There’s no smog. But they still shifted fourth-round of Quaid-e-Azam Trophy matches to Haripur, Swabi and Mirpur, after play was lost to something in Multan and Sheikhupura the previous round.
Either the batsmen were underprepared or their pitches, because you had some fantastic bowling, with two bowlers taking seven wickets, and two more five. In fact, in one match you had 15 wickets falling on the first day, in another 13, in another 17, in another 13, in yet another 18. There were three matches where the side batting first was not bowled out, but the weather did not allow more than 43 overs bowled in any. The only match approaching normality was where Karachi Whites made 341 for 8 off 71 overs, with Saud Shakeel getting century, against AJK, which is not one of the strongest teams. Karachi Blues made 144 for 8 against Dera Murd Jamali, which was bowled out for 50.
Of course, Dera Murad Jamali is the home district of the late Zafarullah Jamali, the first international sportsman to become Prime Minister of Pakistan (he was a hockey player, which might explain why the Dera Murad Jamali team is not doing that well).
The smog does seem to be worse than previous years, which gives weight to one of the explanations of the smog, which is that there are simply more people. Not just does more agricultural land have to be converted into concrete jungles for people to live in, but more fuel has to be burnt moving them around.
But all the strange things were not because of the smog. A KP policeman confessed the other day to helping the blast in the Peshawar police lines mosque which killed 84 people last year. He is living proof that if you give enough money, you can get anything done by the police. He took Rs 200,000.
Of course, that does raise the question of where the terrorists got the money to pay off the cops. And also the question of whether he was caught because he had been detected, or because he was being greedy about the money. In principle, he was supposed to pass up a proportion to his superior.
I wonder if the head constable and constables sacked in Lahore for taking bribes were dismissed for being corrupt, or because they had violated the chain of command. I’m sure that the sacked coppers felt aggrieved. I mean, if policemen don’t have the right to earn directly from the citizenry, why should they take up such a thankless career?
In the run-up to the Great PTI Rally, the question of whether VPNs are haram or halal came up. I found it interesting that the Ulema lined up according to their party affiliation, with the government’s CII Chairman saying it was haram, and Maulana Tariq Jamil that it was halal. Luckily, no one said it was farz (like you couldn’t go on the net without a VPN). Actually, haram’s opposite is not really halal. Harm means forbidden, like pork or carrion, but there’s nothing similarly compulsory about the halal. You can go a lifetime without eating beef, though it is halal. However, the farz is compulsory: you have to pray five times, for example. The omission of farz is haraam.
It seems that a more significant religious issue is Imran Khan’s walking barefoot in Madina, and the phone-calls that the COAS, Gen Qamar Javed Bajwa, received. This was revealed by Imran’s wife, Bushra Bibi, in her video message to PTI supporters to take out the rally. The government thinks it was the Saudi Crown Prince that is supposed to have made the calls, and that the PTI is trying to spoil relations with Saudi Arabia.
Imran said the interview was being misinterpreted. He would. He has to, or he would have a tough time of it when next she visited. If he didn’t, he would dread release more than the government. But he was struck by a double blow last week, as first Khalid Ahmed the veteran journalist, and then Nazir Junior, the international off-spinner and umpire, passed away. Khalid was Imran’s neighbour in Zaman Park, and may have played a bit of cricket with him, but Nazir and he played together for Pakistan.
He should have watched the Indi- Australia clash carefully, though, not because they’re the top two teams in the world, but because both are captained by pacers. Cummins of Australia is a long-term stand-in, until they find someone up to the job. And Bumrah is a one-Test stand-in. But Imran isn’t bothered if they gey onto the same page in their own counties. Do long she is left alone here.
