The Pakistan Day parade in New York last Sunday was a SpongeBob show – you know the porous yellow sponge with big blue eyes, a huge mouth and oversized teeth. He wears square pants and is pretty innocuous kind of guy. The parade was similar.

Despite the first couple in the White House getting quite exercised about the parade, it was a fluky affair. George W Bush’s twinkly greetings to the Pakistani community failed to bring the fighter-cocks together. Even Laura Bush’s cheers egging the Pakistani-Americans to continue to preserve their heritage through sharing their history and culture and thus enriching America fell on deaf ears.

Remember the movie Gangs of New York? I won’t go as far as declaring the in-fighting among Pakistani community in New York as murderous yet the tut-tutting is a constant. Going at each other’s throats, the stink has gotten to Mayor Michael Bloomberg. The billionaire mayor has decided to wash his hands off anything Pakistanis invite him to partake. He led the parade until one summer day some years back two gangs of organisers began to pull him towards their side. A tug-of-war started and Bloomberg was roughed up. Watching the disheveled sight, the mayor’s security swooped in and pulled him out of the melee. Since then Bloomberg has kept away.

So what exactly is the dogfight among the Pakistani community now?

The parade, an annual affair since 1985, has become infamous. In 2000 seven members of the Pakistani Army pipe and drum band jauntily marching along sword dancers on New York’s fashionable Madison Avenue decided to scoot the next day. They were never seen again! One more disappeared during dinner the next day. He went to the toilet and was gone forever.

Fast forward 2007. Two bullheaded trustees out of 39 decided to wash their dirty linen in Manhattan Supreme Court. Mohammad Saifullah and Mian Mohammad Fayyaz were elected the parade chairman and secretary-general respectively last March. They hated each other. So they went to court and the judge was a woman.

Justice Marilyn Diamond (what a colourful name!) ordered a new board election right in her courtroom. In a 13-to-9 vote, Saifullah and Fayyaz got licked. Justice Diamond let them organise the event but ordered that within 45 days of the parade, the trustees must draft and approve new bylaws and financial records must be made available to all board members.

Marilyn Diamond, 61, has herself had a splayed sort of life. She claimed to receive death threats calling her a ‘pig’. She was given around-the-clock security. She was even guarded when she went to get her hair done; go to luncheon dates or party all night long. And she continued to complain about the abusive threats she kept getting. But recently, security was abruptly withdrawn when a criminal profiler alleged that the lady was writing the bizarre notes herself to hang on to her guards.

End of story time. Now back to the parade. A week before the Pakistan Day parade, India attracted bumper crowds at its 60th anniversary parade on Madison Avenue. Bollywood beauty Priyanka Chopra was the grand marshal while the Indian-American astronaut Sunita Williams was the guest of honour. Both the women were crowd-pullers.

But if it’s any consolation, Mayor Bloomberg didn’t attend.

I asked some Pakistani friends to share their August 14 celebrations around America. Ahmed Bilal of Houston said that in 2000 he went with his family on their ‘insistence’ and found Gen (retd) Hameed Gul speechifying on ‘jihad and destroying India by using our nuclear bomb’. The retired ISI director-general also attacked America for being evil.

“Everything was so disorganised and I had to leave within 10 minutes. Thank God, it was before 9/11 otherwise the general would have been flown to Gitmo Bay. He was literally shouting that Pakistan has made the nukes to distribute to Islamic countries and to destroy India and Israel. I was nauseated by the talk. Fortunately, I was never homesick again.”

Arif Hamid has his tale to tell: “One year we decided to attend the 14th August celebrations at Exposition Park in LA. So we drove about 50 miles from Orange County (Costa Mesa) to the venue. First the parking was totally a mess (Pakistani style) then the events were so disbursed with everybody trying to be in charge. Some people formed groups and were yelling out aloud anti-Pakistan and anti-government speeches on megaphones (their pronunciation was so pathetic as if they had just come in from the boondocks back and beyond in Pakistan). The food prices were jacked up four times. There was not much entertainment for the kids. I think the year was 1987. After 10-15 minutes I looked at my wife and my daughters, they were looking at me questioningly. When I asked them ‘shall we leave?’ they all had a big smile on there faces. That was our first and last visit to such an event.”

Arif now lives in far suburbs of Chicago. Here too in the past years Pakistan Day celebrations have been celebrated on two different dates at the same location because of political rivalry. “Our Mayor got very upset. He said ‘if Indians can agree and practise harmony on their independence day by everyone joining in, why can't the Pakistanis?’ The fighting in the Pakistani community eventually ended in a compromise, but I can still feel the tension in the air.

“The funny thing is that 14th August is celebrated in all big states of America. It starts somewhere on the first weekend of August and continues till the last weekend of the month around the country. Yeh hai hamara Pakistani Amreeka. Pakistani hain aur Pakistani rahein gay, na badlain gay apnee harkatain. Jeevay Pakistan.” (This is our Pakistani America, we’re Pakistanis and will remain Pakistanis, we will never change our ways, long live Pakistan).