A staged drama?

Pique Magazine, April 2013

@AbidSherAli: “Ask your mom if I am burden? She will say hell no.” 

The social media, much like Forrest Gump’s life, is like a box of chocolates: you can never tell a good one from a bad one just by looking at the instructions on cover. Actually you can, but Forrest Gump was ‘special’ and hence did not know better. We in Cyberistan refer to these bad Kinder eggs as ‘trolls’. They are usually anonymous and have very little in the way of a real identity, choosing instead to hide behind monikers such as ‘StoodUpForChange’ and ‘Out_to_kill’. My personal favorite is ‘Tsunami786’, an obvious homage to the terrible power of the Almighty that inflicts natural disasters such as the PTI upon us. But I digress.

The hallmarks of a textbook troll are:

1.     An inability to conduct a civil conversation

2.     A reliance on slogans and empty rhetoric

3.     An unyielding sense of moral certitude

4.     An unflinching belief in the power of their political/religious system

5.     A tendency to descend into trash-talk rather quickly

Such sociopathic qualities may qualify any normal human being for a psychiatric evaluation. However, it’s all fun and games as long as their identities are anonymous and there’s no physical harm being done. After all, public figures and celebrities have to put up with a fair amount of unfair scrutiny, criticism and abuse from sad, anonymous folk as it is. However, it is a different story altogether when the source of that abuse is a known entity. All pretense of normalcy flies out the window by the time that you discover that the troll is actually a prominent figure and, up until recently, the holder of a very high public office.

Cervantes’ greatest work

Enter Abid Sher Ali, or Sher, as he likes to identify himself on Twitter. Rambunctious, pugnacious and vicious; the Sher is a vehement Noon Leaguer and a (now former) member of the National Assembly from the Punjabi heartland. Sher rose to prominence as a self-styled vigilante, a Quixotic figure charging the windmills of corruption, wherever he found them. His political allegiances and in his capacity as chairman of the house Standing Committee on Education, it was a little obvious whose windmills he would be charging.

Ancient history

In 2009, he picked Farrah Dogar, the daughter of Mr Abdul Hameed ‘Stricken-From-Judicial-History’ Dogar, as his first victim. Daddy’s girl had her heart set on going to medical school. But the evil examiners at the Intermediate Board did not see it that way. Like any ambitious little girl, Farrah went to daddy for help. He leant on a few cronies at the Inter Board, who called in the ruthless examiners, gave them a good talking to and told them to mark Farrah’s papers correctly. Our hero singled out Ms Dogar because she was a soft target tied to a big fish. The controversy dragged on for nearly a year, and many a talk show host and newspaper columnist, especially National Conspiracy Custodian Ansar Abbasi, made hay with the allegations and the media circus that ensued.

This is not all. The next year, the Don chose to play More-Literate-Than-Thou and using his brand new MBA from the Punjab University (Pakistan’s most credible degree awarding institution), decided to open the can of tapeworms known otherwise as the Fake Degrees Case. Yes, the same life-changing  event that yielded hits such as Degree, Degree Hoti Hai! by the Fresh Prince of Raisani and DJ Dasti’s Love of the Common People. Many expected the lion to go as red-faced as Rudolph the Reindeer when it was eventually discovered that most of the offenders actually belonged to his party. That, sadly, was not to be. And one by one, all fakers were shown the door.

So far, you might think that this chap sounds like a stand-up guy. And he would’ve been too, had it not been for his penchant for shooting right from the hip. You see, Punjabis have never been really good marksmen. Which is why the predominantly Punjabi army has been unable to hit a single key militant hideout in over five years of fighting in FATA. But they find the officer’s clubs and messes with the grace of a vampire bat, bouncing sonar off treacherous mountainsides in zero visibility. But that’s beside the point. The key thing you must remember here is that the right honourable Sher is from Faisalabad.

Faisalabad and the great Punjabi tradition

Often dubbed the Manchester of Pakistan, Faisalabad is known for exporting two things: textiles and jugtain. The former are globally marketed products which earn millions in valuable foreign exchange for our GDP, and the latter earn the intended target a fair bit of ridicule and the assailant a good laugh.

For generations, the people of Punjab have been using the art of jugatbaazi to cut the more arrogant down to size. There are those who think this practice crass and vulgar, but the fact is that hundreds of thousands of people across the country buy, rent or steal CDs and DVDs of Punjabi stage dramas. In fact, Punjabi stage dramas are a big hit around the world as well.

It starts with the mannerisms and the appearance. One can wax poetic about the state of the victim’s hair and look for resemblances with disheveled farm animals. One can also explore the possibility of cross-breeding, at which point the entire family tree gets dragged in to the discussion. Then the discourse descends into the fantastical and hypothetical world of interspecies matchmaking.

Thinly veiled barbs regarding virility and spousal satisfaction levels are traded and a winner is declared based on the perceived length of one’s manhood after the first thirty-seven salvos. This is not much different from the old days, when kite-flyers would yell observations about their opponents’ wives and sisters’ characters across rooftops. In such cases, the unmarried, only-child is the automatic winner.

Jugatbaazi does not require a degree in rocket science. Just a razor sharp wit and a way with images. One of the greatest exponents of this art, Tariq Teddy, also hails from Abid’s hometown. Once the scourge of the stage drama circuit, his on-stage rivalry with the late great Mastana was the stuff of lore.Other famous comedians from Faisalabad include Rana Sanaullah and Raja Riaz – the Heckle and Jeckle of the Punjab Assembly. But unlike stand-up comedy, which is hard work, you don’t need research to indulge in some good jugatbaazi. In fact, the more outrageous the quip, the heartier the laughs. Needless to say, no one escapes with both their honour and manhood intact.

Man against the world

Anyone who owns a TV set has probably seen the maestro in action at one time or the other. A thorough ladies’ man when on TV, the Sher turns on his charm. The likes of Kashmala Tariq, Sharmila Faruqi, Fehmida Mirza and even the late Fauzia Wahab were all too familiar with his wily ways. On Twitter too, the Sher’s colourful character (unrestrained by censor laws) flows as freely as diarrhea. To date, the Sher has dubbed Fawad Chaudhry a canine, Mubasher Lucman a purveyor of loose women, Altaf Hussain a primate and has been continuously asking Imran Khan to work on his “no balls”, whatever that’s supposed to mean.

The right honourable gentleman from Faisalabad makes it a point to refer to the inferior genetic makeup of most of his detractors, often asking them to check their parentage and boasting about having had relations with their mothers and sisters. He has also volunteered to “fix” many, including women, leading casual observers to believe that he may have a motor workshop and spare parts racket on the side somewhere.

But not everyone appreciates the Sher’s comic genius. Zainab Jameel, one of the pretty faces on the primetime satire show Khabarnaak, recently complained that Sher was “mannerless… and mentally sick”. The fact that she regularly shares the screen with four of the most uncouth Punjabi stage comedians in the industry today should not throw you off. Sher’s misogyny is a class apart.

Recently, with the mushroom growth of pretty young things in news anchor slots, the Sher has taken to prowling the timelines of the likes of Geo rookie Rabia Anum and SAMAA veteran Nida Sameer. He is also known to spar with Dr Shahid Masood, Mansoor Ali Khan and Gharida Farooqi. It’s not always pretty, but it makes for entertaining reading. Phrases such as “Listen don’t make me squeal you like a pig. And I will” are pure gold. But the Sher reserves a special space in his heart for that most dou number of talk show hosts, Mubasher Lucman. One-time Twitter chums, Lucman and Sher are now arch-rivals. Their contempt for each other is matched only by the contempt the early Bond villains had for all things MI6. Indeed, the Sher makes potty-mouth Lucman seem tame in comparison.

Too good to be true?

When the account first surfaced in late 2012, many were skeptical about the authenticity of the Sher’s identity. Most dismissed it as a phony, but some followed it in silent horror. Over the course of the last few months, it has slowly started to sink in: this is The Real AbidSher Ali. Sources within his party confirm that not only do the tweets come straight from the horse’s mouth (or smartphone, as the case may be), they are stomach-churningly hilarious and provide a steady stream of entertainment for party workers and spectators alike.

What has been most distressing, however, is the rate at which Sher is taking down women. By early March 2013, statistics collected by various fake accounts showed that Abid Sher Ali had offended nearly 73.4 percent of all women on Twitter, as far afield as North America and Europe. This is a very disturbing trend, especially for eligible bachelors who support the Noon-League. Pretty soon, feminists and normal people will be starting Change.org petitions against the Lionheart of Faisalabad and will seek to have him removed from the public eye.

Such forces cannot be allowed to succeed. In today’s world of political correctness and diplomacy, where nobody’s shit stinks, there no one tells it like it is anymore. Sometimes, trapped in the utopian social media bubble of tranquility, people lose sight of ground realities.

Once among the sea of accepting voices, we forget that out there is a sea of piranhas, bottom-feeders and wolves in lion’s clothing. Abid Sher Ali serves as a reminder of all those things and more: he keeps us in check. One day, in the not too distant future, mothers will tell their sons cautionary tales of the man who had no respect for women, children or the elderly.

They will tell of a politician so outspoken that he talked his way out of parliament. One day, not too far into the future, we will reminisce of an outstanding statesman whose ego (and mouth) wrote checks his party couldn’t cash, and had to pay the price for. Someday, they will write of Abid Sher Ali, the greatest stage artist to ever come out of Faisalabad. I just hope that I’m still around to set the record straight.