Giving 'client' its due value and izzat

For far too long, the word 'client' has got a bad rap in this country. The word itself means someone who receives professional services from an organisation or a professional. While the business and professional world itself - from advertising and retail to legal services and real estate - are quite familiar with this meaning, 'client' still bears middle-class opprobrium associated with other euphemisms like 'massage parlours' and 'client states'. A doctor's patient is nothing but her or his client, as is someone commissioning an artist or an architect the artist's or architect's. It may not strike one immediately but investors seeking information from organisations specialising in providing informed information pertaining to making investments are as much clients as Pope Julius II was of Michelangelo, commissioned to adorn the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel with his art.

While countries like Pakistan may have deservedly got the sobriquet 'client state', the correct term for a country that is economically, politically and militarily subordinate to another state should be 'vassal state'. That itself should go a decent way to ensure that the term 'client' is imbued with the value that he, she or it deserves, especially in a country that owes much to its services industry where the customer - the client - is seen as king.