Whenever a country is facing some serious problems and if the Government in power consists of well meaning, intelligent and sincere persons then they can always find ways and means to overcome these problems if not fully then at least to the extent of survival of the country and its people.
While watching the conditions in Pakistan today on account of the present recession in the country which is actually a result of world-wide phenomena and as a result of this the slow down of economy and the money market the business and industry has badly suffered. There are industrial units and banking companies if they are not closed down then they had to cut down their activities substantially with the result of that they were forced to cut down the strength of manpower and so number of unemployed persons has increased and there are no further jobs available and if nothing is done then there would be rather it has started happening that there will be starvation and even suicides on account of starvation. Now is the time that the Government must use all its resources and improve the situation and here will come the will of the Government otherwise every-thing whatever our ancestors had attained will be lost. The best way is to cut down all unnecessary expenses rather all expenses and divert these funds for the well-being of deserving masses and help the starving unemployed persons by way of employment to provide them help by way of providing jobs so that their self-respect may remain intact.
Now thinking in retrospect that in the recession of 1930’s the reigning Government in the sub-continent had expected this recession much earlier and had already planned that how to solve the repercussion which will arise when the catastrophe sets in. So the first action they took was that they started constructing buildings and repairing the existing network of the roads in the country to provide the jobs to each unskilled labour and in a next step to provide jobs to each skilled labour they started repairing and renovating the existing Government buildings which were already in a dilapidated condition in addition to this there were number of revenue offices and Police Stations which were either in the rented premises or a make shift arrangement in such cases they started constructing new premises. They were very conscious that the cost should remain at the minimal level and keeping in view the country’s financial resources and the availability of the building material, so only two items were used burnt brick and a paste made of lime stone, gypsum and silica sand all of them were available in abundance locally the material was in the shape of boulders and to crush them. A circular hole was dug in where it was crushed by a heavy wheel of stone which was rolled over and pulled by two bullocks and in this water was poured continuously so as to make a paste of this material.
Years of experience has proved that this paste which was used instead of cement has proved in certain cases stronger than cement as all the ancient buildings and even some of the strongest forts are built by the same material which are still in a perfect condition like Red Fort Delhi and Agra and all through India the forts and old buildings are built with the same material. So this material was used to built the walls and even the plinth was laid the same way and the sealing were of wooden beams and those wooden beams were also connected to each other with these burnt bricks and with the strength of this material the entire constructed area of the sealing was in a way become one piece so unbreakable.
Then on the 2nd stage they made arrangement for the young educated boys they evolved a scheme called “Zaid Ameen” as on account of procession farmers had also suffered like any other profession as the agriculture products were not getting the right price in the market and so some-times even the stocks remained with the farmers unsold. Under these circumstances the condition of farmers was such at the harvest time that neither they could buy the seed nor manure so it was necessary to save the farmers and to keep them going an institution of Zaid Ameen was created to finance the deserving farmers to provide loans to finance their requirements and this loan was called “Taqavi” and to distribute this loan was the job of newly created Zaid Ameen’s and this job was for a short period of 3 to 4 months and then they were re-employed after again at the time of harvesting the crops and when it was ready for marketing so the next time when the job was again given to them was for the purpose of recovering the loan. So these Zaid Ameen had a job for 6 to 8 months which made it very economical and with this money they could survive the whole year as those were the times when the most important thing was the survival rather with this amount one could live comfortably for the whole year as the living was very cheap and usually people lived in joint families.
In addition to the above another scheme was devised being called “Alwzl system” that means all Government or semi Government employs were entitled for one month leave in a year which was called earned leave and for that one month another person was employed temporarily. The system for employment was very simple that as the Government for employment off and on called applications for permanent jobs where only a few were selected from the list of unsuccessful candidates which was always available in their records and instead of spreading money on new advertisement they picked up an Aiwzi candidate from that list and so most of the people got employed from those lists for 3 to 4 months at least in the year and I remember very well that even for this Aiwzi jobs there was always a rush. Actually those were such times and the commodities were so cheap particularly eatables that even these meager amounts of short time employment were considered a God sent opportunity.
And in this case the most important part is that the general public had so much confidence in their rulers that they rightly realized that the Government is doing its best to accommodate a com-mon man. When it happens than the Japanese who will naturally be the allies of Germany so they will join hands with him and in this position the Eastern border of India will be very vulnerable for the Japanese bombers. So the Indian Government started constructing chain of airports in Eastern UP, Behar, Bengal and Assam. So that in such eventuality they may block the way of these bombers to reach in the depth of India while in the process of constructing these airports the Government needed lot of man-power. Apart from laborers, clerks, officers, engineers, and in such large establishment even the doc-tors and nurses for dispensaries which were established on every site of construction so by 1937-38 there were hardly any person left without a lucrative job.
As expected the World War started in 1939 in Europe but later on after the Japanese invasion on Pearl Harbor the Japanese also declared war against the allies.
Immediately on the start of the world war the Army needed every-thing including the food items, clothes, and shoes etc so the demand of these commodities was so large that even in a large country like India which was a place of abundance in these commodities the existing resources started being in short supply, so immediately to avoid the profiteering and hoarding by the business community the Government of India started procuring every commodity and made it mandatory for the suppliers and producers to sell it only to the Government, which they proportion-ally allotted for the supplies to the Army as well as for their newly adopted “rationing system” for which they opened rationing shops in every locality and all eatables like wheat, flour, rice, sugar and pulses were available according to the requirement of every family and for this purpose a survey was conducted throughout India and every house of the sub-continent together with the number of occupants was recorded and each head of the family was issued a “Ration Card” with complete details of its occupants with their names, ages and gender and particularly they saw to it that the commodity is available on the same cost as these rationing shops as before the start of war, and these ration shops were opened in every area and any time of the day with in that week the weekly ration could be purchased. Though however ration was provided to each person according to his requirement so it was limited but enough to survive, so there was no impact and no increase in the prices and in this way they avoided any inflation.
As the war lingered on more and more commodities were included into rationing system including clothes and particularly the petroleum products which was the primary need of the Army and air force so rationing system on petroleum products was the strictest of all the commodities and particularly for the car owners every month the coupons to buy the petrol were issued to the car owners and only against the coupons they could buy petrol enough for their requirements of going and coming to office and going for shopping once in a week and there was no other way of acquiring the petrol. Though however some people who were not using their coupons they sold their coupons to other needy per-sons but to sell the coupon by itself was a very hazardous job as if you are caught then buyer and seller both were sent to jail and the only way was that they used to give their petrol coupons which was for sale to the petrol pump owner who could sell that coupon to some of his trusted customers who needed the additional petrol for a car and then that customer could buy the petrol against that coupon. Luckily there were no names or car numbers on those coupons so once it was in your possession it was your property. So the Government in power had more or less made the system full proof and the most interesting part was that inspite of these difficulties and shortages the controlled prices remained on pre war level. As I have already mentioned that the petroleum products were the worst hit commodities but inspite of this they neither increased the price of Kerosene oil nor they put it on ration, because electricity was not available in every city or town rather even Where it was available it was for street lightening and on the shops in the market but only 10% houses had the electrical light and the biggest source of light at night was kerosene lamps which were available in the market in shape of hurricane lanterns. People also used petromax which again was consuming kerosene oil.
But the road transport and busses were the most important transport for travelling from one city to another and could not survive on the rationed petrol, so all of a sudden we came to know that a new gadget by the name of gas plant is installed in the busses it had cylindrical shape and like a30 gallon water geezer and was operating on the power used was coal fire it was fitted at the back of the bus by cutting a cavity in the body and on a bracket underneath as it may not move or fall down.
I do not think it was any form of high-tech, as I have seen it being fabricated in some of the make shift workshops near the bus stands where only 5 or 6 people were working. I think it was also not expensive because if I am not wrong its total cost was about 400 or 500 rupees which actually in those days was a substantial amount and so the road transport kept on running as efficiently as ever. Apart from road transport, the railway was also so efficient and every passenger was so much important for them that at every station where the train stopped, the cleaners used to come to every compartment to clean and wash the bath rooms with disinfectants and at every railway station the water tanks of the bath rooms were filled with water. The quality of food and other eatables were of the highest quality better than what was avail-able in the market. The refreshment rooms at every station were of such quality that some people always invited their special guests in the railway refreshment room. As every railway station had their refreshment rooms one of European style whose contractors were Killners and all Muslim non vegetarian con-tractors were Easa Brothers and the refreshment rooms of vegetarian food at every station had a different contractor and Dining Car of the train was of such a standard that sometimes people used to travel only from one station to another to dine or to have their luncheon in the Dining Car. Apart from quality of furnishing and servicing, the quality of food was of the highest standard. The trains in those days had the steam engines and the fuel used was coal again so there was no pressure on any petroleum product either on buses or railway engines.
Sometimes I think that in a period when technology was on the basics and had not reached any high tech stage a gas plant could be produced by a road side iron smith shop then while today why we cannot produce on the same technology, bigger gas plants to meet the shortage of electricity in the country as far as coal is concerned, it is the fuel we require is in abundance in Pakistan but again it depends on the will and vision of the reigning Government. Considering the gas plant system introduced in the p1939 and 1940 to meet the shortage of petroleum products.
I don’t understand that when in 1939-40 the British Government could take such constructive steps for the well-being of the people and the country why our Government cannot use the experience and vision was showed by the foreign rulers of the country. Now as we are facing all sorts of problems in generating of electricity and prices of petrol which has become out of reach for even the well to do people and as it was proved that the gas plants were as successful as they kept the entirenet work of bus sys-tem throughout India efficiently and economically being operated. So now with so much technology as is available today why they cannot produce bigger gas plants to feed our electric generators rather to pro-duce electricity as the Government in power is so disappointing then the private sector can come forward and solve these problems.
While we are not taking advantage of visions shown by the British Government in solving every problem we can atleast copy their actions as far as infra structure I can name a few who can immediately start producing gas plants i.e. Heavy Mechanical Complex, Taxila, Pakistan Steel Mills Karachi, Machine Tool Factory, Karachi and Pakistan Special Steel Factory of Karachi plus a large number of high-tech factories situated in Gujranwala and Lahore and some other places of the country in private sector. Now it looks a simple matter to beat the shortage of electricity is that there are several electrical units in the country which are right now closed down on account of non avail-ability of fuel so for every factory a large gas plant can be fabricated locally and provide fuel to the closed down electricity producing units and these units can provide enough electricity to meet the shortage. As I have mentioned above it should not be any problem to get these plants operating with this simple technology. Unless projects of producing gas plants both the Government and private sector will have to come forward and take up the job of producing gas plants seriously. As for the Government it takes a long time to make a decision, but the private entrepreneurs after the decision can immediately start work.
As I was explaining during the war time the affluence in farmers and labours community on account of higher wages and better prices for the agriculture products. So it was not only confined to the above mentioned class rather the big contractors were becoming bigger than ever plus the demands were so high for the army suppliers that to meet their dead line to fulfill their contractual obligations they had to use sub con-tractors to produce for them and so even these sub-contractors became very affluent and ultimately entered into the category of big contractors.
In addition to this just to cater, a large number of foreign forces who were staying in different cantonment areas all around the country, as new cantonments were also constructed for them. For example in Karachi right now, the main cantonment area is Malir, it was built for the American forces and this was happening all around the country. To cater their daily needs as well as for their entertainment, number of restaurants, coffee shops, bars and night clubs popped up. Shops of all consumer goods also emerged in addition to the existing shops. I remember that all these outlets whether it was shops, restaurants or night clubs were over crowded by the customers. All inter-national currencies particularly Pound, Sterling and US Dollars, more or less became a legal tender together with the rupees. There were a large number of communities like Anglo Indians and Goaniese through out India who were not very well off. Americans and British forces found their company as more congenial. The night clubs, bars and restaurants were all seen ever crowded by Anglo Indian and Goaniese girls in the company of British and American soldiers.
As regards the utility of petroleum and gas plants, how it can be usefully adopted by us. Now I will continue and adopt with the use-fullness of food rationing. As I already explained, it had been a marvelous scheme for rich and poor both. It was so successful that in Pakistan it continued up to the period of 1970. I do not know why we discontinued it. And instead of it introduced the most inefficient and corrupt system of utility stores. In India the rationing card system is still continuing. They have expanded the scope of utilities to supply in the ration card, un-grinded wheat flour, sugar, rice, pulses and kerosene oil on ration card. Now the vision of the government of India is that when people started complaining about the quality of wheat flour, they gave them an option to buy wheat flour or ungrinded wheat. Another very important factor is that, poor people of India mostly use kerosene oil stoves for cooking. They also included Kerosene oil in the scope of rationing.
Another very big advantage of ration card is that India has a record of every house in the country, including total number of family members. As they are also recorded ages, gender even they also recorded those people who are living in the remotest areas of the country. Without ration card, they can not get their food requirements. The ration card in India is also used as Identity card. In this way, India can correctly calculate number of people living in that country. After doing this exercise, they do not require population census. Every new born and deaths are immediately added or subtracted in the ration card.♦
