Changed thinking
by
Javed Hafiz |
Pakistan’s wealthy families are in the march to progress
In 1960’s, Dr Mahbub Ul Haq, a known economist, said that much of Pakistan’s wealth was concentrated in 22 families. The common man thought that by eliminating or reducing the wealth of these families, his plight would dramatically change. That did not happen despite nationalisation undertaken by the PPP in 1972. This exercise did please the diehard leftists but left deep wounds on the economy. The consequent flight of capital was massive. Most of the well known entrepreneurs like Saigals, Dawoods and Habibs opened businesses abroad. This brought the impressive development of the Ayub Khan days to a halt. The readers may recall that in 1960’s Pakistan was cited as a model developing country.
Within a couple of years Dr Mahbub Ul Haq’s thinking completely changed. In his book, Strategy of Economic Planning, he argued that high rate of investment was key to economic development. High level of investment could be achieved by higher savings. In the socialist system, like former USSR, higher savings could be achieved by the state as it controlled the entire economy. In free economies, savings were voluntary. The entrepreneur and the common man saved due to explicit incentives like high profits or interest rates. His revised argument was that income disparities actually increased savings. In socialist as well as free economies, people had to sacrifice by restricting present consumption for future prosperity.
It took Pakistan years to restore investors’ confidence. Had we avoided the nationalisation blunder, Pakistan would have progressed much more. But that is being said with the benefit of hindsight. Way back in 1972, I remember I had actually not foreseen the horrible consequences of nationalisation. India never committed the mistake of scaring away its Birlas and Tatas and they have contributed handsomely to the Indian economy. In fact, some of the Indian entrepreneurs are now in the international league. But for nationalisation, this would have happened in the case of Pakistani entrepreneurs as well.
The Daily Times, an English newspaper of repute in Pakistan, has published a list of 10 richest families in Pakistan.
According to this list, the Nishat group of companies headed by Mian Mohammad Mansha, has the highest income in Pakistan. His group owns 30 large companies including the Muslim Commercial Bank. Mian Mansha is originally from Chiniot, a small city in central Punjab, which has produced so many business magnates. The traditional business of the well known Sheikhs of Chiniot was leather. They later expanded to the textile sector and now they are all over. No wonder three of the richest families in Pakistan today are from Chiniot. The other two are the Crescent group and Monnoo groups.
In the 1960’s, most of the richest businessmen and industrialists in Pakistan were based in Karachi. That is no more the case. Since 1986, when the law and order situation in Karachi started deteriorating, the capital started moving up north. New industrial units were set up in the vicinity of Lahore, Sheikhupura and Faisalabad. This list of the richest 10, includes only one Karachi based group, the house of Habib. I do not know why it leaves out the Dawoods, the Haroons, the Lakhanis, Arif Habib, and Haji Abdul Razzaq Yaqoob (ARY). It is a matter of record that the house of Habib had given the Quaid-E-Azam a cheque of Rs80 million in 1947 for the new state of Pakistan. This was a huge amount then considering that the Koh-e-Noor textile mills in Faisalabad (then Lyallpur) was established with an investment of eight million rupees in 1948. This amount will barely buy a small residential plot today!
It is noteworthy that two of the 10 richest families own media empires, the Jang group and the Nawai Waqt group. This shows that the media business is now a lucrative industry too. Both of them are into electronic media as well. The Jang group owns the famous Geo channel. The Nawai Waqt group has launched its own TV channel called Waqt.
The latter group has done well despite the fact that they are conservative and would not compromise when it comes to ideology of Pakistan. Their channel does not show any jazzy music or vulgar entertainment. The late Hameed Nizami, the founder of Nawai Waqt group was a student leader in the Muslim Students Federation, a student body that played active role in lobbying for Pakistan in 1940’s.
Education is now a big business in Pakistan. The list includes Syed Babar Ali of the Packages who also takes credit for establishing the Lahore University of Management Sciences (LUMS), an institution of international standard. One could argue that the list is not one hundred per cent accurate but it is not totally off the mark too. It includes one family from the NWFP —the Saifullas, — and one from Balouchistan — the Hashwanis. Significantly, no feudal lord is included in the list.
Javed Hafiz is a former Pakistani ambassador to the Sultanate.
Oman Tribune
|
Other comment for Javed Hafiz
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| NEWS UPDATES |
|
|
|
|
|
|
