LAHORE: Lateef Jauhar has lost too much weight and his skin its glow. But even then, he is stable and his body has begun to accept food again.

Jauhar went on a 40-day hunger strike outside the Karachi Press Club after his party leader Zahid Baloch was kidnapped by unidentified people. Even until now the whereabouts of Zahid are not known. This Baloch, who is now regarded as one of the heroes of his student party -- the Baloch Student’s Organisation-Azad (BSO-A), readily sat down to die for a cause, but ultimately survived to tell his tale.

Invited by the Awami Workers Party (AWP), Jauhar had an hour-long talk with his audience, mostly comprising AWP party members, press and others belonging to the civil society.

His struggle was a terrible experience, he said. So sick did he become that he had to be put on a drip while on hunger strike. He was accompanied by many other BSO-A students and leaders, and other Baloch who live in Karachi and even interior Sindh and Balochistan. But nothing deterred him from going back.

“I had to do this to put pressure on the elements,” he said. “The media gave me coverage, but many media outlets gave my cause better coverage than others. But in the end, I feel I have managed to send my message across, even internationally. Eventually, I was persuaded by my community, intellectuals and human rights organisations that I would be needed more living than dead.”

“Whom can a dead man help?” He said the Asian Human Rights Commission was one of the prominent groups that helped him realise this.

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“Balochistan is one of the poorest provinces,” he said. “But the terror that our youths are facing has reached the roots of society. Even the student who goes out to buy a pen is apprehended by these elements and is then interrogated and given such a hard time that in the medium to long run it is hardly surprising that these young men turn towoards violence. Our libraries and our literature have been burnt, and I want to say we had no objectionable material, unless these people think sayings of Karl Marx and others go against the state.”

Jauhar openly blamed the state for its incompetence and indifference. He went to the extent of saying many of these elements are directly linked to the state.

BSO-Azad activist Lateef Jauhar

“If students are bullied like this how is it expected that he will go forward and hold talks? They will become psychologically unstable and eventually this frustration will force them to take up arms. In a militant’s eyes, it is not wrong to take up arms against someone who has beat up his mother or killed his brother.

In fact for him it will be justified. If he does not become a rebel, he will become a liability. Due to this insecurity, the BSO-A held its last meeting in the rugged mountains in secret.”

He claimed Baloch activists are constantly being kidnapped, tortured and killed. Sometimes they are so brutally tortured and mutilated that they cannot be identified.

“This sort of violence will only breed further violence. What is the use of this aggression, especially from state elements?”

He said Baloch are e presented as unnecessarily fierce and brutal militants instead of showing that they want peace and stability in the region.

Also read: Baloch student ends hunger strike

“If we do not allow more liberal and progressive people to rule, we in Balochistan fear the country will never find a turning point where the situation can be improved.”

Jauhar also spoke about other matters in Balochistan, including growing militancy and how BSO-A was against it, and how state elements and terrorists in the weakening province were creating serious strife for the people. He condemned the level of sectarianism in the province and said it was a reflection of the state’s indifference to such major issues.

“We have sacrificed so many of our people, including women. Now we want a stop to this violence. In Baloch history we have a woman leader for the first time whose house is attacked every single day.”

Published in Dawn, June 28th , 2014