140 dead and 538 injured – this little byline cuts through hearts and our future!
Yesterday was the day of images – moving pictures of excitement, energy, applause and then the saddest of recent tragedies. Innocent men and women charged with emotion and enthusiasm were blown away by suicide bombers, remote devices and alien belief systems. Or was it the case of wilful machinations and deceit. Only time will tell.
She had arrived much like the Greek characters – tearful, maligned, triumphant and a little pawn in the hands of gods. Amid the voices of criticism and hypocrisy that fail to note the complexity of our times, she emerged as a people’s woman – once again. Here were the loyalists dancing, singing and clapping – their queen, exiled and beaten had re-emerged.
They couldn’t care about the cost or the process. That was for the armchair classes of Pakistan to ponder about. The pull of Bhutto-name for the have-nots was once again re-established. So began a journey on the blood-lined roads of Karachi that have cracked with violence, blood and lawlessness. Yet they moved ahead oblivious of the fault lines that run from the drab, destroyed villages of Afghanistan to Karachi passing through a web of seminaries, officialdom and Lal Masjids of this world.
And so halfway, this peaceful journey – a testament of what the real Pakistan is all about – halted. And, something had erupted: imperial projects, state diktats and the crumbling centre. There was flesh, blood, fire and tears. And the wretched TV screens have documented all of this.
Devastating is one word that replaced amazing by the time we crossed the midnight in Pakistan! To quote Rumi here
A splinter is often
difficult to get out.
How much more difficult a thorn
in the heart! If everyone could find that thorn
in themselves, things would be
much more peaceful here!
There is a head now flashed on the screens – they can’t tell if it was a Jiyala or the suicide bomber. The TV channels are flashing bodies again and again – as before, discretion was thrown to winds and we have the singular honour of being a country where human limbs and guts of the dead are not just flashed but imposed on the senses until you are numb, exhausted and terrified. And, glorifying terror is the last thing we need.
Urooj Zia, a newspaper reporter was there:
“The bomb blasts happened while we were there. I was stunned, to say the least. There were people, bits of people, blood EVERYWHERE. An AryOne World cameraman lay there dying in front of us. We moved him to a police mobile, but he died in the hospital. I knew he would. I got his blood all over me — my hands, arms, clothes, shoes. Then there were charred bodies of policemen — smoke rising from them. Slippery blood everywhere….I went back to work after that, filed my story. Got home around 04:00 a.m., couldn’t sleep for two hours coz I couldn’t get the images out of my head. Puked a couple of times too.”
This tragedy is not just about who is responsible for this carnage. When humanity is in danger, we have to rise above our biases and loyalties and condemn what is WRONG. This is an issue that we all have to now live and deal with.
Our religion does not allow targeting women even in wartime and suicides are FORBIDDEN. Period. There is now a consensus at Al-Azhar and various other places of Islamic scholarship. If this is about Waziristan or the Lal Masjid then it should be fought elsewhere and not against the unarmed, dispossessed political workers.
All Pakistanis have to unite in condemning this barbarity. And all variants of Pakistaniat ought to be involved in this process – bickering at this stage will only make us question as to what message are we sending to the world, that we to quote Qandeel Shaam are “multiple little groups all bopping their heads against one another”?
Violence, militancy and suicide attacks are and will remain unacceptable. Legitimate politics must not give way to war-lord-ism! I end with Faiz:
abhii chiragh-e-sar-e-rah ko kuchh Khabar hii nahin
abhii garaani-e-shab mein kami nahin aaii
najaat-e-deeda-o-dil kii ghadi nahin aii
chale chalo key wo manzil abhii nahin aaii
Quoting someone else:
Jaltay parcham se aati awaazein hain
Matti tar hai per nazroN meiN paani nahiN
BaRh rahay hain iss sher-e-khamoshaN ke
Rehnay walay aur zinda ghar khaali sabhi
In hawaoN se baRh ke
In chatanoN pe chaRh ke
Kaali kaali in bad-rang ghataoN se
LaRtay rehna hai jab tak hai haathoN mein dum
Aur hai ye wa’da na kam ho gi himmat kabhi
raigistanoN mein gulshan javaN ker de
aur dikha de haqiqat kahani nahiN
aur in lafzoN mein rang waoh ravaaN ker de
jo bataeiN amal aur bayani nahiN
in hawaoN mein ja ke
Kaali raatoN mein aa ke
Iss zameeN ke in jhootay khodaaoN se
LaRtay rehna hai jab tak hai haathoN mein dam
Aur hai ye wa’da na kam ho gi himmat kabhi
Can all the political hoopla and media three ring circus as displayed over enthusiastically by the likes of Geo TV and ARY One, compensate the mourning families of those who died and/ or have lost their limbs in this terrible incident?
Benazir has so far offered only her condolences! Each attendee at the PPP procession was promised Rs.500 but eventually the price they had to pay was much higher! Has BB offered any compensation to the deceased or the injured who were their? They spend Rs. 12 crores on useless hoardings and political jingles in a heartbeat and yet for those who are dead they only have empty words! BB and her cohorts are milking this incident to gain political mileage as the ”I-am-going-to-be-the-next-PM” look on her face during her post-blast press conference said it all!
Before we get too swayed with the so-called ”Democarcy Naach Gana” we must stop this useless carnage and building of political hopes by the likes of BB and her party on the dead bodies of innocent Pakistanis.
BB claimed that their were 3 million people (???!!!!) their to welcome her on her arrival which is the reason they were traveling slowly (9km in 12 hrs) Yet right after the blast, it just took her 15 minutes to cover 25kms to Bilawal House???? Where did the thronging masses who were impeding their traveling go???? Did they magically disappear?????
I for one am going to most certainly vote again in the upcoming election with my entire family, I will not however vote for the looters and plunderers of my past who now are being projected as angels or saviors!
It’s high time to act against extremism.
Dear friends –
Many thanks for the discussion – let me say that this post was not about BB – not at all. She displays the typical problems associated with the political/ruling class in Pakistan.
Whether she has a right to rule or not will be decided by the people when there is a free election. And, the courts are taking care of the corruption charges (or dropping them). Please note that I have not stated even once that she is a saviour or the best leader we have; or in the words of temporal above that she does not live in la-la land. She probably does live there and as far as I am concerned the best process for her to be rejected and weeded out of the political system and elections overtime – not by the pre-meditated judgements of the educated elites!
Coming back to the main theme of the post: this is a tragedy when a peaceful rally is attacked – we don’t know the culprits and BB’s press conference has not helped it either.
I am mourning for the dead bodies that have gone to various cities, for a man from Nawabshah who can’t find his brother and for the mothers of Lyari who lost their sons – what was their fault?
Of course, some readers will say that their fault is that they should stop supporting the PPP – but most of these people are have-nots and not educated and prosperous professionals (like the ATP readers) so they have to have a hope in the unfortunate country where they live in. And, let me say that their version of “hope” appears to be less dangerous than the hope lessons given with training in violence!
A great read on Benazir’s Homecoming.