When it comes to holidays, ‘two’ sounds better than ‘one’

Yasir Ilyas

The government has reverted its decision of two weekly holidays and declared Saturday as a working day again.

The decision of a five-day working week was taken in April this year in a meeting of the Council of Common Interests (CCI) to meet the shortfall of electricity in the country. It was decided to shorten a working week to five days with extension in working hours to overcome work deficiency with an excessive off-day. Initially, it was decided for a span of three months and the decision to this effect was to be reviewed in July. However, it was further extended till October 31, but the government took four more weeks to revert the decision.

The schedule of a six-day week is not new for the public, but it would certainly be taken with a heavy heart by a large number people after exercising a comparatively easier schedule of a five-day week. The working hours in offices would be another source of confusion.

When this question was raised to people from different segments of society, they came up with interesting answers.

Tahir Abbas, a student as well as a radio jockey at an FM channel, said: “When we got used to the routine of a five-day week, a longer working week is again imposed upon us. The five-day week was quite good for people in a number of ways. A relatively larger number of people listened to our show on the weekend as there were two holidays. There was a lot of traffic of callers on telephone, but now this thing will not be the same as the weekend has been chopped down to a single day”.

Holidays are always very exciting for students. They wait eagerly for them. When the schedule for two holidays a week was announced, they were the ones who welcomed the decision with open arms, but now they are gloomy.

Riaz Khan, a university student who is residing in a hostel and belongs to Peshawar, said that two holidays were good as he could go to his home on the weekend, but now there is only one holiday and he cannot go to meet his family members. “There are several students in the hostel like me who cannot go to their hometowns now as the ‘luxury; of two weekly holidays is over,” he added while making a grim face.

A family, visiting a picnic spot in the capital, said: “Two holidays were better as we could plan our weekend in a better way. We reserved one day for outing and the other for resting to get fresh to cope with the workload in our office.”

Transporters, including cab drivers, also considered the old routine a better one as they could find more passengers on the two-day weekend.

Another student, Wasim Abbas, said that one holiday is far better than two holidays. He was of the view that teachers overburden students with assignments considering them free for two days. But on other hand, he would miss two holidays, because he used to have extra time to have fun in addition to doing course assignments.