Adil Najam
I must confess that after our recent posts on the vigilantism by folks at Jamia Hafsa and the Lal Masjid I had hoped not to write about this issue yet again so soon.
This is not because I shun controversy or duck issues. It is merely because discussions on this issue tend to be prone to slogan-mongering from those holding extreme positions on all sides, they tend to drown out the more serious and more thoughtful deliberations that are so needed, and they quickly turn into mud-slinging matches which take up too much of our time in cleaning up the mess made by those who routinely ignore or are incapable of understanding and following our comment policy. Having said all that, let me also say that it is intellectually dishonest to simply ignore events and trends that are tearing apart the fabric of society.
With that rather long preamble, what has really prompted this post are two things I saw in today’s Dawn. The first is a set of two ads on behalf of ‘The Citizens of Karachi’ (clicking on the images will take you to larger and more readable versions). The first starts off with:
“Are You Ready? Do you want danda bardar and klashnikov shariat?
IF NOT THEN… come to attend the rally in lage number and show your solidarity against the danda bardar and klashnikov shariat.”
I found these ads to be yet more evidence of a polarized society. More than that, I wonder who put these ads? Any clues, readers? I also wonder how many – and who – will show up on the 15th at this rally (starting 2:00PM near the Mausoleum of Quaid-i-Azam)?
The second item appears on the back page of Dawn (and most other papers) and is much more disturbing. Here is the story in full:
Militants Beat up Dancers
LAKKI MARWAT, April 12: Clashes between militants and villagers in the Dhoda-Shah Hasankhel area on Thursday morning left two people injured. About a dozen people were taken hostage by the militants.
Sources said a group of Taliban militants had beaten up some transvestite dancers, shaved their heads and broken their musical instruments near Abdulkhel as they were going to the Dhoda village to perform at a wedding on Wednesday night.
Villagers decided to take revenge by raising a Lashkar against the Taliban, the sources said. Light and heavy weapons were used and the Taliban also fired rockets during the clash which lasted for several hours. The Taliban took 12 villagers hostage. Five of them were later freed while the others were in the custody of the Taliban till late evening, according to the administrator of a seminary, Hafiz Amanullah Khan.
A heavy contingent of police and Frontier Constabulary personnel reached the area. A ceasefire was brokered by some local ulema who held talks with village elders and the Taliban. The sources said the situation was tense and additional contingents of the FC had been summoned.
What is common between both stories is that the battle lines in a divided society are being drawn. The only possible good that could come out of this is for the mainstream of the country to recognize the difference between being ‘religious’ and ‘religious extremism.’ Maybe it will take such actions to remind people that we can be religious without being religious extremists; that faith should help flourish a culture of caring, not of violence.
Actually, I find it ridiculous that MQM gets blamed for everything that happens in Karachi.
Why is everyone convinced that this is MQM organized. The ads do not say so, and like the original post I also wonder who is behind this.
If it is MQM, it will lose a lot of credibility for me . BUT that will mean that this type of hooliganism is AGAIN making both the military and the failed parties more crdible. I don’t like teh military at all, but if it is between these Talibans and the military, the choice is an easy one.
Just as the military is trying to convince people that it is only tehy who can save us from these fanatical extremist mullahs, the mullahs are also projecting themselves as if they are the only ones wh can deliver us from military rule. Both are wrong because the way to save yourself from one evil (military rule) is NOT to jump into a worse evil (Taliban style religious extremists).
When ever anything happens in India its the ISI who did it and whenever there is uncontrolled sectarian violence, doctors being targeted, or religious parties going up against the government its still the agency.
The fact that there in reality is a sect of people who thinks that the majority of Pakistanis should be condemned to hell, they are willing to kill and die for what the think is religiously sanctioned, and whether the agency is behind it hardly matters. Its not like paid actors pretending to put up a fight, there are real people willing to blow themselves up and who have done so in the past.
How can we overlook all of this for the mere argument that the agencies are behind it.
If you’ve ever heard the ‘foot soldiers’ of these religious outfits speak their mind, they arent pretending about anything..they believe to be the sole flag bearers of Islam and view anyone not conforming or resisting as an opposition.
I would like to request Adil Najam to present the true picture. Presenting a political party’s rally as a call from the citizens of Karachi is substandard journalism.
Dear Dr. Najam,
We all remember how MQM has engaged in past in bloody battles with Jamaat and Jamiat folks to gain control of Karachi’s colleges and universities. Their commitment to secularism is arguably the strongest in Paki politics (even Benazir once appointed a Sipah mullah as a minister in punjab). Religious minorities feel much safer under MQM’s umbrella than elsewhere. Of course it doesn’t mean MQM is the answer to our predicament. They are a mafia that has a rather sizable following.