Adil Najam
Report from News (21 February, 2007):
A fanatic shot dead Punjab Minister for Social Welfare Zill-e-Huma Usman “for not adopting the Muslim dress code” at a political meeting here at the PML House on Tuesday. A party worker caught the accused, Maulvi Sarwar, and handed him over to the Civil Lines Police. Huma was at the PML House to hold an open Kachehry. As she was busy meeting the PML women activists, the accused sitting in the audience approached her with a pistol and pumped bullets into her head from a point-blank range… The accused, M Sarwar Mughal - popularly known as Maulvi Sarwar - is a resident of Baghbnapura in Gujranwala. Two police stations of Gujranwala and the Tibbi police of Lahore had booked Maulvi Sarwar for the murder of six women, but he was acquitted for want of sufficient evidence. His alleged spree of killing “immoral” women started in the year 2002. In his confession statement before the police on Tuesday, he said he was opposed to women holding public office. He added that after he read in the newspaper that the minister was holding an open court, he decided to kill her.
Sometimes you just wonder why! Sometimes you just want to give up!
I have been feeling sad and numb and down and dejected all day. I heard about the brutal murder of Punjab Minister Zile Huma Usman’s murder by a crazed fanatic some 10 hours ago. And I have been in utter shock.
I have tossed and turned. I had thought earlier that I would not even write about it. What is the use? When a society goes so mad that a woman is killed just because she is a woman, what can a blog post do. Just ignite more silly debates; more childish heckling; more immature point-scoring; trying to show how smart you are; or, more likely, trying to show how idiotic others are; reaffirming your own belief that you are always right, and everyone else is always wrong; single-track chest thumping; self-righteous finger-pointing. No remorse. No compassion; not a word of sympathy; not a shred of caring. All there is, is anger; getting high on our own anger; anger for its own sake; getting so very angry that you even forget what or who you are angry at.
But now I do want to write about this. We, as a society, have some serious thinking to do.
What killed Zille Huma Usman? Not religion. Not madness. But anger. Uncontrolled anger.
A society that seems to be fueled by anger. No conversation is seen to be legitimate unless it is an angry conversation. And the solution to everything seems to be violence. ‘Kill the infidels’ say the believers. ‘Kill the mullahs’ shout the modernists. ‘Hang them by the gallows.’ ‘Put them in boats and let them sink.’ ‘Death is what they deserve.’ We have heard it all right here. I suspect we will hear it again. That dastardly, self-righteous anger. This violence in the language, as Zille Huma so tragically found, becomes the violence of bloodshed all too easily. Today it was in the name of religion. Tomorrow it will be something else.
So, do me a favor folks. Give her some dignity. Hold your anger. Think about what happened. Ponder. And pause. For the sake of whatever is sacred to you; please pause!
An innocent woman’s life has already been taken by our inability to put a lid on our passions and our anger. Let us please not make a tamasha out of her death by making her a poster child for whatever ’cause’ we are parading for right now.
I don’t know what the discussion is on, but I can vouch for the fact that Omar R Quraishi is one of our top journalists… ex-Dawn and currently the News… and frankly the quality of The News features has gone up manifold since he has come to the helm of affairs.
Let us celebrate our every day heroes… instead of abusing them.
haha — whatever you say lahori - whatever you say — actually i think its you who couldnt take a rebuttal and criticism — and when you couldnt handle that you launch a personal attack — how convenient — waisay lahori i wonder how you would respond to someone on this board who made a sweeping generalisation, with regard to your profession, that everyone in it was corrupt
Omar, you sound like a spoiled snob who thinks he knows everything. Which is usually the sign of someone who knows nothing.
Maybe you are right. Maybe the press was not bought off here. Maybe its just that it is run by a bunch of people who don’t know their job to well, and can’t seem to take criticism very well either!
lahori you may live in samanabad but you sound like one of those clueless expats — i didnt get offended at all by what you said but it is clear you are one of those self-proclaimed experts on what the media doesnt do and what it should do — thats like me trying to give expert advice on banking or finance but i wont — like i said there was a LOT OF NOISE when it happened and there was considerable follow up but as it happens with the press other MORE IMPORTANT stories came up — you obviously think that press should cover something that is your pet obsession but im sorry it doesnt happen like that — as someone has pointed out the hard fact of life is that much worse things than what that nirala guy did are happening in society — many by influential people but the press covers — FOR INSTANCE, YOU SURELY DONT THINK THAT THE MATTER OF DISAPPEARANCES IS BEING DONE BY THOSE WHO DONT HAVE INFLUENCE - HOWEVER I HOPE YOU HAVENT MISSED THE COVERAGE OF THIS ISSUE IN THE PRESS — SO HOW COME THERE IS NO PRESSURE ON US NOT TO COVER THIS TOPIC — WHICH IS CLEARLY MORE SENSITIVE THAN THE NIRALA STORY
like i said lahori, you sound like a clueless expat
aqil — a lot is written about the police all the time — a lot has been written about police reforms as well — other than by afzal shigri — and btw you dont read to write all that much on it because its clear what the problem is– lack of political will to implement the reforms and constant interference by politicians, and the new nazim system of governance — like i said you probably missed this coverage — also its a slightly technical subject so there might be relatively fewer articles but they have come and most of them say the same thing — as in its clear what needs to be done -
(Please note, the all caps are for emphasis)
Incidences like Nirala rash driving are an every day scene in this country. Such accidents are not a matter of being rich or poor. The car drivers, truck and tanker drivers and even the train management has failed to curtail it. More crime is surely happening than reported in the press. As for the press its work is to report—it certainly cannot take over the job of a human right activist or a vanguard of justice. The whole administrative and judicial structure seems to be corrupt and in deplorable condition. Ask anyone. So, as I had said earlier , if justice cannot be brought to our country we must not expect any positive change and revolution in our society. Laws are ofcourse there but as the saying goes, law is only a web for catching ants and flies —not lions and bears, atleast in our country.
[quote comment=”35672″]lahori — it was news for a while — just like paris hilton’s jumping bail will be for a while — no offence but you sound like one of those annoying expats who think that they have all the solutions to what ails their home country — and by the way, i am in a position to tell you that as for my newspaper there was never any pressure on us to not write about it — and we did cover it extensively, had columnists write on it and so on[/quote]
No point in answer this personal attack when none was directed at you. So, I will leave your personal insecurities to you to deal with yourself. If Samnabad is s foreign country to you, then I must be an expat, and I am sorry that a mention of our media’s silence and connivance in shielding the absconding of the Nirala kid annoys you. But your being annoyed does not change the facts. Yes, there was a little noise in the media right at the beginning and then it got squashed immediately. Where was the outrage and commentary on a prominent and rich person just ‘disappearing’ from police custody? Small news items hidden in the inside pages and then, poof, the news disappears. Just like the Nirala speedster.
Omar, sorry if I sounded overly critical and if it felt like several posters have ganged up on you.
I read Dawn, the news and daily times very regularly, so I am fully aware of what’s being done.
Some issues have been highlighted very well in recent years, (such as hudood ordinance), and the media deserves to be commended for its positive role on them.
but there is also plenty of room for improvement. For example, on police reforms, barring a few isolated articles (mostly by Afzal Shigri), there hasn’t been any in-depth analysis of the actual content of the police reforms package and subsequent amendments to it. There are plenty of pieces with general comments about the break-down of law and order and references to the police order that it’s failed, but one expects a bit more than that.
Likewise on devolution, the last time I recall an opinion piece pointing out the excessive concentration of power in the hands of bureaucrats in the executive magistracy was in feb 2005, in a three part series by Gen Tanvir Naqvi. Most Pakistanis are not even clear on whether they would like devolution to continue, but this has not led our press to provide some in-depth analysis of these arguments to inform public opinion.
Sorry if any of this has offended you, but personally, I have high expectations from the media precisely because there are some very well meaning journalists whom I respect for there sincerity, hence the criticism.
Aqil that kind of work is being done — you just need to read it