NAWAZ Sharif, the Quaid of his own PML faction, is in a bitter-sweet mood.

There are ample reasons for his bitterness. He feels that as two-time prime minister he did not deserve to be tortured mentally, physically and, more importantly for him, spiritually. He appears to be an angry man who has resolved to himself, like that famous plaque on a statue carved for the Irish famine victims in Boston, “Never again”.

He has got his own list of ‘Never agains’ for this country that he shared with me and a colleague from Dawn in a ‘talkathon’ of about 200 minutes at his Lahore residence the other day. In between, when he left to address a minorities’ conference, brother Shahbaz Sharif filled us in on his take of the same issues.

Never again, said Nawaz Sharif, would the judges of this country be treated the way they have been treated by this regime. He believed that the restoration of the judges was a revolution bigger than elections. “If we did not bring the judges back this time ‘never again’ will any judge dare to stand up to the injustice and tyranny,” he said passionately.

Shahbaz Sharif shared his opinion, saying that this will set the tone for generations to come. So committed are the brothers on this issue that they took an oath from PML-N candidates, binding them to the cause, two days later.

Nawaz Sharif, it seemed, has turned into Che Guevara of sorts. He still insists that Article 6 needs to be applied so that ‘never again’ should any adventurer dare to breach the Constitution. He was not convinced even when my colleague pointed out that the khakis never let their people down and he might also have to soften his position in the end. “Never again,” he stuck to his guns.

While Ishaq Dar and Pervaiz Rashid nodded their heads in (the Ittefaq) unison, the brothers talked about the need to have a national government that will first decide the basic issues of this country. Nawaz Sharif believed the country had become ungovernable and nobody would like to become the prime minister in these conditions. “We have to all do it together,” he said.

There was revolution galore in that House No One of the Ittefaq Lane named after the seven brothers of the late Mian Sharif. Never again shall media be curbed. Never again shall politicians be disgraced. The gist of his talk was that if given another chance they would sort out everything.

This was getting too heavy for our ears. It was not a formal interview so we had no reasons to go for any overkill. But at one stage we could not resist reminding Mian Saheb that we had heard similar promises earlier. They all say that but the moment they get into power the dynamics change. “How do we believe you would do what you are saying you would do?” we finally asked him directly.

He almost stared us in the eye, took a deep breath, and then said with a meaningful smile: “Believe me, I am infected with the democracy bug (Jamhuriat ka keera mujhay lag gaya hai).”

There were reasons for sweetness too. He was happy to return home and on his own terms. Eight years ago it seemed everything was over. He was thrown in dungeons, his family confined, house taken away, assets either sold or seized. Now he knows, for the third time in the family history, he has bounced back. Life has returned to House No One. The usual rush of election activity was visible and one could smell the feeling of hope in the air.

At the sidelines of our meeting, the usual ‘darbar’ activity was on. It was a royal court but different from, say, the ‘darbar’ of Asif Zardari and the Chaudhrys of Gujrat. In the PPP ‘darbar’, there is abundance of jiyalas, but the dominant group is always what is called the ‘jimmy-kitty types, the English-speaking Washington-returned accented techies. The Chaudhrys, of late, have replaced their ‘wazadari’ with arrogance, where they make you wait for hours unnecessarily. Small wonder they have now in almost every district a traditional political family that nurtures a grudge against them for some insolence or for some misuse of ‘thana’ or ‘katchehri’.Nawaz Sharif's ‘darbar’ was a free-for-all. It seemed like you were sitting in the middle of Anarkali Bazaar of Lahore. People were constantly coming in and going out. It was a kind of ante-room where about eight of us had squeezed together and people were passing through to use the only washroom there. Ishaq Dar was saying prayers a little more than usual. Somehow, it was a little extra casual.

Taste for classical songs

Nawaz Sharif’s sweetness was oozing out. He retains his taste for classical songs. While we were in the middle of our discussion, somebody brought in the Bishop of Faisalabad from the minorities’ conference taking place outside. The robed priest was slightly nervous. Suddenly, Mian Sahib, in a gesture of courtesy, sang out, “Tu hindu rahe ga, na musalmaan rahe ga, insaan ki aulaad hai, insaan rahe ga.” It was kind of funny. The poor bishop, we felt, was dying to say that he was already a Christian and none of the two.

There was the usual Lahori warmth, which in nine cases out of ten had to be reflected in food as well. The problem was that we had requested them not to bother about food as we ate simple “daal chawal” because of a medical problem. On landing in Lahore, we realised it had created a crisis of sorts. The issue was how to make your guests happy if they did not eat. The first thing that was conveyed to us by diehard PML-N worker Khawaja Amir was that “there was daal chawal for us”. There were two more people who informed us about this before we were ushered in. Then came Shahbaz Sharif. “There is daal chawal for you specially cooked in the house”.

We were really embarrassed to cause this much fatigue to them when even Nawaz Sharif kind of made us register the fact. In the end, when ‘daal chawal’ was finally brought in it turned out to be ‘warriwatta’, the finest Kashmiri cuisine that one could think of. There was more meat and spices than ‘daal chawal’. It was a small gesture but this attitude was reflected everywhere. There was an air of camaraderie that makes PML-N a cohesive group. To see how these get translated into their political strength, read tomorrow’s issue.