KARACHI - Newly-crowned Chicago Open squash champion Farhan Zaman was given a ‘special’ gift by Pakistan Air Force (PAF) Director Sports Group Captain Shahid Nadeem, who without even thinking for a while, terminated the services of Fakhar Zaman, father of Farhan Zaman, who was serving as squash coach in PAF, Peshawar on a meager Rs 15,000 monthly salary, citing poor performance by the coach.
How such childish reasons can be presented for such a coach, who has helped his own son from nowhere to top during his initial training. There were a lot of complaints against Director Sports in the past too, even visiting journalists from Islamabad got rough treatment from the same gentleman, when they were in Peshawar to cover the CAS Open International Squash Championship recently.  Despite number of complaints lodged to squash legend Qamar Zaman Khan, no action was taken against Shahid. Instead of honoring Fakhar for his brilliant work, Shahid decided to settle scores with the PAF coach just for personal hatred, but the timing was not right at all, as at a moment when Farhan was performing exceptionally well, he was given a timely reminder by the director sports.
Who will be held responsible if Farhan, who is already fed up from the long-standing misbehaviour and rough treatment, finally decides to call time from playing for the country and settles down abroad? This decision of Farhan can spell disaster for the country, as there are hardly any player left in the country, who can match his pace and a certain rise on the PSA ladder.
Sharing his views, former world squash champion Qamar Zaman, who is also president of KPK Squash Association and vice president of PSF, termed the incident as highly regrettable and totally uncalled for.
“The guy was sacked just because of personality clash. In the past, I had requested the PAF high command about the rude and humiliating behaviour of director sports, who even stopped my entry to Hashim Khan courts, which was later restored after high commands’ interference,” said Qamar. “If a person like me is not safe from such treatment then how can it be possible for others to even think about any positive or satisfactory response from Shahid Nadeem,” the PSF vp added.
Qamar said: “Farhan is very bright future of the country and real hope of winning the PSA events, just like he did by winning the Chicago Open. But he had complaints against the director sports in the past and he was fed up with routine mistreatment rendered to him. Now his father is sacked, any hope of his change of heart is almost over. If he stays back and opts to take foreign nationality, which is very much on cards, no one else but director sports PAF will be held responsible for that grave crime against the country,” he concluded.