Daily Times

To illustrate the situation of Sindh let me borrow a translation of Munir Niazi’s immortal poem from Aatish Taseer, “In part the road was hard/In part, I wore a collar of grief about my neck/In part the people of the town were cruel/And, yes, in part, I, too, knew a taste for death”, which he has used in the latter edition of his book, Stranger to History, to describe the circumstances of his martyred father’s tragic death at the hands of a zealot.

Elections are over now and Sindhis have chosen to go back to the same, what Mir Taqi Mir called ‘pharmacist’s boy’ for medicine, who in the first place caused the affliction. So be it. In Sindhi we say ‘hiku anrahoondu, beo afaala gandaa’ (not only worthless but manner-less as well.) They did it to themselves. Now let them face the music. But prescience of what is to be expected next has already started manifesting.

Agha Siraj Durrani, the macho man of the party dared Sindhis immediately after winning the elections by proclaiming that the party would bring the hated Sindh People’s Local Government Order (SPLGO) back and go ahead with the Zulfikarabad project. His pictures with a bottle of ‘the daughter of the grape’ (Cast off dull care, O melancholy brother! /Woo the sweet daughter of the grape, no other/The daughter is forbidden, it is true/But she is nicer than her lawful mother! — Omar Khayyam) in one hand, and the daughter of a former powerful bureaucrat in the other armpit making rounds on the internet! A case against him of rigging the election in his favour is about to be decided by the court. But whatever the fate of the case, Durrani is not going anywhere. If not a minister, he will be made an adviser like Murad Ali Shah.

Syed Qaim Ali Shah, the effervescent, black haired ‘lad’ has once again been chosen to use his strong muscles to steer the vessel of Sindh through troubled waters. Syed Owais Muzzafar Tappi is being entrusted by the PPP leadership with the task to investigate the cause of the dismal performance of the party in the elections. Murad Ali Shah, even though he could not be elected, will be looking after the finances of the province. Maybe Sindh has gone completely barren and a capable elected person could not be found to man the ministry of finance. But hey, what is a ministry between friends?

Having elected to power the party they tried in the past and with such men of proven capabilities at the helm, Sindhis could go back to their traditional stupor. When they are shaken out of their daze after another five years (God forbid!), hopefully there will be nothing left to worry about, including Sindh itself.

Then there is this ever oppressed, perpetually persecuted, party of the perpetrators (in a good sense, of course) of Pakistan. After his famous ‘Teen Talwaar’ and “Separate Karachi from Pakistan” speech, I could not stop tears from flowing from my eyes when I heard on YouTube his heart-rending cries of “Allah mujhe jahannum raseed karde!” (Oh God, please dispatch me to hell!), and the subsequent treatment meted out to Raza Haroon et al. Can someone put the fear of God into Pakistanis, since Altaf Bhai himself is unable, due to technical reasons, to do it these days? Why are they so hard on this peace-loving, law-abiding, innocent person? Can they not see he is already going through a lot of agony? Police raids on some residences and offices in London in connection with Dr Imran Farooq’s murder and all?

And then Altaf Hussain says that the present government only consists of rural Sindh and urban Sindh; of course, urban Sindh means MQM, is left out. What if the PPP, the ANP, the PTI and PML-N have won a seat here and there, urban Sindh is MQM. And, when he says urban Sindh should be given representation in the government, it means the MQM should be allocated the same lucrative ministries it held previously. And why not, they are not snakes to eat earth. Everyone has a stomach attached to his/her body.

But then the detractors, the fools, ask what about Ishrat-ul-lbaad, the longest serving governor in the history of Pakistan, whose poor wife may still be collecting welfare cheques from the British government? Whom does he represent, if not the ‘urban Sindh’ party? They say that the MQM is like a spoilt child, wanting the best for itself and then crying for not getting the rest. Ever since the 1980s, the MQM has held an unquestioned sway over Sindh but if Sindh’s problems are traced, the majority of them will point back at the MQM. And then the party gets rewarded for creating trouble! Reminds me of another verse: “Maine ajab yeh rasm dekhi keh baroz-e-Eid-e-Qurban/Wohi qatl bhi kare hei wohi lei sawaab ultaa” (I see this strange tradition that on the Feast of Sacrifice Day/ the one who kills is the one who gets rewarded).

But the nation could take heart and heave a sigh of relief now. It looks like the MQM waiting for a better deal from the federal government, and, meanwhile staging a couple of days of mourning, on whatever pretext, to prove their worth, has been shown the door by the PML-N, and has now very kindly agreed to grace the government of Sindh. Looks like they will have their two cities, ministries, governorship, etc. back and live happily ever after, or at least until the next government comes into power.

But don’t forget the PML-N. People say that Mian Nawaz Sharif has learnt lessons from the torments he suffered during the time of the last dictator who was considered by some the sector in charge of Islamabad for the MQM. That he has not forgotten the May 12 incident, etc.

But then we look at some of the recent happenings: Sharif has already reneged on the main promises he and his younger brother made during the election campaign. His close coterie of ministers includes a vast majority from Lahore, and, especially, his Kashmiri kinsmen. His recently formed National Economic Council consists of an overwhelming majority from Punjab, with one Sindhi member and none from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa or Balochistan. Also, he has started courting the ultimate consort of the kings. The other day I saw it reported in a newspaper that when a delegation of the MQM met with Sharif to congratulate him on his election to the prime post, he was really happy, and is reported to have asked them to communicate his thank you to the Quaid-e-Tehreek without delay. A couple of days after the election of Dr Malik to chief ministership in Balochistan, three more dead bodies were found there. “Na tum badle, na hum badle, na dil ki aarzoo badli/Mein kaise aitabaar-e-inqalaab-e-aasmaan karloon?” (Neither you, nor I, nor the desire of heart has changed/How can I believe that a revolution has changed the skies?)

From the reports it seems that Sharif and his government has neither the will nor the ability to do much. Any hopes of change, it looks like, have receded alongside the waves of ‘tsunami’.

The writer is an independent commentator