The prime minister had a point there when he made a sarcastic dig at the critics of motorways by saying that how can those who fly in chartered planes understand the importance of roads? May one,however,ask him a simple question . Isn’t he too sailing in the same boat? Doesn’t he too fancy travelling in choppers and chartered planes? Can a pot call the kettle black?
Whenever those political leaders who prefer flying instead of travel by road are asked why don’t they drive instead their pet answer is that it saves their time.
Time was when the rulers used to travel by train from Peshawar to Karachi and also address wayside gatherings at the railway stations that were located in the route along the way. Railway travel has now gone out of fashion.
One remembers many former governors of the KPK travelling by road during their visits to tribal area and,mind you,they used to visit every tribal agency twice a year which kept the road maintenance division of the C&CW on its toes. They also used to carry out surprise inspections of the under-construction developmental works .
Monitoring and supervision of developmental projects seems to be the things of the past. The revenue administration in the country has also gone to the dogs because the rulers have involved the district revenue collector and his subordinate revenue staff in unwarranted extraneous protocol duties with the result that the system of checks and balances has gone haywire because the senior revenue officers don’t find time for their duties.