Daily Times

If you thought that extremism of minds and thought stemmed from some seminaries, you might be only partially correct. If I were to tell you that our entire society has some infection of this fatal disease, you would take an offence to such a sweeping statement. Allow me to elaborate a bit further. We are highly emotional in most situations and always stay on the extreme ends. We have this love-hate syndrome with people, and lack the tendency of staying somewhere in between. I am a product of the same society, and have suffered from this ailment to some extent as well. With conditioning of my environment and exposure to critical thinking skills when it comes to forming an opinion or a thought process, I have tried to improve to some extent.

A couple of weeks ago, I was at a social gathering, and people were discussing Altaf Hussain’s offensive remarks and, of course, parroting the lines they had heard from their favourite anchor person of the idiot box. The buzzword on the table was ‘traitor’. I was quietly trying to focus on my food and ignored the chatter. A friend of mine elicited my opinion, and I told him that our country has had a long history, and a long list of ‘traitors’. Starting from the man who should have been the prime minister in 1947 by the name of Hussain Shaheed Suharwardy to Altaf Hussain. The list is quite long, including none other than the sister of our much-revered founding father. Some faces turned in shock, some in offence and some in utter disbelief.

Then I asked the people on my table what they would call someone who admits to bargaining with national security on national television and seeks an unconditional pardon. Since when did national TV become the venue to dispense verdict on such highly sensitive matters? What would you call a person who openly defies the writ of the state in the capital and uses derogatory terms for soldiers? What would you call the person who tramples on the constitution and has no regard or remorse, and escapes culpability on medical grounds? What would you call the folks who openly invite the notorious ISIS to come and establish a caliphate in our country? I had a few more questions on my mind but people now were almost angry. I was immediately labelled as an Mutthaida Qaumi Movement supporter, and by default I inherited a similar label but with a twist of a few words.

I explained that I had no regard or love for the newly labelled traitor. I strongly disagree with his style of politics. Whether it is him or anyone else who uses force or fear to advance their agenda is not someone that I follow. But I do agree with some of his views about the rights of his community. I do not completely shift my pendulum overnight about someone. I reminded them of a few more statements of Mr Hussain that were equally offensive, yet ‘all was well in those days. An exiled leader who will perhaps never set foot again on the soil that gave him birth would chant a slogan, and all hell would break lose. As if God forbid, this country will wither on a derogatory slogan from a person who was terribly insecure to begin with.

By now, the people were calming a little bit, and yet cross-questioning my stance. I categorically stated that I was equally offended by the nonsense that Mr Hussain had uttered, but knew that whatever he had uttered was protected under free speech. No matter how much our sentiments were bruised because of that we cannot do much. The only legal argument that we could make was the incitement to commit violence. That too had to stand in a court of law in the United Kingdom.

If we were to make that argument, then in order to be fair we have to pursue a similar course of action against people who resorted to such unruly behaviour against Pakistan Television when Islamabad was under siege by the ‘revolutionaries’. By now people at the table were trying to bring their counter-arguments of what about this and what about that. So and so got murdered at the behest of a certain someone in London. I calmly responded that there is a thing called state and it has investigation agencies, prosecution and all legal powers within its ambit to enforce law and order. The allegations and rumors have to be investigated and evidence has to be presented. If it is so overwhelming then even if need be a trial in absentia must be held. Chances of the British government extraditing the suspect to face any charges in Pakistan are very slim. But again the state has to enforce law evenly and follow the letter and spirit of the law for every one equally. There should be no selective prosecution. Similarly, when government demolishes political offices under the pretext of illegal encroachment, it must serve proper notices. Every action of government sets a precedent for any situation in the future.

Later, I asked the folks why is it that a certain defector of his party who alleges many things on screen, and has formed his own party now just abruptly left the party and resurfaced after almost two years? If someone who claims to be so patriotic and knew a lot about the inside happenings, especially about the ‘RAW connection, why did he not approach the law enforcement agencies at the time of his quiet exit? By now some folks on the table nodded, and some stared at me as if I was trying to invent facts. My plate was empty, so I simply told the folks on the table to question things and events. It is your right. Form an opinion based on your independent thinking and on facts, be objective and not emotionally react emotionally to everything that is presented to you as ‘breaking news’.

The writer is a Pakistani-US mortgage banker. He can be reached at dasghar@aol.com. He tweets at http://twitter.com/dasghar