A visit to Wah Ordnance Factories is education as the outfit is not just a public sector defence hardware churning machine – it is much more than a mundane ordnance factory. POFs is a multifaceted institution, where besides the interaction between explosives and fabrication of guns one comes across a score of other more humane activities. Of late there has been an extensive face-lifting of the cantonment, and a number of human development and welfare projects have come up which are running in a most satisfactory manner. In fact the very look of the place is more human than militaristic.

I had visited POFs sporadically, and the first time I went there was many years ago due to a sponsorship of ISPR (Late Gen Riaz Ullah) with a team of journalists, though I don’t claim myself to this clan and I suppose I can just churn out some rough-hewn writing. We were then conducted round the place by the POFs PRO, Mr Saeed, a bulky or I should say an unwieldy pan-chewing Urdu speaking literary figure. I thought he was more at home with poetry than pyrotechnics, gunpowder and the art of gun foundry. But I suppose he liked it at that way. This was way back in 1986.

Later I got more interested and attended rather regularly the annual defence science seminars which were held in the ornate POFs auditorium, and even I had a chance to address one of these gatherings just after the 1991 Gulf War on the topic of ‘Smart i.e. guided munitions’ I also spoke to the POFs managers on the subject of ‘time management’, something unusual for a rural buff I suppose.

And after that due to some reasons, not quite known to me, this worldwide scientific interaction and my visits to Wah truncated till I was invited by Gen Qayyum HI (M) this week to visit Wah. It was indeed gracious of him to do so.

11 June afternoon was very sultry when I was picked up by POFs transport from F-11 Islamabad and as we made our way weaving through dirt roads of Golra to the main road to Peshawar there appeared to be no respite from the blistering heat. But then as we reached Wah boulevard it became somewhat dusty, and lo the rain came and the clouds burst in cats and dogs. It became not only pleasant but almost chilly and during the night I had to use blanket in my POF Wah Hotel room.

As I have pointed out I had last visited Wah when the US Coalition put up a massive incursion in Kuwait to evict the Iraqis in January 1991, and this time I had come just after the end of the US-led invasion of Iraq. In the intervening period, POFs seems to have completely changed and there I could see signs of tremendous progress and innovation in every sphere of the working of the institution including eye catching civil works, neatly laid roads and green belts, a very creditable export business, welfare, technical and human development projects, the centrepiece being the IT and computer science projects. The whole atmosphere appeared to be confidence giving. The transformation appeared to be simply stunning. I was impressed to learn later that the POFs have their own R&D outfit which carries out what I can term as ‘functional’ R&D, as no basic research can be carried out by a small staff with inadequate funding.

I had a couple of hours for the visit which was to culminate with a short sitting with the Chairman POFs Board Lt Gen Abdul Qayyum HI (M). I was conducted round the premises by Mr Khawar Nawaz, an erudite Director of Exports who is a civil engineer by trade and has put in some 30 years or so in the POFs. He provided a succinct historical introduction to POFs covering all facets of this great place with the help of elaborate visual aids and slides which saved a lot of time. The progress shown by the POFs during the last few years appeared to be more than discernible. He was assisted by the POFs PRO Mr Zafar Mahmood Malik, and Lt Col Masood Ahmed, CO I DSG Bn Wah Cantt who also acts as a staff officer to Gen Qayyum in his capacity as Col Commandant of the Regiment of Artillery.

I had some lively discussion with Mr Kawar Nawaz, and I found him acutely knowledgeable about his stuff. I thought he was sophisticated, urbane and knew his trade well. I think the only thing he lacked was that he was not a rocket/gun engineer and a ballistic expert.

I was shown the computer room, or I should say the computer barrack and later we visited the improvised R&D. Brigadier Jahangir, an EME officer runs this outfit which carries out some sort of urgent ‘trouble-shooting’ as with the inadequate funding no basic research can be undertaken by this skeleton staff. He told me that there was a problem of a faulty fuzed projectile and the item was in such a large quantity that the only way to save the projectile was to make it functional and not throw it away. The fuze was replaced by a perfectly working POFs modified fuze and thus valuable foreign exchange was saved. I came to know that POFs do not have any ‘wind tunnel’ facilities for carrying out range table work and for working out of ballistic parameters. I was told that Defence Science Organisation under the Ministry of Defence has got such a facility at Bharakao.

I had a rather hurried run through the factories which are well laid out and have no environmental problems. It was good to see that even the old British provided machines in the factory are kept in good working order. I was shown the delicate fuze shops where women were working and at one shop ‘two-rupee’ coins are fabricated for the Pakistan mint. This was all very encouraging. POFs, WIL has many such profitable commercial outlets. The profit is ploughed into welfare schemes.

Gen Qayyum was rather busy, and I came to know that he is usually like this, as he wants to get everything done without leaving any flaw in it. He, I learned, is to go to Sweden on 15 June to attend a conference and naturally he must be fully prepared for that. And for that very little time was really left for him, besides his daily punishing routine. I thought he was a tireless and relentless man.

During discussion with him he told me that he is just as worried about the congestion of the defence production assets and he is trying for a dispersed proliferation of such assets, and as it is, Sanjwal, Gadwal and Havelian are away from the main POF complex in Wah Cantt. Interestingly most of the other Public Sector defence production assets are located in what I call the ‘Iron Trapezium’-Chaklala, Havelian, Kamra, Sanjwal – Wah. This has some benefits but some strategic disadvantage too in the long run.

We might note that the Indian defence production assets are widely dispersed e.g. their heavy vehicle/tanks are built at Avadi, South India, their missiles are fabricated at Bangalore, Mazagaon is their main ship building centre with their chemical weapons done up at Bhopal and one of their biggest Ordnance Depot is at Panagarh, near Calcutta, so on and so forth.

It is interesting that our main thrust in defence production is in the Public Sector, whereas all world leaders in this activity are in the Private Sector. I suppose and the general told me that we do not have the expertise and dedication in the civil sector, and once that has been built up, the general would gladly hand over the POFs to the private sector.

I put up the point of private ballistic range to be established at Wah, but I was told that there is no requirement as we do not work on any weapon system ‘ab initio’, and we have to follow the acquired military technology as best as we can. All the same, I am still of the view that it would be good if we have that capability as there can always be a technology suffocation and a contingency plan should always be there. Of course such ranges are expensive to install and run.
Finally I thought for a hot summer day and an extremely busy general officer it was more than generous and gracious to listen to my Wayward comments and then politely suggest the pros and cons. I found the Chairman patient, dynamic, God fearing and professionally top class.

While we were departing the Gen pointed out to me the portraits of the twelve POFs chairmen (including him). This is interestingly a polyglot lot, one of them the first one Mr Ghulam Farooq Khan was a civilian, and present one Gen Qayyum is a missile and gunnery expert. What a diverse expertise is needed for this very important job. The job has been mostly held by EME officers including Brigadier WD Arshad who was my course mate, and even by an ASC officer. But I suppose a gunner can be best attuned to the problems of powder, propellants and projectile ballistics. It was great education to be in POFs Wah, though for a very short period. I
must thank Gen Qayyum for his generosity.
POFs Wah is the premier defence production outfit in the country and provides back up infrastructure for the armed forces of the country producing every item of the defence hardware except heavy equipment. Of sure, this self-reliance is most confidence giving.

The POFs have a tremendous range and flexibility and in the same premises equipment and assemblies of polyglot origin i.e. Chinese, British and American et al are produced. Although, initially POFs was geared to work on the British FPS system, the POFs had successfully adopted the metric system by modifying their plants.

Over a period of time, POFs has become highly export oriented, and has had a very successful participation in International Defence Exhibitions, both in the country and abroad.