While the affair between Hina Rabbani Khar and Benazir Bhutto’s son Bilawal might be a bit of a surprise to the outside world, many people who move in the power corridors of Pakistan have been privy to this news for some time now. While Hina’s high profile ministerial position makes it difficult for her to go on shopping trips with her lover in London and Switzerland, these visits have happened in the past.
Such secret rendezvous in places like London or Dubai is reminiscent of India’s first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru’s late night meetings in London with Lady Edwina Mountbatten, the wife of the last British Viceroy of India, Lord Mountbatten.
If Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari’s son does decide to quit public life in Pakistan and retreat to private life in Switzerland and the estate in Surrey in the UK, he would be following in the footsteps of Edward VIII who abdicated from the British throne back in 1938.
This affair is definitely not an outlandish concoction like the link-ups between JFK Jr. and Diana, Princess of Wales. This is more like the affairs President Kennedy had with Marilyn Monroe and others during his time in the White House.
With the unpredictable nature of Pakistani politics, and the massive wealth accumulated by President Zardari – not to mention the time he has spent in jail and Benazir’s assassination– Bilawal might well decide that the game of politics and democracy in Pakistan is too risky and not worth risking his young life for.
With the timetable set for the withdrawal of US forces from Afghanistan, Afghanistan is more likely than not going to turn more radical including the possibility of the Talibans regaining power.
The US will likely help the Pakistani armed forces keep the Pakistani Islamic radicals in check. The Army is no friend of the Zardaris.
All this make it quite likely that Bilawal and Hina might prefer the life of private citizens in familiar surroundings in Europe and America which is probably where they feel more at home than the Islamized Pakistani society.
As a young man in his early 20s, Bilawal might prefer to spend time with his lady love, someone he is really smitten with, rather than the heat and dust of Pakistani politics.
Bilawal might argue to himself that there’s time yet for him to become a devout Muslim – no need to sacrifice all the good things in life from such an early age.
Hina Rabbani Khar is not a sub-continental version of Diana since she has already accomplished a great deal in her own life and she’s not a shy 21-year-old girl. One could argue she is more like Grace Kelly. But Ms. Kelly left her Hollywood career behind when she became Princess Grace of Monaco. It remains to be seen if Hina Rabbani Khar will renounce public life. Hina could either follow in the footsteps of the Bollywood heroines of yesteryear such as Sharmila Tagore, Dimple Kapadia, Nitu Singh and others left their movie careers after marriage or she could have a political career of her own like Hilary Clinton.
Also, old Bollywood actresses are now all making comebacks. So the old rules may no longer be valid in the 21st century.
