Marx, ‘Kelay’ and Khaadi

A boycott of fruits was organised by people on social media to target the richest section of society: The fruitwalas

The proletariat revolution is finally here in Pakistan, the masses has finally come together to defeat class stratification in the country by…boycotting fruit?

No more do people need to use fairness creams to defeat communism: their Marx says ‘no Marx strategy to beat Marxism will not work anymore’.

Karl Marx had envisioned a communist utopia but he never thought the way to reach out would be by not eating bananas – guess the cleric forbidding Muslim women from eating bananas was on to something.



A three-day boycott of fruits was organised by people on social media to target the richest section of society: The fruitwalas. These fruitwalas, who had amassed millions making an extra rupee on each fruit they sold, are like an Italian mafia; they always manage to make me a watermelon I can’t refuse. As Don Vito Fruitleone (played by Marlon Mango) said, “Mangoes is a dish best served cold.”

The latest 'Panama Leaks' show that fruitwalas in Pakistan have trillions stored in offshore accounts. All the money amassed by hard working Pakistanis in their air conditioned offices enjoying their inherited wealth was stolen from them by the elite rehriwalas. How dare the fruitwalas think they can be capitalists too? Who do they think they are? Good looking chaiwalas? If the fruitwalas really think they deserve more then why don’t they simply become beautiful looking and get a person with a DSLR to make their picture go viral?

If they can’t even do that, then they are simply lazy cheats who want to rob hardworking Pakistanis of their money. Pakistanis like shop owners who promise upon God that they’ve bought the item for Rs300 so they can’t sell it to you under Rs350, advertisers who’d sell you cancer if it made them money, politicians (need I say more?), construction businesses who mix cement with playdoh, industrialists who pay their employees in toffees instead of money – these are the Pakistanis who feel robbed by a price hike in fruit during Ramazan.



The deal struck with the British in 1947 was pretty unequivocal. The rich will stay rich and the poor will remain colonised. There was no talk of fruit. If we were to pretend poor people are human beings too then what was the point of owning a country and making all the effort to move?

The poor should be seen, not heard. This is why the support online for the fruit boycott has been unanimous. If the poor really did not support this protest, why weren’t they getting on their iPhones and laptops to articulate their opinion on food forums? The least the poor can do is use Photoshop to make fancy viral graphics to further their cause.

But not too much. It gets irritating when the poor people actually do something fruitful (pun intended). This is why I fully support Khaadi – they should not be made to pay more to their employees, it is a free world. If the employees feel they are being exploited, why don’t they do their A levels and open a chaiwala place in Defence to make money?

Look at how much business Khaadi will lose if people boycott it – it is not like Khaadi is selling fruits that you can easily boycott. Kurtas are highly perishable; if they don’t sell out fast then those designs may go out of fashion. Nothing happens to fruits if they don’t sell for weeks – so what if the fruitwala has already bought it from the market and now has to desperately resell it? The worst case: his family can eat all 96 bananas for dinner that day.

Khaadi workers demanding a liveable wage is so ludicrous. The owner of Khaadi should be celebrating for making billions – he has a right to set any price that he wants for his kurta. He is selling kurtas, not fruits.



Plus clothing is not an essential item, no matter what Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto said. If African tribes can live their lives naked then I don’t see why my neighbour screams when she sees me nude on my roof.

The protesters against Khaadi are simply looking to tarnish a brand – it is a target against the elite so it has to be motivated. If the poor felt they were being exploited then they would have said something for the past 200 years that they have lived under colonial conditions.

There is simply no evidence to suggest that Khaadi has committed any wrong doing but I am convinced that every fruitwala is a mafia boss because like Tinkerbell I just choose to believe.

 

This article is a work of satire.