| July 24, 2006 | Monday | Jumadi-ul-Sani 27, 1427 |
The ‘un’-intelligence agencies
DO Indian Muslims spy for Pakistan? Yes, but only to the extent that Indian Hindus work for the CIA. This is obviously a facetious argument that slanders both communities, unfairly no doubt. But let’s see where it leads to anyway. If we go by the claim that India’s Muslims are indeed “Musharraf’s children,” as Hindutva mascot Narendra Modi suggests, then the unfortunate corollary for Pakistan is that it must be getting very poor intelligence out of India.
Therefore, at least from Modi’s perspective, it’s a blessing in disguise for the Indian state that Indian Muslims have negligible if any access to matters of state, much less its top secrets. We are not discussing here some grand and eloquent exceptions, which don’t prove much.
If we take the loot and plunder of India’s state secrets by the CIA, for example, much to the chagrin of its other competitors in the Western hemisphere, Pakistan’s ISI can only rue its predicament and poor ranking. The information ferreted out by CIA’s Rosanne Minchew from a trusted worker at the National Security Council is believed to be priceless for anyone interested in India’s defence planning for the next 50 years. Could the National Security Council computer man have ever worked for the ISI for a higher fee or other assorted benefits associated with espionage? According to Modi’s logic that would be unlikely. Unfortunately for Modi only the ISI can tell us if this is indeed so.
Indira Gandhi was not so lax when it came to the CIA. Remember the day she published the names of 10 Indian journalists, some of whom are celebrities today, that she accused of spying for the Americans? And she had reason to believe what she was saying, because her government was being run by the KGB! But today’s government and its processors, the BJP, are so besotted with the United States that they happily look the other way when a file is being stolen from under their nose.
Take the disclosures made by former foreign minister Jaswant Singh in an interview last week for instance. He has claimed that the Americans had a mole in Narasimha Rao’s office during his 1991-96 period in office. That mole had passed on nothing short of India’s nuclear secrets to the CIA. “And we are still being snooped,” Singh said, evidently outraged. But he didn’t raise the issue for 10 years for some reason, much less blow the proverbial whistle. There have been countless other instances of turning Nelson’s Eye to espionage. One Indian sleuth defected to the United States and other was getting ready to fly off when he was nabbed. If the Indian state has protested to the United States the public is oblivious of the Herculean feat.
In a moment of introspection Modi declared in Mumbai that terrorism has no religion. The next time round he should add a new dictum, that spies have no religion either. But that may bring its own headaches along. Modi would have to consider whether selling state secrets was less anti-national than blowing up packed trains. Therefore, there is a systemic malaise that we tend to ignore in our rush for instant judgment.
An unstated benefit of the partition has been that it left no room for communal quarrels between India’s Hindus or Pakistan’s Muslims as far as religious zealotry, high corruption or the sheer mismanagement of their national affairs goes.
Both are wallowing in graft and bigotry in equal measure. This wasn’t the imminent scenario in the run up to the partition. And so Pakistan walked away from India to run a model state for South Asia’s Muslims. Shock came when Bangladesh walked out of Pakistan to run what it thought would be an even better state. All three are eating crow today in a manner of speaking regardless of the picture their stock exchanges present.
For if Hindus were good administrators by virtue of being Hindus then Nepal or India would not be in such a bloody mess today. Both nation states are run predominantly by the majority community, not in a legal sense but in a de facto way. Similarly, if Muslims were the better administrators in South Asia, as some may have felt in 1947, Pakistan and Bangladesh should not be in the horrible ditch both find themselves in with little hope of an early rescue.
If Hindus and Muslims are equally good or bad at destroying themselves as civilised people then the snide remarks they inflict on each other after a nuclear test or a bad day at cricket do not merit attention. The problem is elsewhere. When Advani conceded Jinnah’s secular credentials he must have seen in the Quaid’s 1948 speech glimpses of what Indian schoolchildren were themselves taught in the Nehruvian era -– precepts of a secular state.
But there has been perceptible change in half a century since their times. The goal posts seem to have changed. If Pakistan’s demeanour with its own people has chipped away at Jinnah’s two-nation theory, India’s sins of omissions and commissions with its own minorities have reinforced that very theory, which its constitution had set out to negate.
But perhaps we are blaming the boots for the faults of the feet. Let’s look at the Mumbai blasts. The instructive thing about the catastrophe was the humanity intact in Mumbai’s common citizen. It showed that in crisis people generally take on the responsibilities that should otherwise squarely belong to the state. Selfless people, concerned people, helpful people, caring people. They all sprang up from nowhere to carry out vital rescue and relief, in most cases of total strangers. It was just enough that they were fellow humans. It was equally true that most of those that ran out to help with the mangled remains and blood-drenched victims were people of very ordinary means.
The moment the state stepped in the picture was very different. There were traffic jams, as minions rushed to tend to the VIPs. Insidious rumours started circulating, most of all with the use (or abuse) of the media. The fourth pillar of any state, the media in India has a tendency to become a pliant, unquestioning courier of views that self-seeking intelligence bureaus often strive to put on air. Of course the most visible arm of the state in any crisis are the politicians, always jockeying for political mileage they can cull out of a tragedy. At least this is what happened in Mumbai. If there was no communal incident after the mass murder of 200 innocent commuters, the ordinary people of Mumbai have to be saluted for their stoic resolve to carry on with life against difficult odds, against an increasingly callous state. Had political calculations suited the state to engineer a “backlash” a 1993 would not be too difficult to orchestrate. Some things improve with time.
The aftershocks of serial blasts on July 11 shook Mumbai and Gujarat diamond industry alike, says Diamond World, a website dedicated to the profession. A large number of people killed and injured were Gujaratis, it says. It is estimated that around 15 per cent of people caught in the blasts were from the diamond fraternity. In view of these deaths, the members of the diamond industry shut shop for a day after the blasts.
jawednaqvi@gmail.com
It was appalling to learn, after almost ten days, that the man shot dead by the police in an alleged encounter on July 11 as notorious bandit Mashooq Brohi was someone else. He may be just another innocent victim of the ‘overzealousness’ of a law-enforcement agency.
One does not know if the Karachi police chief felt any remorse when he revealed this ‘heroic’ deed of his special team — the Lyari Task Force — at a hurriedly called press conference. One wonders if the team has already pocketed the prize money announced by the home minister. The team members might have also been preparing to get into the uniforms of higher ranks.
The truth surfaced when the family of Mashooq Brohi denied that the man killed was the dreaded criminal. Brohi is alleged to have been involved in many cases of kidnapping for ransom and other heinous crimes. His relatives’ cool reaction to the killing aroused the suspicions of the inspector-general of Sindh police, who ordered an inquiry. The probe uncovered that the victim could be anyone but Mashooq Brohi. He may be Rasool Bakhsh as is claimed by his family in Sakrand.
Earlier this month, a court discovered that a man prosecuted for three-and-a-half years as a terror suspect was actually the namesake of the wanted man.
The law-enforcement agencies, whether visible or invisible, have become an object of mockery. It is not without reason that people blame every act of terror on these agencies.
Following the assassination of Allama Hasan Turabi, in the heavy presence of law-enforcement personnel, dozens of vehicles, a fast-food outlet, petrol stations and other properties were destroyed by ‘angry youths’.
Religious scholars leading the funeral procession had urged the emotionally charged youth not to resort to violence. To stress their point, they said people resorting to violence were not from among those mourning the Allama’s death. They also warned the law-enforcement agencies of imminent vandalism and arson and urged them to gear up to prevent such a situation.
It was surprising that the intelligence agencies did not take measures to prevent the violent acts. The mob went on the rampage and caused damage with impunity.
The young men’s anger was understandable. They needed something to take out their ire on. Pelting buildings with stones and shouting slogans against forces they perceived were responsible for the heinous act could have some justification. But such organised attacks as were seen during the two days could not be the work of the people saddened by their leader’s murder.
The least the agencies could do was to identify people who were involved in the frenzy of destruction. If they had done this, the miscreants could have been brought to book for the losses they caused to life and property of the people.
Allama Turabi was a divine who preached peaceful co-existence. His presence alongside leaders of the Jamaat-i-Islami, the Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam, Jamiat Ulema-i-Pakistan and Ahl-I-Hadith ulema was a source of encouragement for peace-loving people who wanted sectarian harmony across the country.
There have been many incidents of sectarian violence during the last few years. But Allama Turabi held on to the rope that promised internal peace in the country. The assassinated leader always opposed violence even if it were directed against his opponents. He would not have liked his supposed followers burning cars and motorcycles of people who were in no way responsible for his assassination.
The Muttahida Qaumi Movement and the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal are blaming each other for the losses is an attempt to politicize the issue. If they are serious about the matter, they could seek each other’s cooperation to pinpoint those responsible for the violence. The video footage of TV channels, private individuals as well as police and other law-enforcement agencies might have captured the culprits in action.
Now the authorities say they have picked up a few men for the arson attacks. Experience shows that people are arrested on such charges and when things settle down, they are let off.
Mapping the city
Take any map of Karachi, even the ones prepared by the Survey of Pakistan, and you would be surprised at the number of uncharted localities – shanty towns, settlements formed by large-scale displacement of people and so-called goths. One wonders why most bookshops and roadside vendors keep only those two maps of the city which have been prepared by as many private organisations without the slightest regard for the canons of cartography: their maps are not made to scale, do not show recently constructed flyovers and bridges and fail to mention even old drainage channels.
The Survey of Pakistan brought out a detailed street map of the city in book form years ago. For map-lovers, it was –- and still is –- a priceless volume. A couple of years back, the Survey of Pakistan brought out another map of the city: this time a fold-up map specially designed for tourists, who mostly have to do with maps prepared by five-star hotels which place so much emphasis on former district south as though other localities in the city did not exist. But this fold-up map is too detailed, or perhaps too large-scale, to be easily manageable. (All fold-up maps are not necessarily large. Bartholomew’s map of Damascus, for instance, can be opened, read and folded up easily.)
So, one felt immense joy when Karachi’s naib nazim, Nasreen Jalil, recently announced that a modern and updated map of the city would soon come out. It’s about time that Karachi also had a proper street map.
Respect for age
At a time when the aged are the victim of what can be called an erosion of values, a remarkably new phenomenon is emerging in Pakistan — showing respect to the old. Respect for the elders is part of our culture. It is, however, confined to relations and to those whom we know. But now respect for the elders is getting institutionalised publicly.
At a number of places, especially government offices, there are separate counters for senior citizens, and in banks and other public institutions where there are no such counters, an old man or a senior citizen, when spotted by the clerk, is invariably asked to come up to the counter before others. For filling forms or writing cheques or deposit slips, bank staff offer assistance.
This is one’s experience, at the passport office, the National Bank of Pakistan and Habib Bank. One wonders if the staff are doing this on their own or they are under instructions from their superiors. In any case, this is a good sign and a relief to the aged.
— Karachian
Email: naseer.awan@dawn.com