The latest bombing at Data Darbar has at-least confirmed one notion. That unless drastic national security enhancements are made, this act of terrorism will not be the last! This is where the two largest religious thoughts, Deoband and Sufi, clashed. The terrorists achieved multiple ends by striking one of the holiest symbols in Sufism in Pakistan. One, their ideology – even if not their force – is well and alive. Two, they can strike at will and with impunity anywhere despite the successes of Zarb-e-Azb. Three, they are the dominant stakeholder with regards to the other two religious groups – Barelvis and Sufis.
Data Darbar is the largest Sufi shrine in South Asia and considered one of the most sacred places in Lahore that attracts approximately a million visitors every year. It started as a simple grave of Ali Hujwiri, commonly known as Data Ganj Baksh – a perennial Muslim mystic. He is believed to have lived around the 11th century CE and was known for his ideas of peace and inclusiveness. Thus, to see this shrine bombed twice in a decade is irony at a grand scale!
On 1st of July 2010, two suicide bombers blew themselves up in the main complex. At least 50 people were killed and approximately 200 injured in what is deemed as one of the biggest attacks on a Sufi shrine in Pakistan. Recently, on 8th of May 2019, a suicide attack killed at least 9 people outside the shrine in which was described as a targeted attempt on the lives of the police contingent providing security to worshippers. Ironically too, this happened during the holy month of Ramzan which espouses social accommodation and harmony.
Could these tragedies be averted? Or can any future calamity such as these be prevented? Yes, but it requires a Herculean effort to get there!
Fundamentally, this is a classic story of a power struggle where the insurgents – in an organised movement – are trying to use all means necessary to change the dynamics of influence till they gain the upper hand and usurp power away from the government. In order to do so, insurgents are making use of subversion, ideological and social manipulation and the strategy of armed conflict – the Data Darbar tragedies being a case in point – to get the majority on their side. Their policy objective – the transfer of power! In this case, the insurgents are the terrorists!
The government of the day has its work cut out for it. This scenario of asymmetric warfare provides a daunting challenge to the incumbent. And that is what is being played out daily in Pakistan! Consider.
For us, in the face of the greatest of odds, the policy response is UNITE. Unite our people against them, unite our minds against them, unite our policies against them! All this must be done under the overarching national security policy, the biggest aspect of which is to SHAPE the reconciliation and the environment through POTENT resolve!
We want to maintain the security status quo, they want to challenge and topple it. We can secure 1000 locations, then they can strike at 10,000. We wish to localise and contain violence to defeat them, they want to expand it to stretch our security forces and defeat us. We want to curtail deaths and avoid even a single casualty – to secure the minds of our people, they aim to kill ordinary citizens at random to spread terror in the same nascent minds. They want to use the globalisation enabled tools of the three democratisations – information, finance and technology – to create the fourth democratisation of violence, we endeavour to neutralise their use of the three democratisations. We wish to prevent seamless integration between different terrorist outfits, their aim is to get together even on a bare minimum agenda to gain advantage. We have to succeed in defeating their every attempt to terrorise our people, they have to succeed only once in a hundred attempts to claim a victory.
This speaks directly to the already recommended Pakistani national security policy which is principled and peaceful survival and unswerving social and economic growth through mutual co-existence, harmonious internally and externally. The operative phrases here being ‘principled and peaceful survival’ and ‘harmonious internally and externally’.
Moreover, detailed analysis done previously has also established that Pakistan needs effective policies for counter insurgency and counter terrorism – under the overall arch of the suggested national security policy – to safeguard the nation from these existential security threats and the spectre of bombings. A counter insurgency policy of reconciliation is required which can SHAPE the environment. Where each letter of the word SHAPE stands for a particular operational and tactical activity. First, stop and call-off Jihad as per definition of the extreme right elements. Second, halt Jihadi operations and disband Jihadi groups. Third, announce amnesty for all except criminals and retaliatory elements. Fourth, pursue resolute operations only against the unwilling. Fifth, enlist all amenable individuals into relevant security arms. In a similar vein, a counter terrorism policy of resolve needs a POTENT strategy to be auctioned. Here also each alphabet of POTENT stands for a specific operational and tactical action. One, a prepared government and people. Two, Organised for firm action. Three, tenacious in their beliefs and ends of this strategy. Four, enabled to stand together. Five, never give an inch to terrorism and terrorists – six.
Most crucially – for the insurgents or terrorists, the grand strategy is to use violence to divide and conquer to usurp power. Doing so, will enable them to with the fight, battle and consequently the war. For us, in the face of the greatest of odds, the policy response is UNITE. Unite our people against them, unite our minds against them, unite our policies against them! All this must be done under the overarching national security policy, the biggest aspect of which is to SHAPE the reconciliation and the environment through POTENT resolve!
Only this will enable us to secure our people around the three national ends of one national identity, one common purpose and one set of national interests! And avoid any future repeat of the recent tragedy at Data Darbar!
The writer is Director Programmes for an international ICT organization based in the UK