he name of the book is Who Owns Pakistan (1998), and the writer is Shahid-ur Rehman, who also penned three other books: Long Road to Chagai (1999), Pakistan: Sovereignty Lost (2006) and Pakistan: The Reckoning Begins, published posthumously in 2023. Shahid Bhai (as we used to call him) deserves some introduction.

An introduction is in order because many from the young generation of journalists across Pakistan do not know or don’t remember how many outstanding journalists we have lost just in the last five years: Ahfaz-ur Rehman, Anil Datta, IA Rehman, AR Shamsi, Farhad Zaidi, Khaleeque Zubairi, Saleem Asmi, Shahid Hussain, Shahid-ur Rehman, Zain-ul Abideen, Ziauddin, and some others. Some might disappear in history. Those likely to stay longer managed to compile and write books that will guide us for decades.

Ahfaz-ur Rahman’s Sab say bari jang, translated as Freedom of the Press (2017), IA Rahman’s Pakistan under siege (1990), and Farhad Zaidi’s collection of columns Rait peh likha (2006) are some of the books that will remain useful for a long time. Shahid-ur Rehman was an exceptional journalist who reported on economic and financial affairs and kept meticulous notes for reference. He began his career in 1971 as an economic reporter for Pakistan Press International and then became bureau chief of Morning News, Karachi. He was a correspondent for Kyodo News Agency of Japan in Pakistan and a stinger for Nucleonics Week covering the nuclear industry and proliferation issues. He received commendation from Kyodo for coverage of 9/11 and an interview with Gen Pervez Musharraf in 2005 about the transfer of nuclear technology to North Korea by Dr AQ Khan.

His first book, Who Owns Pakistan, is a study about the concentration of wealth in Pakistan. It was published in May 1998. Long Road to Chagai is a history of Pakistan’s nuclear programme that appeared in May 1999. He also worked on various assignments for McGraw Hill, Asia Week, North-South News Agency and the International Herald Tribune. With Ziauddin sahib, he was a lynchpin of the Senior Journalists’ Forum in Islamabad, which regularly met in the library of the National Press Club. Sadly, after the death of the two in quick succession, the Forum itself appears to be dying a slow death.

Shahid Bhai was a kind-hearted gentleman. He encouraged all his juniors and was always ready to share his insights with others. He was incredibly hard working. He was working on his book Pakistan: The Reckoning Begins when he passed away in April 2020 at 74. He always had a pleasant demeanour and a smiling face. One cannot recall other journalists – apart from Zameer Niazi sahib – who kept such meticulous record of their work.

Who Owns Pakistan tells the story of Pakistan’s economic woes over the decades, especially during the 25 years from the nationalisation of industries by ZA Bhutto in 1972 to the privatisation mantra of Nawaz Sharif till the late 1990s. Shahid-ur Rehman researched several aspects of Pakistan’s economic policies and complemented his insights with interviews of leading industrialists, cabinet ministers who had served in various governments and government officials who had contributed directly or indirectly to the decline of Pakistan’s economy.

Shahid-ur Rehman documented details of the ethnicity of top business and industrial families from the 1950s and ’60s to the late 1990s. He wrote about how various businessmen from Aga Khani Ismailis, Bohris and Kathiawari Memons to Chinioties, Gujratis and Lahories transformed the business landscape of Pakistan. A detailed chapter deals with ZA Bhutto’s nationalisation programme and how this nationalisation subsequently changed the political environment in the country, resulting in change of fortunes for Bhutto himself. The business people and industrialists had no love lost for the prime minister when he faced a major challenge from the right wing that had tacit support from the establishment under Gen Zia-ul Haq.

The book’s main thrust is that the nationalisation affected the investment decisions of business people and industrialists who were no more interested in the country’s long-term development other than moving abroad to protect themselves and avoid more losses at the hands of an unpredictable state. Shahid-ur Rehman tried to quantify the impact of nationalisation on the 22 families that benefitted most from privatisation later on. He maintained that some ‘nincompoops’ ensured that nationalisation and privatisation failed to deliver their desired results.

Shahid-ur Rehman was working on his book Pakistan: The Reckoning Begins when he passed away in April 2020 at 74. The book was published three years after his demise.

The stated objectives of both nationalisation and privatisation looked good on paper. However, the way the respective governments carried them out and the petty interests of business people; civil and military bureaucracy; and politicians contributed to their failure, ultimately affecting the people of Pakistan. He also held the taxation policies and systems responsible as those created distortions affecting the long-term prospects of institutions and organisations. These policies also created opportunities for corruption at all levels and in most spheres of the society. The book explains how the rich made money in the first fifty years at the cost of other citizens.

The importance of the book lies in its success in providing a perspective to ordinary readers on the causes of the economic nightmare Pakistan has been facing ever since. There are many books available today on the economic history of Pakistan, but most of them have an academic audience. This book is mostly for the lay person who may be interested in understanding the salient features of Pakistan’s economy without engaging with the jargon. For example, the chapter, Pakistan’s Economic Saga and 22 Families, explains in simple language how some prominent families at the time of independence managed to acquire a strong foothold in the newly created state and how, within 20 years, they captured the bulk of Pakistani business fortunes.

Shahid-ur Rehman also collected data on the divisions in the 22 families after Bhutto’s nationalisation spree. The divisions were a tactic used to appear smaller in the eyes of the state and the general. When Gen Zia initiated privatisation, the relevant business people took full advantage of it. In a way, the book is also a catalogue of the corruption that marred the privatisation process. It names many beneficiaries from Mian Mohammad Mansha and Nawaz Sharif to the Hashwanis.

His account of the privatisation of bank is particularly startling. The author holds that the government manipulated the process to deprive the previous owner, who was also the highest bidder. The chapter on the rise of the Chiniotis is also interesting.

The first section of the book concludes with the role development finance institutions have played and how the Central Board of Revenue, now the Federal Board of Revenue, helped them in their less-then-transparent dealings to benefit certain quarters. The Corporate Law Authority is also taken to task. The second section of the book is about the people the author calls Pakistan’s robber barons. In this category, he includes some major business groups such as Nishat, Saigol, Crescent, Deewan, Ittefaq, Chakwal, Saphire/ Gulistan, Habib, Packages, Atlas, Hashwani, Dawood, Monnoo, Fecto, Lackson, Fateh, Bawany, Schon, Dadabhoy, Rupali, Colony and Adamjee.

Pakistan: Sovereignty Lost angered the then prime minister Shaukat Aziz, who told Shahid Bhai, “But we have regained sovereignty.” This book is more concerned with the debt conundrum. When it hit the stands in 2006, there was some talk of sovereignty regained by the incumbent Musharraf-Aziz regime. However, Shahid-ur Rehman contended that the claim was a myth and a ruse. He had started working on the book in 1999, immediately after Gen Musharraf mounted a coup and promised a turnaround of the economy. The 250-page book says Pakistan lost its economic sovereignty bit by bit. It says the process started when, immediately after independence, it sought economic assistance from the United States. The process continued when Pakistan received one million tonnes of wheat as food aid from the US. Interestingly, India to got two million tonnes of wheat under the programme.

The book claims that the then foreign minister Zafarullah Khan led Pakistan into SEATO without the cabinet’s approval. There are some interesting details about Gen Ayub offering the Badabair facility to the US and asking for more loans. It says after ZA Bhutto’s failed attempt for economic independence, Gen Zia took Pakistan to a point from where it became harder to extricate Pakistan.

Pakistan: The Reckoning Begins is an expression of the author’ anger at what he calls the wilful mismanagement of the energy sector in Pakistan. The book begins with an account of the rise and fall of Asad Umar, who assumed charge as federal finance minister under Imran Khan. The author says Asad Umar mismanaged the ministry and left it in a worse situation.

The book begins with the discovery of gas in Balochistan in 1952. It says gas reserves were depleted without substantially benefitting Balochistan. There are also chapters on how hydroelectric and nuclear power could not end the country’s energy woes. Perhaps the best part of the book is about the role various lobbies and cartels have played in the energy sector.

Shahid Bhai lived a full life and contributed tremendously to the body of knowledge about the economic history of Pakistan. His son, Arslan Shahid, has managed to publish it three years after the demise of his father.

The writer is a columnist and an educator. Mnazir1964@yahoo.co.uk; @NaazirMahmood