| 01 June 2004 | Tuesday | 12 Rabi-us-Saani 1425 |
Irsa confirms water theft
A blast followed minutes later by another: this gets good results, for more blood flows. Not only do the wounded join the ranks of the dead, and the dying die quickly, the second explosion pushes the casualty figure up.
Thus you have - if you are a highly motivated practitioner of the art of killing - the satisfaction of making a greater number of families feel bereaved. The Israelis - whom even the Nazis cannot beat when it comes to organized slaughter - introduced this fiendish tactic in Lebanon after they invaded and occupied that beautiful Mediterranean country in 1982.
A car bomb would explode in one of Beirut's crowded streets, killing dozens of Lebanese and Palestinians and wounding and maiming, maybe, hundreds. As ambulances, relief workers, doctors and pedestrians would flock to the site and help the survivors and pull out those trapped, a second bomb would go off precisely at that spot 15 minutes later.
The idea was simple: kill and maim as many Arabs and Palestinians as possible - a noble deed in the eyes of Israel and its supporters. Could we have believed that we would live to see this phenomenon in Pakistan? Get as many victims as you can - that seemed to be the philosophy of those behind the two blasts at the Pakistan American Cultural Centre on Fatima Jinnah Road in Karachi last Wednesday.
The first bang occurred at 5.05pm and caused injuries to some PACC students. It was a low-intensity blast, triggered in a car, but it served its purpose by attracting the usual quota of policemen, Rangers, ambulances and mediamen. As fires burned and the wailing ambulances raced and press photographers flashed their bulbs, the second car blew up at 5.32pm.
It was a powerful blast, and eyewitnesses saw guard Jahangir of the Clifton police thrown against a wall. He died instantly. Both cars were 10 feet from each other. The toll for the day was one killed and over 30 injured.
Were the perpetrators of the crime Pakistani? Or were they foreigners sworn to take it out on the people of this country for all that has happened to them in Afghanistan?
One can understand if aliens who had turned Afghanistan into their fief were angered by Pakistan's foreign policy somersault. From being the Taliban's mentor and sustainer, Islamabad turned itself into a US ally, helped Washington dislodge the Taliban from power, and put Al Qaeda to flight. But must Al Qaeda and its supporters choose to take it out on the people of Pakistan? What have they done to deserve this from Muslim "brothers"?
Al Qaeda and the Afghan Taliban are not the only ones opposed to Islamabad's support to the US-led war on terror; lots of Pakistanis are equally critical of their government's perceived pro-US policy.
If they had used their rational faculty, Al Qaeda and Taliban could have made common cause with such Pakistanis; instead they chose to kill as many innocent Pakistanis as they can. Is this service to some noble cause?
In May 2002, a powerful explosion blew a Pakistan Navy bus to smithereens and killed 11 Frenchmen in Karachi. These foreign engineers were not building a casino or a nightclub; they were helping Pakistan build modern submarines. Was that a crime? Does not Pakistan have the right - like any other country in the world - to defend itself?
What was the message Al Qaeda gave to the people of Pakistan by murdering these Frenchmen - that the Al Qaeda leadership considers not only the Musharraf government but the state of Pakistan its enemy, and that, for that reason, it would even sabotage Pakistan's defence efforts?
It is not yet clear who murdered the Chinese engineers at Gwadar. The Chinese were helping Pakistan build the long overdue second harbour. Does not Pakistan have the right to have a harbour well away from east and closer to the oil supply line? What threat does Gwadar pose to anyone?
Yet, like the killing of the French engineers, the murder of the Chinese technicians, too, gave out one message loud and clear - that those behind this diabolical act did not wish the state of Pakistan to develop and strengthen itself.
If the crime at Gwadar was not committed by Al Qaeda, but by some recalcitrant elements, then we must pause. Freebooters of the Rashid Dostum type would not care less how many get asphyxiated in their air-tight steel containers. But must those who claim to champion Islamic causes be indifferent to the death of innocent people and wage war on the Muslim world's only nuclear power?
By waging war on the state of Pakistan, whose cause are they promoting - Islam's? Or of those who would love to see Pakistan destabilized and in chaos? That was perhaps the reason why the perpetrators of the crime at the PACC had chosen to follow the Israeli tactics - a second blast within minutes of the first to kill and maim the maximum number of Muslims.
Irsa confirms water theft
Ibrat writes that the Indus River System Authority has detected water theft by Punjab and asked it to adhere to Irsa's directives on water-sharing. Irsa's chief engineer (operations) Amanullah Khan has told the secretary of irrigation department, Punjab, through a letter dated May 19, 2004 [16/1594/99/IRSA(0)CE)], that the province has received more water than its share from the Taunsa head-works.
The daily says that the theft of 384,000 cusecs of water from Sindh's share confirms that Punjab has been usurping Sindh's water and wants the Kalabagh dam built in order to grab even more water. Therefore, Ibrat suggests, the federation should not only take notice of the water theft but should also impartially consider Sindh's opposition to the dam. Otherwise, the sense of deprivation that is already there in water-starved Sindh will intensify.
Awami Awaz points out that the recent increase in incidents of terrorism in Karachi has once again exposed inefficiency of law enforcement agencies and accentuated the feeling of insecurity among the people of the city.
Citizens' lack of trust in the agencies was demonstrated by the attack on a police station by an enraged mob after the murder of renowned religious scholar Mufti Nizamuddin Shamzai.
The targeted killing, the paper points out, followed a series of bomb blasts in the city - outside the Pak American Cultural Centre and the city port and inside a mosque. The paper says that the incidents call for strict security measures in and around mosques and madressahs and also steps to restore public confidence in law enforcers.
Kawish says that a special session of the National Finance Commission, presided over by Prime Minister Mir Zafarullah Jamali, has failed to resolve differences over the sixth NFC award after which it is expected that the provinces will prepare their budgets on the basis of the existing award.
In this situation, Sindh has urged the centre to pay its dues for the use of its property. If the province does not receive the outstanding amount, it may not be able even to pay salaries to its employees which will create a disastrous situation in the crises-ridden province. The daily urges Islamabad to pay Sindh's dues to help it smoothly run its affairs.
Hilal-i-Pakistan deplores that the supply of contaminated water has not remained confined to Hyderabad but has spread to Thatta and Badin districts. It insists that merely ordering an investigation into the release of poisonous water of the Manchhar Lake into the River Indus is not enough; the Sindh government must take immediate remedial measures to help consumers.
For this purpose, a special cell, comprising representatives of the departments concerned, should be formed work out a strategy on a war footing to save people from the hazards of the deadly water.