As months go, last April was auspicious for Pakistan like no other month in recent history. The visit of the Chinese president brought forth editorials across the globe, ranking it high in terms of events that might be deemed ‘game-changers’ in the realm of world politics for decades to come. A few days later, tragedy set in again, the kind Pakistanis are accustomed to and, by now to some extent, sadly immune to as well. Sabeen Mahmud, the owner of The Second Floor (T2F), a bookstore/cafe in Karachi, was shot and killed after an event highlighting the plight of missing persons in Balochistan.
I felt depressed. I did not know her personally and had only heard of her bookstore from Karachiites who had nothing but praise for both. On the day of her untimely death, I was meeting a friend who, as it turned out, knew her well. We spoke gently in the beginning sharing our mourning for the loss of a young person. Then, as we started discussing the hows and whys of the incident, the conversation turned sour. My friend started attacking the army and Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) so harshly that by the end of our time together, I started wondering if Sabeen was working for RAW and whether my friend was a covert CIA operative. Such is the severity in the rhetoric in Pakistan around its most significant institutions: the security apparatus (minus the police, which so far does not weigh in except as an easy target for cynicism).
The divisiveness in the upper strata of society, where it is mostly confined, has reached a point where there is no middle ground. This pattern is nothing new. One has to only read the comments section of a mildly controversial article in any major western newspaper to understand the kind of extreme and disturbingly hateful polarization that exists between the citizenry of any nation on any issue. Over the next few days, I continued to hear people praising Sabeen, others cursing her. No news or information emerged on the killers and most fingers pointed to the ISI for cancelling the LUMS event where the panel on Balochistan was first meant to be held.
Then, last week, the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) issued a statement naming RAW as the principal player behind terrorist activities in Balochistan. One would assume that includes some portion of the deaths of missing persons as well. That was a shocker, to say the least, as the Foreign Office (FO) itself has generally been operating under a self-imposed gag rule in terms of calling out India for any reason. The accusation was mostly welcomed by the nation. Finally, those who believed that the carnage of civilians in the country was the work, at least in part, of exogenous forces hostile to the nation felt vindicated. Why the army finally decided to point a finger at our neighbour, who we generally absolve in silence in the war of words, was intriguing.
One might venture a guess that China’s visit caused the critical disclosure. After all, the bulk of China’s gigantic investment and plans for their future trade with the world depends on infrastructure that Pakistan has to build within itself. Gwadar is the jewel in the crown. Blowing up roads and railways has always been one of the easiest forms of subversive attacks in any country. However, the force of 10,000 to safeguard Chinese interests does not have a large component of ISI agents without reason. There is no room for error. The Chinese are not interested in the army parading those who execute their citizens after the fact. The whole point of the brigade is to prevent their murder, not avenge it.
Naming RAW specifically may not be at the behest of the Chinese per se but it is a necessary starting point to display some self-esteem. For too long, head buried in the sand, Pakistan has let the world throw a volley of accusations and rebuke at it without an iota of effort to counter the maligning. This is a clear and deliberately adopted policy decision of civilian governments, to display a position of no defence (therefore guilt by default), be it related to water disputes, terrorism or any matter of integral importance to the reputation of the nation within and without. After all, if the Indians want to go to the UN in a state of ardent rage because the alleged mastermind of the Mumbai attack is let off scot-free in the homeland, why can Pakistan not go to the world body as well the next time bodies are riddled with bullets, and women and children are blown to bits in markets? And if those bodies happen to be Chinese the next time around, the stakes go up higher, beyond anyone’s imagination.
Once some saints asked Hazrat Bahauddin Zakriya how he was able to bear that so many of his murids (followers) were rich. He replied whilst smiling, “There are two sections of society that ultimately determine its destiny: the ulema (religious scholars) and the umra (the elite).” For Pakistan, both groups are scary in terms of their ideological alliances but for now let us deal with the elite. The problems with the Pakistani elite are many but the main one in relation to India is that they are psychologically intimidated by them. India’s sheer geographical size, economy, numbers, ‘place’ in the new world order as the darling of the US and, as now being slowly revealed, Israel, all these instil fear and cowardice in the best of our rich. “We cannot take them on, we cannot win.” These are the slogans of surrender of those who have conceded defeat.
(To be continued)
The writer is a freelance columnist