Aslam Azhar: the godfather of PTV

2015 has been a treacherous year, with Pakistan losing several luminaries one after the other and the last among recognised ones being Aslam Azhar's the uniquely endowed God-father of Pakistan Television, besides the great losses of men in uniform laying down their lives to ensure security of their fellow countrymen against the mad spree of terrorists targeting innocent citizens.
The year began with Justice Rana Bhagwandas (Retd) passing away in February, Ada Jaffery in March, Lieutenant General Ehtesham Zameer (Retd) a former DG ISI in May; novelist Abdullah Hussain in July as did Mujahid-e-Awwal Sardar Abdul Qayyum . Lieutenant General Hameed Gul (Retd) departed for the hereafter on 15th of August while only a day later Colonel Shuja Khanzada (Retd) the Punjab Interior Minister was targeted by mercenary forces, Abdul Hafeez Peerzada breathed his last in September while Justice Javed Iqbal (Retd) left us in the month of October, Makhdoom Amin Fahim and Jamiluddin Aali in November, Kamal Ahmed Rizvi in the second week of December and now Aslam Azhar the moving spirit of Television in Pakistan leaving us in the dying moments of the last year.
It was the year 1956 when in a House of Commons style debate in Government College Lahore the great alma mater of the time for many, I first saw a young man walk into the Hall from its grand door at the rear opposite the dias from which the speakers against and for the motion were taking turns. A hush went through the spine of the gathering because the young man was known to unnerve and confound many a speaker with his incisive points of order and information he barraged upon them. This was Aslam Azhar the elder son of a pre-partition Indian Finance Service officer A.D. Azhar who was a thoroughbred Punjabi as against the son whose resounding English language accent one thought was largely due to his Cambridge schooling, but very few might know that he owed this facility to his father who he said actually taught him phonetics of the language. This of course saw him as the leading English Newsreader of Radio Pakistan on the National Hook-up in the days when Edwards Carapiet was his compatriot.
That was just the beginning of an illustrious career of a man who after graduating from Government College Lahore, had to go to Australia in the middle of his Masters because of his father's posting. He nevertheless soon went to do his Tripos in Law from Cambridge, but never practiced it saying that his teachers did not inspire him enough to take up the profession. However, because of his intellect, Aslam was quick to be spotted by multinational Companies and first joined BICC and then Burmah Oil in Karachi when he met Nasreen an adorably serene girl at that time, and eventually went on to marry her in 1964, a year which became memorable as Aslam Azhar with his natural flare of the language caught the fancy of the powers that be and was picked to head a team of four toiling men to take up the challenge of setting up Television in the country.
Starting the exercise in a pitched tent office within the premises of Alhamra, which eventually came to house the present day Punjab Arts Council in Lahore, Aslam Azhar. Fazal Kemaal, Zaka Durrani and Nisar Hussain all of whom are now gone, huddled together in the hut and within months produced a blue print for what was then styled as the Promoters Company Pilot Project; the promoters being the Wazir Ali's. November the 26th 1964 became the landmark day when Field Marshal Mohammed Ayub Khan inaugurated the project and heralded the advent of television in the country. The service that ensued soon confounded the critics who had termed TV transmission a luxury for a poor nation like Pakistan as the pilot project concluded successfully and the promoter's Company was proudly converted into an autonomous body styled as Pakistan Television Corporation Ltd, which became the fore runner of the proliferation of mass communication technology in South Asia.
Aslam Azhar with his passion and zeal became a mentor for many as a TV professional as he led by example, and from a scratch raised Pakistan Television to unmatched heights as long as he lasted. He was a sucker for professional discipline where he made no compromises, but was an inspiration for those who considered the sky as the limit. "We are the missionaries of this age," he used to say, and like most speech writers added to ZAB's public expression as his address to the nation was adorned with the phrase as he inaugurated the new premises of the Lahore studios in 1973. The saying stays inscribed at the entrance lobby of the premises.
Aslam Azhar was a theatre buff and drama particularly Shakespeare's touched his soul, so much so that during the early live television years when once producing Julius Caesar sitting on the panel he himself played Brutus, he left the panel unattended to do his bit in front of the live camera on the wheels wielded by the unmatched Nisar Mirza, and returned to complete the single camera production. His television team he proudly and fondly termed a family, was indeed an emblem of the missionary zeal he ascribed to it, and only those who saw those miracles actually happen can testify how in a span of 25 or 50 minutes when a canned foreign film was aired, the sets of the previous live programme was knocked down, the next one put up and lit, and the participants made-up and ready to perform. This went on for well over a year, all without a hick-up and I am talking of Lahore studios, which were located in a temporarily built borrowed space within the Radio Pakistan premises.
Only the few who were close to him knew that Aslam who with his liberal outlook was not actually what he seemed. He was born of a multi-dimensional personality of A.D Azhar, who being a finance expert, was also a poet and a well humoured person. He was not only proficient in Urdu, Arabic, Persian and English but had authored and compiled a very popular book titled "Lazzat-e-Awargi." He was a deeply religious person, not in the traditional mould but embedded in the culture and traditions of his ancestors. And that Aslam was an independent soul with his own personality cult, owes it to the fact that A.D. let him float free and find his wings.
Aslam who was never shy to express himself frankly when forced to, did exactly that when once presented a book by someone through his elder son. As days later he asked his father how he found the book, he said, "Rubbish; complete rubbish." That was Aslam, and you ought to be ready to take what comes because you asked for it, and I loved his occasional outbursts such as this one. A debator and orator par excellence in his younger days, the more he progressed in years he withdrew within himself and became an introvert, as he neither challenged others nor forced his opinion upon anyone as he took to explore mysticism and Sufism besides reading extensively ranging from Astrophysics and ancient civilisations to the theory of relativity. And just when I had planned to pluck the courage to probe into him as soon as he would get well enough after his accidental fracture of the leg, he quietly ditched us all.
May his soul rest in peace as he leaves behind an adorable wife Nasreen Apa, as we all call her, Osama his elder son an Information Technology man in whose voice he has left his own image, Arieb the second son who inspired by his father's bent for Sufi verse is a songster of the Sufi mould, and Umaima a lovely special daughter. Nasreen sitting besides Aslam's body that fateful night on phone with a mourning friend said, "I don't know how I will live without this man". Sharp comes Umaima chuckling innocently to her friend standing beside her, "Man! He was her husband."
(The writer is a veteran media professional, analyst of political, social, cultural, Television and film industrial issues. He can be reached at email:[email protected])