From the high vantage of my Eyrie, the eagle’s nest perched atop the F-10 Markaz plaza, the city looked like a world preparing to submerge beneath the approaching darkness. A heavy night was falling, spreading deep charcoal tones across the Margalla Hills and casting long shadows over the bustling commercial square below. Up here, the chaotic noise of evening traffic softened in the cool air, becoming a distant, rhythmic hum.
Inside my rooftop retreat, the stillness of dusk deepened. The final ribbons of twilight vanished from the western horizon, while neon signs and streetlights flickered awake below, piercing the gathering gloom like scattered artificial stars.
Outside, my “foxy” [mustard-yellow Volkswagen,,] rested quietly beneath the evening sky, its familiar silhouette a reminder of the ordinary world beyond the solitude of my rooftop retreat.
Yet my thoughts were far removed from the city’s nightly spectacle. I remained captive to a vivid dream that had shaken me that morning—a dream in which I entered a quiet sanctuary, only to be unexpectedly recognised as a Syedzadah, a descendant of the Prophet’s blessed lineage. What followed was overwhelming: desperate souls fell at my feet, seeking prayers, comfort, and direction.
The shock of that collective reverence had remained heavy in my chest throughout the day. What did such a dream mean? Was it merely the mysterious theatre of a sleeping mind, or was it a reminder of the burden that accompanies the trust people place in another human being? The thought unsettled me. Reverence can intoxicate the unprepared; responsibility can crush the unworthy.
A familiar, gentle chime interrupted my reflections.
BāBā-Tāl, my tall, thin, sharp-eyed dervish guide—the Bell-man—had arrived. The tiny brass bells on his navy-blue robe whispered with every measured step. His blue jeans were torn at the knees, loose threads dangling above his joggers, bearing the imagined dust of countless caravan trails. His deep-set eyes, framed by a weathered face and a thick beard and moustache, carried the strange stillness of someone who had watched centuries pass before his eyes.
He did not ask permission. He stepped inside, switched on the light, and settled beside the two freshly poured mugs of steaming tea.
I looked into the dark amber of my cup and shared with him the emotional weight of my morning’s dream. I spoke of the reverence, the desperate faces, and the fragile realisation that a profound spiritual responsibility might be demanding my attention.
BāBā-Tāl listened without interruption.
The studio grew quiet. Steam rose from his untouched mug like a silent offering. Through the western window, the ancient Margalla peaks stood against the fading blue of the sky. His bells gradually fell silent.
He did not look directly at me. His gaze seemed to travel beyond the room, beyond the hills, into a time not yet born.
When he finally spoke, his voice was low, measured, and grave.
“Bacha!”
He paused.
“The Supreme Power in the heavens does not consult the calendars of men. We cannot dictate when a responsibility will arrive, nor can we know the full meaning of every dream. But remember this: when a trust descends upon a human being, it is not a decoration to be worn. It is a burden to be carried.
“If your heart is being prepared for service, prepare it for sacrifice. If your pen is being called to speak, prepare it to speak truth. If people ever look towards you for guidance, do not mistake their desperation for proof of your greatness. Their need is not your coronation. It is your examination.
“You may be broken by the weight of that responsibility; you may be melted by its heat. But if you emerge with compassion, humility, and justice, you may become useful to those who have nowhere else to turn.”
He fell silent.
I looked into his eyes. They were no longer merely the gentle eyes of a wandering dervish. They were fiercely serious, carrying the imagined weight of millennia—the look of someone who had watched empires crumble into sand and human vanity outlive the monuments erected in its name.
He spoke again.
“Bacha, prepare your heart, your mind, and your pen. If the hour ever comes when you must serve, serve without the hollow vanity of modern kings. Remember the Four Rightly Guided Caliphs—not as a title to borrow, but as a standard of justice, accountability, simplicity, and duty. The pride of Islam is not the pride of a man who demands that others bow before him. It is the dignity of a faith that commands him to stand for truth, protect the vulnerable, and answer for his deeds.”
His words settled into the silence.
I followed his shifting gaze towards the western window. Beyond the rooftops, the Margalla Hills watched over Islamabad with the ancient indifference of mountains that have seen generations of rulers rise and disappear.
And suddenly, my private dream opened into a public question.
Why do the masses run blindly towards anyone who promises them a miracle? Why do people, exhausted by injustice and deprivation, fall at the feet of those who claim to possess extraordinary powers of deliverance? Why does a nation repeatedly search for a saviour instead of demanding institutions that protect its citizens from the very need for one?
Because there is a famine of wisdom in the palaces of the earth—and, too often, a famine of justice in the corridors of power.
From the political capitals of the West to the shifting sands of West Asia, and across the troubled landscapes of our own region, leadership is frequently manufactured, packaged, marketed, and implanted from above. Political engineering, privileged networks, propaganda machinery, and the invisible ropes of influence can elevate individuals before the people have had a genuine opportunity to judge their character or hold them accountable.
The puppets dance beneath metropolitan spotlights; the powerful congratulate one another; the compliant celebrate the arrival of another chosen face. Meanwhile, the grassroots wither.
The ordinary citizen pays the price.
The labourer waits for wages. The farmer waits for a fair return. The young graduate waits for employment. The mother counts the coins needed to feed her children. The taxpayer watches public wealth disappear into privileges that he could never afford to imagine for himself.
And then, when the system begins to collapse under the weight of its own arrogance, the same people are told to trust another manufactured saviour.
This is the tragedy of leadership imposed from above: it asks for reverence before earning trust and demands obedience before demonstrating competence.
The Qur’an offers a radically different moral compass. Allah declares:
“Indeed, Allah commands you to render trusts to whom they are due and when you judge between people to judge with justice.”
— The Holy Qur’an, Surah An-Nisa, 4:58.
The command is unmistakable. Authority is a trust, not private property. Leadership is a responsibility, not a hereditary entitlement or a prize distributed among the well-connected. Justice is not a favour that rulers grant their subjects when convenient; it is a duty they must fulfil.
The same principle illuminates the meaning of public service in the teachings of the Holy Prophet Muhammad [Peace and blessings be upon him].
In Sahih al-Bukhari, Hadith 7138, and Sahih Muslim, Hadith 1829, the Holy Prophet Muhammad [Peace and blessings be upon him] teaches that every one of you is a shepherd and every one of you is responsible for those under your care.
This is not merely a lesson for the private conscience. It is a warning to every ruler, minister, administrator, judge, and public official who treats authority as a privilege while forgetting accountability.
The greater the power, the greater the responsibility. The higher the office, the heavier the burden of justice.
A leader who cannot hear the cry of a hungry child has no right to demand the applause of a prosperous gathering. A minister who cannot face an ordinary citizen without a protective wall of protocol must ask himself whether he serves the people or merely occupies their institutions.
And a bureaucrat who hides behind files, procedures, and official language while citizens suffer beneath the machinery of government has forgotten that administration exists to serve human beings—not to turn them into supplicants.
The Holy Qur’an also offers a vision of collective responsibility:
“And those who have responded to their lord and established prayer and whose affair is determined by consultation among themselves…”
— The Holy Qur’an, Surah Ash-Shura, 42:38.
Consultation is not a decorative ceremony staged after decisions have already been made. It requires listening, participation, and respect for the people whose lives will be affected by those decisions.
True leadership cannot be implanted into a nation as though it were an artificial organ. It must grow within the living body of society, nourished by public confidence, tested through service, and restrained by institutions that prevent the powerful from becoming untouchable.
Even Abraham Lincoln’s celebrated formulation of democratic government—“of the people, by the people, for the people”—points towards this fundamental truth. The precise arrangements of government may differ from country to country, but legitimacy cannot indefinitely survive where the people are reduced to spectators in the management of their own destiny.
Percy Bysshe Shelley, in his celebrated sonnet Ozymandias, offers a haunting warning to rulers who mistake power for permanence:
“My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;”
“Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!”
— Percy Bysshe Shelley, Ozymandias (1818).
The irony is devastating: the boast survives, but the mighty empire it celebrates has crumbled. Power without humility cannot defeat time, and grandeur without justice cannot secure a lasting legacy.
Consider the symbolism of the Kaaba, the sacred House towards which millions of Muslims turn in prayer. Its history reminds us that sacred responsibility is not established through personal vanity. The Qur’an recounts how Abraham and Ishmael raised the foundations of the House, praying that their service be accepted by Allah (Surah Al-Baqarah, 2:127).
The lesson is humility before the task. The builders did not make the sacred House a monument to their own greatness. They served a trust greater than themselves.
What, then, becomes of a leader who transforms public office into a personal shrine? What becomes of a political movement that demands unquestioning devotion to an individual? And what becomes of a nation when its citizens are taught to worship personalities instead of defending principles?
The answer is written across history: institutions weaken, accountability disappears, and a vacuum opens for those who feed upon public despair.
When the roots of a tree are severed, no amount of paint on its trunk can restore its life. Similarly, when leadership is detached from the sorrows, aspirations, and lived realities of ordinary people, its outward grandeur conceals an inward decay.
Into that vacuum crawl the political and economic predators—the oligarchic class, the Takasirya Tabqah—whose privileges depend upon keeping the public dependent, divided, and distracted. They may change their slogans, alliances, and public faces, but the underlying arrangement remains disturbingly familiar: the many carry the burden while the few collect the benefits.
The antidote is neither blind worship of a new personality nor the cynical rejection of every person who seeks public service. It is a culture of accountability in which leadership must earn its place through character, competence, compassion, and measurable service.
The people must be able to question their leaders without being branded enemies. Journalists must be able to investigate the powerful without fear. Public institutions must serve citizens without discrimination. And rulers must understand that a mandate is not a licence to own the country.
As for the dream that had unsettled me that morning, I could not claim certainty about its meaning. No human being should mistake a dream for a certificate of divine appointment. Its true worth, if any, must be measured by the humility and moral seriousness it awakens.
Perhaps the most important question was not why desperate souls had fallen at my feet in that dream, but why human beings become so desperate that they seek salvation in another human being.
Perhaps the responsibility was not to accept their reverence, but to understand their suffering.
BāBā-Tāl’s figure receded into the shadows of the rooftop walkway. His bells gave one final, delicate chime before the night swallowed their sound.
I returned to my desk.
The Eyrie was quiet again. The Margalla Hills had disappeared into darkness, and the lights of Islamabad shimmered below like countless unanswered questions. I picked up my pen. The morning’s dream, the dervish’s warning, and the cries of ordinary people converged upon the blank sheet before me.
The words began to flow—not as a claim to prophecy, but as a prayer for the kind of leadership that humanity so desperately needs.
QUATRAIN — Coined by T. Hejazi — Where poetry becomes tears, and tears become poetry.
They seek a helping hand when they have fallen,
A voice that answers every desperate calling,
They chase the promises of power enthroned,
Yet yearn for roots that hold their world upright.
No crown can make a ruler just or wise,
No throne can silence truth beneath the skies,
The trust belongs to those who serve the needy,
Not those who make the helpless kiss their hand.
Let justice live beyond a ruler’s reign,
Let truth expose the gilded walls of gain,
Let mercy break the oligarchs’ cruel chain,
Nor should their tears enrich the powerful again.
Let humility guide every station,
Let conscience rise above manipulation,
Let service stand against domination,
That none may claim their destiny alone.