The Sindh cauldron-I Apocalypse now
Two recent incidents show up in stark relief the magnitude of the Catch-22 problems that have polarized society in Sindh into a seemingly unbridgeable divide. The first was the murderous set-piece ambush in Baldia that resulted in the deaths of a Ranger Captain, an SHO Police and four other policemen. Since the location was nominally an MQM majority area, the immediate reaction of all concerned was to blame it on the MQM, hundreds of suspects being picked up for interrogation. The other incident was the claim of a girl of Kashmiri origin, Naheed Butt, that she had been strip-searched during the search of her home by law enforcement agencies (LEAs) looking for an MQM activist named Taqi.
Baldia is inhabited by Mohajirs who originally belong almost evenly to a Baloch sub-tribe called Patni and “Turks” originating from Turkish sea-faring class that had settled in Kathiawar. Even there pre-partition these two communities had rivalries that had degenerated into gangland-type warfare which continued post-partition on a sporadic on-off basis in Karachi. The Patni-origin criminal gangs tended to lean towards the MQM post-1985 but remained quite independent, the “Turks” on the other hand aligned themselves with local crime syndicates drawing most of its members from the Punjab Pakhtoon Ittehad (PPI), mainly the Pathan “Swabiwal” drug gangs. As per prevailing practice all over Karachi, the local police took a percentage as “Bhatta” (or protection money) from all the gangs. Baldia’s great silent majority of Mohajirs remain MQM sympathizers but the local MQM leaders do not have the same control (or for that matter, clout) as the MQM has in other MQM-majority areas. Being involved to an extent, the local police left the criminal gangs on both the sides alone while keeping the vast majority of the population in line through intimidation, not a new modus operandi for corrupt enforcement agencies all over the third world. The deceased SHO was believed to have developed animosity with the Patnis and was seen to be favouring the “Swabiwal” Pathans in their on-going feud. As a sequel to an earlier incident where a Pathan youth had been killed in a drunken dispute, that late Sadiq needed to restore his authority in the area by a “show of force” with the inadvertent help of the Army. It seems quite clear that Late Capt Amir of the Rangers was totally innocent of the greater manipulation in which he and his sub-unit were being used as a pawn. In short order, a deadly ambush decimated almost the entire party, whether the masked assailants were aware that a Ranger officer was part of the group being ambushed is a matter of conjecture that can only be confirmed after anyone who took part in the ambush is caught and confesses.
In search of suspects, MQM activists being high on that list, a LEA raiding party headed by two Army Majors and accompanied by policemen and lady searcher were on the hunt for an MQM activist named Taqi, a detainee had given the lead that he was sheltering in a particular hiding place in the Buffer Zone. A lady named Naheed Butt, who was among the inmates of the house, subsequently claimed that she was strip-searched by the lady searcher in the bathroom while the door was kept ajar. Though she confirmed that the incident took place out of sight of the male members of the LEAs the very fact that a female has had the courage to come out into the open to make such an accusation, rightly or wrongly, puts the LEAs on the defensive. In such a charged atmosphere where houses are being searched such an incident was only waiting to happen.
As a sequel to the first incident, the LEAs (particularly the Rangers) have to be commended in exercising remarkable fire discipline while under grave provocation. Since any gut reaction to such a merciless killing would have been to extract bloody vengeance, the GOC Karachi, Major Gen Saleem Haider, and his troops deserve plaudits for keeping taut control and thus saving the situation from developing into a bloody cycle of violence. Because the ambush took place in primary Mohajir locality, the normal assumption would be that the people of the locality would have some knowledge as to who perpetrated this ghastly crime, either because they were sympathizers or more likely out of the fear of retribution by the criminal gangs. In any case, the picking up of large number of suspects for interrogation would have served to let off steam among the incensed rank and file of the LEAs, in the final analysis one must thank Heaven that nobody has been killed in retaliation. In retrospect, the LEAs could have exercised greater judgment and picked up a substantial number of suspects from the criminal gangs who seemed to have come out unscathed rather than the general citizens who seem to be in double jeopardy, damned if you will and damned if you won’t. In general, this is a common cause for complaint in Karachi, that the actual criminals usually escape justice because the LEAs avoid picking them up as they have weapons and influence, alternatively innocents having no such recourse are usually victimized. Since this certainly cannot be due to any stated policy from the Army hierarchy, a concerted effort has to be made down the leadership line to assuage this grievance.
In this day and age in Pakistan, it is difficult to accept that two Field Officers could have allowed any female to be humiliated in any manner in front of their troops (or worse in front of the local police) but it does seem likely that Naheed Butt may have reacted to being physically women-handled by the police lady searchers. One understands that this is increasingly not an uncommon occurrence in countless cases in Karachi, particularly when responsible officers have not been part of the raiding party. While there seems to be a grey area in the Naheed Butt case, the LEAs cannot be absolved of an attitude that has crept in over the elongated period of Operation Clean Up that makes a portion of the populace feel humiliated and harassed despite the strict instructions to the contrary from the Corps Comd downwards. The Naheed Butt case exposes a Catch-22 malady in which the LEAs in Internal Security role become increasingly fallible to perpetuating disorder inadvertently while engaged in trying to maintain the same. Despite their most sincere intentions they soon get caught up in the syndrome that led John Lindsay to state, “those who suppress freedom always do so in the name of law and order”.
These two incidents highlight the dilemma of urban Sindh. In the first case, the MQM can hardly be blamed for an atrocity committed by other parties while the Army deserve a pat on the back for holding their fire in retaliation. In the other incident, while there is some doubt about the extent of the alleged excess, yet in a roundabout way this was tailor-made for media disaster as the MQM probably had no other way but to resort to a one-day strike to highlight a modus operandi that seemed to be of increasing concern to them. The tragedy is that the call for a peaceful strike resulted in a handful of deaths besides quite substantial material damage. We have sunk to such a state of civilization that we are now reduced to comparing the number of fatalities and injuries as relevant to the quantum of relief or outrage whereas any death or injury should be a matter of despondency.
The MQM represents a sizeable majority of the Mohajir community, since we proclaim ourselves as a democracy we cannot ignore this. On the other hand, the Army is the one national institution that is vital to unity in the maintaining of peace and amity in Pakistan. Both are natural allies given the depth of their respective commitments to the solidarity of the country, yet today they are more or less in a state of confrontation despite their best intentions. It is to be appreciated that despite the normal penchant of the Army to use their weapons as a means of applying force, Operation Clean Up is probably the only example in modern history in urban operations where firepower has been withheld and used as a deterrent only. Equally, one must commend the MQM in not retaliating despite the excesses and humiliation to which they have been subjected to. This state of “armed truce” cannot continue being sustained as the recent incidents have shown. A stark example of the present MQM predicament is that the conductor and drivers of public transport, particularly yellow mini-buses, whose humiliation and harassment of Mohajir passengers was the touchstone responsible for the Mohajir resentment that gave meteoric rise to the MQM after the Bushra Zaidi incident, have again raised their ugly heads and have started subjecting the Mohajirs to the same pre-1985 treatment. In the long order, the MQM may continue to sustain losses because of Operation Clean Up but the Army is in a no-win position as more such incidents in which they may be innocent of are blamed on them. Despite the millions of deaths in Vietnam, the one incident that inspired US political reaction was the My Lai massacre. Baldia could well have become a Pakistani My Lai. That is the dilemma facing us today, to resolve a political issue without using any further military means that can only deepen the frustrations of the Army at performing a thankless job.
The Mohajir community must have its place under the Pakistani sun, to do that the Army must return to its original clear statement of aim, the eradication of crime in the Province of Sindh. That is not a complex requirement, it has been done successfully in the rural areas and can also happen in the urban areas provided the Army goes after the real criminals with a vengeance. The Army and the MQM have to work locally in tandem to contain the situation from further deterioration. MQM’s help can be sought in the areas where the MQM represents a political majority. Who better can pinpoint the criminals in their areas, whether they be political militants, or individual gangs, whether they be Pathan, Punjabis, Sindhis, Baloch, Mohajirs, Afghans, etc, etc? Once the Mohajir community is convinced that the Army action is being targeted to eradicating crime rather than destroying their political framework, the psychological change will itself bridge the present great divide. This is what has happened in the rural areas with the ethnic Sindhis. That is the essence of the problem, the Army must stay with its Selection and Maintenance of Aim. Instead of letting the aforementioned incidents further polarise the issues, let us turn these issues around to unite our resolve for a common cause, the unity of this country. The essence of good political and military leadership should be to unite the flock, not allow themselves to get divided. That is what the enemy wants, that is what we should not hand them on a platter.
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