Who Owns Pakistan - Yimg
Who Owns Pakistan - Yimg
Who Owns Pakistan - Yimg
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Chapter Three - How they make MONEY<br />
"There is no business in <strong>Pakistan</strong> today which can be run without<br />
paying bribes to the ministers and secretaries".<br />
Yusuf Haroon.<br />
Bulk of the wealth today owned by 22 families was grown on govt trees, rooted in<br />
bureaucratic corruption and fertilized by tax evasion, bulk loans, rebates and a bit<br />
of sweat and tears of the founding fathers.<br />
The leaders of Karachi-based businessmen today, the Khojas, the Memons and<br />
the Isamaeelis are particularly a far cry from the great achievers of the Gujrati<br />
communities described by Dwijendra Tripathi, as " exceptional men, with extra<br />
elements (of) that touch of talent, preservence and ability which made them what<br />
they were".<br />
Lawrence White fond in 1974 that the fortunes of the 22 families had resulted<br />
from a combination of "ability, initiative, influence and luck" rather than any extra<br />
elements. But it was G M Adamjee who spoke out a great truth when he said that<br />
creation of <strong>Pakistan</strong> was " like the gold rush in USA" that opened new<br />
opportunities for Muslim businessmen of the sub-continent, catapulating several<br />
of them to the commanding heights of the <strong>Pakistan</strong>i economy."<br />
This is exactly how biographers of Rockefellers had described his success to "<br />
random collision of a man with an opportunity, as if a door had stood open for a<br />
brief historical moment and Rockfeller who just happened to be passing by,<br />
managed to squeeze in before it closed". To use the analogy of Rockefeller's<br />
biographers, 22 families were thus produced by a collision of an opportunity in<br />
history, that was <strong>Pakistan</strong> with a class of businessmen who just happened to be<br />
around when the door opened or when the gold rush took place.<br />
But among the founding fathers of the 22 families, one can not fail to spot<br />
towering personalities like M A Rangoonwala, C M Latif and Yusuf Saigol who<br />
would have left their imprint on the sands of time, even if the collision of history<br />
and opportunity had not taken place. If one was to weigh, present-day members<br />
of the 22 families, on the scales of that touch of talent, perseverance and ability<br />
that abounded in their forefathers and " the combination of ability, initiative,<br />
influence and luck", found in them by Lawrence White then perhaps only few of<br />
them, Nasim Saigol, Syed Babar Ali and Razak Dawood might deliver few<br />
ounces of these ingredients.<br />
But there are no rag-to-riches stories, no self-made men," trained in the sternest<br />
but most efficient of schools called poverty" and almost all of them inherited<br />
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