarchy was very nearly a nightmare.
