Daily Times

Karachi, one of the largest cities in the world, called the city of lights, where nearly 20 million persons reside, has been bleeding for several years. I heard a journalist say the other day that as many as 2,000 of its residents had been killed in 2011. One may ask if that is too many in a city as large as this one. The answer has to be that yes it is, judging by the incidence of homicides in some of the other large cities. A recent report says that on average, there are about five murders a week in New York City (population over eight million) and less than three per week in London (population over eight million). Most of these murders are motivated by personal enmities. A few of them can be ranked as hate crimes that arise from ethnic or religious differences between the victim and his killer.

Karachi is a smaller version of the country as a whole. It has become home for not only the Urdu-speaking people called mohajirs but also for Sindhis, Baloch, Pakhtuns, and Punjabis. Mafias have surfaced in each of these groups whose managers attempt to drive aliens out of the area to create more living space and job opportunities for their own kind. They do whatever they can to intimidate unwanted groups to leave places they currently occupy.

The existing ethnic tension also invites sectarian conflict. The so-called ulema allied with extremists and fanatics have jumped into the arena. The spokespersons of each sect claim that their version of Islam is the only correct one, and that all others are heresies whose proponents are infidels or at best misguided who should be exterminated. Violent conflict between Sunni and Shia Muslims has lately become a lot more frequent and ferocious than it used to be. We know of cases in which militants of one sect have infiltrated the places of worship and processions of another, exploded bombs or blown themselves up and killed scores of innocent persons. Hundreds of individuals belonging to the Hazara community in Balochistan have been massacred merely because they were Shia.

The Prophet (PBUH) is said to have anticipated that his community would one day divide into many factions, which would wage conflict with one another. That has already happened in Pakistan. A culture of violence is spreading here and it is taking hold of not only collectivities but also individuals. We hear of unspeakable atrocities against men and women in various parts of the country almost every day. No movement to stop this trend has surfaced. Politicians and notables in civil society seem to think that this is the way it is and this is the way it is going to be.

Regretfully, it must be said also that governments as well as opposition forces have become not only participants in this culture but also its sponsors. This is one of the principal reasons why violence in Karachi cannot be stopped. Political parties active in the city maintain militias and the place is said to be loaded with weapons. The MQM is the largest and most powerful political force there. It commands the undiluted loyalty of the dominant mohajir population. It is well known that the MQM considers resort to physical violence as a legitimate weapon in waging conflict with its rivals. Karachi was peaceful in the 1990s when the MQM controlled its government. That ceased to be the case when it went out of power. Peace might return if local elections are held, which the MQM would most likely sweep. That is precisely the reason why the PPP government in Sindh is tardy in holding them. It does not promote good order by ignoring the presence of a powerful force in Karachi. The wiser course would be to make a power sharing deal with the MQM. This is not happening because the PPP workers think of themselves as jiyalas who are not only willing but also eager to go into combat with rivals.

Killings in Karachi are not only motivated by ethnic and sectarian considerations. Some persons are shot dead for no reason at all. In these cases, the killer does not even know his victim. It may be fair to assume that he is killing this unknown person merely to create an environment of instability. In doing so, he expects to destabilise Pakistan whose industrial and commercial hub is Karachi. He could be a foreign agent working to create chaos in Pakistan; he could also be a member of an extremist group such as the Taliban who have no interest in this country’s survival or wellbeing.

One may ask why there are not as many killings in Lahore as there are in Karachi. The PML-N is the ruling party in Punjab. No scandals of corruption or other wrongdoing against its leaders have surfaced. A majority of the people in the province does not seem to be alienated from the PLM-N and its government. While its vote bank among urban workers and part of the peasantry may still be intact, the PPP has fallen low in the esteem of far too many people in Punjab. The general outlook is that it will do poorly in the next election. Consider also that the Punjabis outside the PPP are just as capable of mustering the jiyala spirit, as are the PPP workers. In the more general perception in Punjab, the PPP is both corrupt and incompetent, whose managers are plundering the country as if there were no tomorrow.

Violence on a large scale may not be likely to erupt in Punjab in the near future, but it cannot be ruled out. Indications are that society may be moving towards polarisation. The Pakistan army is fighting militants and extremists such as the Pakistani Taliban, al Qaeda, and their associates, but they have not been entirely successful. By no means a majority but a fair number of persons are receptive to the version of Islam presented by these hostile groups. We must hope and pray that violence in Karachi will disappear or subside, and that it will not creep up north.

The writer is professor emeritus at the University of Massachusetts and can be reached at anwarsyed@cox.net