The Press Club
Had I the courage to save it, to stand against such blind faith of people, he thought looking at the tree with disappointment. Finally he took steps towards the wooden main gate of the press club, as he entered; he was greeted by the young receptionist, who was rolling his moustache upwards. He walked towards the spiral staircase and walked towards the library of the club, he lit a cigarette and kept walking slowly, he was greeted by Najeeb, the curly haired tall reporter of a Sindhi news channel, the reporter smiled at him and said in low tone:
“Dear Nazeer read your article, you articulated it very well.”
“Thanks dear,’ Nazeer replied nodding his head and walked in to the library, it was one big hall containing cupboards filled with books, two large wooden tables containing different newspapers and magazines, and there approximately twenty chairs around the tables, many of them were empty. The pale skinned thin librarian, who had a mole over top of his nose sat in corner and his eyes were in the monitor. Nazeer sat on chair without bothering anyone and picked up the newspaper, he worked for and browsed throw the Op-Ed page, actually he wanted to recheck his piece, he knew many times his pieces were censored without any reason, in one go he browsed the article and felt relaxed.
Yesterday he had to fight with his editor to publish the story he had got, his editor Naseem, a fifty-five year old pot-bellied and half-bald guy with thick glasses was not willing to publish the story as it could create a mess by religious groups.
“You always fish in troubled waters,” the editor commented reading the intro of his story.
Nazeer had sat beside him and lit a cigarette, since Naseem was his close friend and it was he who had brought him in the publication, Nazeer kept aside office mannerism when he was with him and said:
“I want tea.”
The editor called the office boy, whose teeth were red because of chewing tobacco and wore an earring that shined, and these were the two things Nazeer hated most about the Afro-Asian boy, when he came the editor asked him to bring tea, he nodded his head and left silently.
Naseem started reading the piece:
“Yesterday as per routine I reached the Press Club, some religious minded journalists were talking about Night of Destiny and praying from God to shower His bounties upon them for the entire year. Round about 4: 30 pm, I was out of cigarettes, and came outside to purchase a packet, it was a hot day, I started to walk on the black road, suddenly I stared towards the berry tree and found that it was surrounded by a group of people, I thought some people have come for protest for fulfillment of their demands, and walked towards the store on left hand of the road thinking I would ask them about their problem after I’ve got my cigarettes, as I returned, I found a lesser crowd now and cursed my fate. However, I witnessed that one among them was fetching leaves from berry tree and giving it to others, I had no idea what the hell they were doing, this carried on for some ten minutes and now it was unbearable for me to resist this stupidity anymore, so I walked towards the group and asked them what they were doing?
One standing just beside me who had a goatee beard guy me a horrifying look as though I had made some kind of blunder and replied rudely:
We are gathering berry leaves for our bath, according to our religious tradition whosoever would take bath with berry leaves on the eve of Night of Destiny. God would forgive all his sins.
I was petrified by the answer as well as the looks of that thin goatee beard fellow; he spat red liquid of chewing tobacco between my legs and cried to the guy on top of the tree: Now move to the next branch.
I left those insane people and walked back towards the club, I was totally mesmerized, when I heard a journalist shouting on his photographer: Go bring berry leaves for me before the tree is bald. I looked towards the guy; he was Amin, the bureau chief of Sunnah, a right-wing publication. I negatively nodded my head showing my despair and walked towards the Cards Room, where some of my like-minded journalists were playing a hand of flash.” The office boy had interrupted them, as he started to put tea cups before the two, Nazeer immediately picked up his cup, while the editor carried on reading the story:
“Amir Akram (a secular scholar) in his book “The Right Way” writes thus: It is your belief that decides how you see the world, your belief dominates your personality, and it is your belief that motivates you to show your positive or negative attitude towards other human beings. If we critically analyze history or turn pages of newspapers, we would find that the root cause behind mass murder of humanity; is some kind of a religious belief. Human beings have always used words like: God, paradise and salvation for their vested interests. You can’t be logical and rationale before belief. People with religious beliefs won’t accept your logical and rationale explanations, whether they understand them or not. Since the very beginning there has been a war between logical thinking and religious beliefs, as logic is light and belief is blind….” the editor stopped reading and said:
“This is way too much hard, and the last portion directly hits beliefs of people.”
“So….!” Nazeer exclaimed.
“I won’t publish it,” Naseem replied straight forwardly, the answer stunned Nazeer, he wasn’t excepting that answer and that too from his dear friend, who knew him very well.
“Why won’t you publish it?” Nazeer asked lighting another cigarette.
“I am privileged to do so as an editor,” he again spoke plainly, this again came as a shock to Nazeer and he saw Naseem with an open mouth.
“Naseem you have always fought for the fucking freedom of press,” Nazeer astonishingly cried and puffed the cigarette; the editor didn’t give a reply.
“For our entire lives we have struggled against the motherfucking censorship and now you are self-censoring me,” Nazeer said angrily, he almost shouted, the editor gave him a weird look, Nazeer without caring about his looks carried on saying: “we were baton charged, lashed and jailed for freedom of expression during the worst dictatorships, yet we wrote whatever we wanted and now in this democratic period you are fearing that some goons would attack your office…” Nazeer’s mind was not accepting editor’s such behaviour.
“To fuck with your freedom of expression,” this time Naseem cried in anger: “don’t forget we live in a country where a governor of a province is shot to dead by his guard, just because he wanted to reform blasphemy laws, and the very person who killed him became this nation's hero, he was greeted by rose-petals, go out in the streets and you would find a murdered journalist every other day laying in pool of blood like a stray dog….. You and your fucking freedom of expression….” the editor’s entire body was now shaking, he spoke again this time in lighter tone:
‘Look Nazeer, I’ve daughters who go to university, I don’t want some motherfucking fundoo throw acid on their faces, I simply don’t want to ruin their lives because of this holy shit called freedom of expression or the free press.”
As the editor paused, there came silence between the two, Nazeer silently puffed the cigarette for the last time and threw the butt on floor and meshed it with his right foot, he stood up from the chair and said with a sigh:
“In that case my dear editor I resign from journalism.” Naseem looked him with a blank face, and then trying to defuse the situation spoke again in low tone:
“Try to understand Nazeer, a fire of hatred might erupt after this piece.”
“In that case I would be the first person to jump in that fire,” Nazeer said looking straight into Naseem’s eyes. The editor sat back on his seat and meekly said: “ok I am publishing it.” This had brought a smile on Nazeer’s face.
After browsing his piece in the paper, he hailed courage of his editor, who had hardly edited anything from the piece, he stood up and left the library and came into the conference hall, he found his tall and slim photographer Faraz sitting in the corner, his bony face showed signs of fatigue, as he saw Nazeer enter the hall, he became attentive and came to him, before even Nazeer could find a place for him to sit, Faraz said:
“Sir, I want leave today.”
“Why?” Nazeer asked surprisingly.
“Sir, was unable to sleep yesterday because I was praying whole night,” Faraz replied yawning.
“That’s not my fault,” Nazeer replied without showing any emotion, the tall skinny photographer knew he won’t allow a sick-leave to him and without saying anything he went back to the corner where he was sitting.
It was a bright and sunny day, at 2:00 o’clock Nazeer came to the canteen and had just asked for the lunch, as shouts from outside came:
“To hell with such non-sense journalism,
Stop hurting sentiments of people….
To hell with Nazeer…..” the shouts shocked everyone at the club, the photographers who were standing outside ran into the club thinking the club has once again come under attack by some fundamentalists, as they reached inside the club, the old watchman hurriedly closed the main gate. Reporters and photographers came into the balcony and watched the crowd increasing by every minute, some young guys with white turbans on their heads started burning effigies of Nazeer.
Three months ago, some religious fundamentalists had attacked the Press Club in the same manner, they were claiming that the press was working for the Jews and American interests as it had not given coverage to their hero, who had cold bloodily murdered the governor in the day light, when he resumed his duty to protect him from any kind of threat. For several hours journalists where taken as hostages by those religious goons, they had stoned the building, broken into the club and damaged the property, yet no case was filed against anyone.
“Nazeer Ahmed, you swine come out….” came a cry from outside: “we won’t leave till you come out Nazeer Ahmed.”
Najeeb, the reporter of Sindhi TV channel came running to him; he was out of his breath when he tried to speak.
“Nazeer, please leave from escape door, the secretary is making calls to law enforcing agencies.” Nazeer looked at the reporter with blank face.
“Don’t waste time, come on… hurry up,” he said collecting his breath. Nazeer totally lost his mind, he had no idea what to do and just followed the reporter with curly hair. Nazeer had just set his foot from the door, when someone shouted from the balcony:
"Look there is Nazeer Ahmed, he is escaping from the backdoor." This brought an alert to Nazeer and he looked towards the balcony, he saw his photographer Faraz pointing a finger at him, Nazeer witnessed a smile of mockery on Faraz's face, he saw the crowd rushing towards him and left himself upon the mercy of merciless mob that was shouting:
"To hell with Nazeer Ahmed...."
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