Pakistani society of today has transformed into a society of fire arm bearers and if one tries to get any clue from clergy of the country of this sanguine behavior, their ready-made reply goes like that “It is the result of deviation from true teachings of Islam and a fruit of friendship & rapport with anti-Islam forces”
During 1990s, Pasban the “Revolutionary Brigade” of Jamaat-e-Islami came up with a slogan “If we won’t succeed in equitable redistribution of resources, we’ll distribute the hunger and poverty on equal basis”. Majority of newspaper intellectuals found themselves enchanted in the apparent structure of the sentence with understanding the real implications of this vague and rather unreasonable slogan and kept them busy in forecasting a potential revolution from the village Karbath in outskirt of Lahore. But one fine morning it was Pasban itself that was found in the middle of a revolution and Jamaat-e-Islami also got some tranquility as a result. Not long ago a newspaper published a photograph of a shop where a routine ‘Sale’ was the advertised in these words: “Suicidal Attack Sale”. There was a flashback of same slogans in one’s mind when on 30th October 2011 the chief of Pakistan Tehreek-e- Insaf, Imran Khan while addressing the grandest ever rally of his party in Lahore declared that “Tsunami of Tahreek-e-Insaf has arrived here”. Pasban a movement of some emotional youth wanted to distribute want and hunger on equitable grounds if their campaign to provide social justice to masses fails in any case; the trader of Lahore emphasized the expanse of his price-reduction as “suicide attack” while the chief of PTI used the euphemism of a catastrophic term of tsunami to highlight his intent to provide social justice to all citizens of state and to end corruption from the country. Have we fallen short of agreeable and pro-life lexicon even to denote a positive action?
That we have been deprived of love and happiness in life even in the ways we use our language is in fact a symbolic of a state that is ever-ready for war and whose institutions are faced with fast descent at the same time. Our vast squares, boulevards and highways are devoid of any life giving signage and symbolism and all we see are model of atomic missiles or old fuselages of warplanes. Similarly our intelligentsia and politicians in their talk shows and rallies either vow to hang and skin their opponents or show the desire to bury them at least. On the other hand there are sectarian elements and Taliban who claim to be the flag bearers of religion of peace and who are always engaged in beheading, shooting and lashing their opponents or targeting innocent people for no reason but still they claim to promote peace all over the world.
We are not even obliged to contact any party or organization to gauge the local disputes, socio-political tensions or religious and sectarian rows that exist in almost every part of the country. The wall chalking, banners and graffiti in local bazaars and streets, trees, public transport and even public latrines can easily enlighten someone of the mind-set and ideology as well as plans of these outfits and groups. One can easily find the incitement to murder of the people from other religions and sects to defamation of their beliefs and their sacred personalities in these vast “advertising arenas”. If it is a dispute of political nature than we can find material on character assassination of his/her person and if it has its origin in linguistic, ethnic or regional differences then we can also observe a very smart exploitation and maneuvering of every imaginable insult and slur. What could be called a prominent expression of our society is the hate, slander or violence of almost every shade and colors.
Pakistani society of today has transformed into a society of fire arm bearers and if one tries to get any clue from clergy of the country of this sanguine behavior, their ready-made reply goes like that “It is the result of deviation from true teachings of Islam and a fruit of friendship & rapport with anti-Islam forces”. However it does not seem possible to provide any tangible proof of deviation from basic principles of Islam to substantiate their claim. Islamic tint is emphatically visible from legislation to symbols and mannerism of everyday life. According to available record, worst of carnage and atrocities were perpetrated by the Islamist groups and organizations. For example all the Muslim sectarian outfits has killed thousands Muslims from opposite sects and this practice continues till today. Political parties and ordinary people have never raised their voice against these sectarian elements and religious bigots. If we ask from political leadership about our tendencies to love the death and alienation with life, majority of them expose their shallowness by simply blaming opponent political forces for the situation and they even lack the will to take any responsibility at their part while every single Joe is aware of the fact that majority of our political leaders patronizes the sectarian killers in exchange for political favors and support in elections etc.
It is a hard act to find the people having value and love for life in the Pakistani society of present days that is deeply obsessed with death and blood. The will to die or kill is quite prominent even in our sloganeering and we love and even spell bound to everything that has the ability to destroy and wreak havoc at a massive scale. Our politicians long of a bloody revolution for any impending change in the society. Our clerics are already torchbearers of a sacred death and it is futile to expect any life loving attitude from them. Everybody is running after martyrdom; either to kill other or to get killed at least. There is no segment of society that do not has martyrs of its own and not longing for more martyrdoms. The peoples who favor peace and reconciliation in this state do not bear any value; rather they are easily dubbed as enemy of the country and agents of foreign forces.
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The writer is an investigative journalist, his recent book Punjabi Taliban has been published in urdu and English languages. He can be contacted at |
