When the
honking of the horns have destroyed your ear-drums, the smoke of the vehicles
and nearby chimneys have clogged your air passage, when the dust is successful
in bringing tears in your eyes and in the midst of all the hue and cry, if through
the haze and smog, you manage to see four red-brick minarets; you have set your
feet in Lahore.
Lahore, the
cultural and educational heart of Pakistan. (As it is primarily called.) The
city cannot stop itself from flaunting about its rich culture and history. The
old, weary and rustic walls of the old (walled) city narrate their happenings
with a bleak smile stretched across their faces; silenced by the tumult of
their inhabitants and their professions in the nearby vicinity, the walls shed
tears of despondency and hopelessness.
The city has
enfolded the mighty Lahore fort and the kaleidoscopic Badshahi and Wazir Khan
Mosques within its realms, who narrate their own legacies to thirsty eyes and
craving ears.
Apart from
the awe-inspiring structures the city hosts within its realms, the city is also
home to perhaps the most horrendous aristocratic love story of all time, the
anecdote of Prince Salem and Anarkali. As legend states; their love still lives
in the hearts of the lovers who flock to Anarkali’s mausoleum on Lower Mall.
Not too far
away from this dome of love, Lahore unfolds a narrative from a different era; “The
Age of the British”.
From the
Lahore High Court to the archives of the Lahore Museum, from the Government
College to the once bustling Tollinton Market, each structure on Mall Road
introduces itself from an anomalistic retrospective, mutually sharing and
keenly holding onto their anecdotes of the British Raj.
As once,
mighty and enlightened the people of this city were. Lahore, with every passing
day is losing its literati essence.
The city
which was once famous for its gardens and was nicknamed ‘The City of Gardens’
in the Mughal era, now resembles a dumpster in the crass era of commercialism;
so lovingly given the moniker: ‘Paris of the East’.
The rain
which brought life to the flora and fauna of the city now brings death to its
inhabitants.
A city which boasted about its ‘educated’, ‘enlightened’ and ‘learned’ masses in now governed by a gang of charlatans. Educational institutions which promised a secure future have now become a base camp for student politics and a picnic spot.
A city which boasted about its ‘educated’, ‘enlightened’ and ‘learned’ masses in now governed by a gang of charlatans. Educational institutions which promised a secure future have now become a base camp for student politics and a picnic spot.
It is rather
saddening to be a witness to such a heinous crime: the death of a nation’s
culture, norms and values, all because of our ignorance.
As Imam Ali
(A.S.) said:
“Our enemies
are not the Jews or the Christians, our enemy is our own ignorance."
