Daily Times

I am disturbed. I just saw a programme on television where a media team in Karachi confronted a man selling donkey meat. No, the selling of donkey meat does not disturb me as it is nothing new, but what he said to the media does. Upon being confronted on high moral grounds repeatedly by the anchor, he asked them where they were when his wife committed suicide because of poverty. He said he did not conceal what he sold and everyone who bought from him knew it was donkey meat; then he said people could not even afford to eat daal (lentil) now. What were they expected to do? How were they supposed to subsist, to feed their children?

Yes, I am disturbed. It was apparent as I watched the programme that people knew they were buying donkey meat and still bought it; that is what we have reduced our people to. And I cannot blame them. Mutton sells at Rs 600, chicken at approximately Rs 200, daal in three digits and donkey meat at Rs 120-140 per kilogram.

General Ziaul Haq is reported to have said that the constitution is a mere scrap of paper, which could be thrown into the dustbin at any time. We label him a ‘dictator’ and of course, as popular perception goes, dictators do not obey the constitution. They abrogate and subvert it, so much so that our ‘democratic’ government has been forced to amend Article 6 through the 18th amendment to make all these acts illegal, unconstitutional and the offence, ‘high treason’, restraining the superior courts from validating any such act.

However, what happens if the ‘democratic’ government fails to fulfill its constitutional duties? What if it fails to ensure that people are clothed, fed, have shelter and access to the necessities of life? Would that be unconstitutional? Or, the mere solution is going to the polls again and again to be re-elected for another term by a brainwashed, uneducated, subservient and zombie voter? What good is a democratic government if various figures and reports show that poverty was significantly reduced in General Musharraf’s era? Why were we outraged when the general said that anyone who could not afford to eat daal should eat chicken? Lest anyone forget, chicken was cheaper than daal those days. Where is that outrage now when people are forced to eat donkey meat because they cannot afford daal?

I am not inclined to go into a debate on whether donkey meat is halaal or haraam (kosher or the opposite), since there is no clear cut mention of this in the Holy Quran. There is no consensus among the sects on the donkey and most consider it to be makrooh. Regardless of this, people are eating donkey meat due to poverty.

The prime minister announced an increase of Rs1,000 in the minimum wage of workers, which now stands at Rs 8,000. With the prices of commodities being where they are right now, how is a person supposed to feed, clothe, educate and house his family in this ‘grand’ income? God forbid if someone falls ill or the house is rented, what then? And what about domestic workers? Someone in our village has employed a child for housework who does impeccable work while getting a ‘handsome’ salary of Rs.1,000. Why in God’s name are we not outraged enough to change this system? Some children at my daughter’s previous school got Rs1,000 as their daily allowance; who is responsible for this disparity? The state is. It is the duty of the state to “provide basic necessities of life, such as food, clothing, housing, education and medical relief, for all such citizens, irrespective of sex, caste, creed or race, as are permanently or temporarily unable to earn their livelihood on account of infirmity, sickness or unemployment.” Also to “reduce disparity in the income and earnings of individuals, including persons in the various classes of the service of Pakistan.” By not fulfilling its constitutional obligation of reducing income disparity and instead having increased the divide further so that it is now a gaping chasm, the state is the culprit. By forsaking the people of Pakistan to fill their ever-deepening pockets, by profiting at our expense, by looting us blind, enough to put other chor (thief) and uchakaas (robbers) to shame. Our government has violated its mandate, not to mention its philosophy of roti, kapra, makaan (bread, clothing, shelter), which is now reduced to knicker, chaddi, banyan (pair of shorts, underpants, vest); one is lucky if one still possesses even a single one of these items.

One could argue that the state is only obligated to provide these basics within its available resources. Fair enough, or is it? So while the poor living in this country are forced to feed their children donkey meat, our rulers and elite dine on gourmet food; or is it possible they could start feasting on chef-cooked ‘donkey steaks’ or ‘donkey tikkas’ or ‘donkey nihari’? What about equality of citizens? Surely, if the masses are eating donkey, it is only fair that the rulers do so too, since the masses do not have the right to eat what they do in their palaces, farmhouses and state-funded luxurious abodes.

While our hard earned money is squandered on dozens of escort cars and security of individuals suffering from delusions of grandiosity, who think they are indispensible, our people suffer for lack of a single decent meal in a day. The individuals who have run this country dry with their parasitic existence should know no one is indispensable…absolutely no one. Their basic duty is to the citizen of Pakistan, the common man, to ensure he does not kill himself or his children due to poverty created by them.

The Economic Survey 2010-2011 has failed to put forward any official statistics on poverty but the disparity in income is now at dangerous levels; there has been no equitable distribution of wealth but the rich still get richer.

Coming back to the news report, it was good of the media team to hand the wretched man selling donkey meat over to the police. It will ensure that justice is done; money would have been extorted from him before he was eventually set free; meanwhile his motherless children probably slept hungry that night and maybe on more nights to come. It ensured that justice was indeed done whilst those responsible for reducing the people of Pakistan to this stage slept in their air-conditioned rooms and ate gourmet meals, nobody handing them over to anyone. Did anyone bother to go and check where that wretched man lived or what happened to his family after he was arrested or would that have been in bad taste and not the media’s job? I am not advocating for those who sell substandard meat or indulge in horrific practices duping the consumer; in this case, people knew exactly what they were buying.

We have a right to be outraged, yes, even at people who sell donkey meat. We heard what the man said about poverty but what we did not see was investigative reporting of the veracity of his story and of many others like him. Maybe we should be outraged only after we have walked a mile in their shoes.

The writer is an advocate of the high court