KARACHI: With the authorities exercising laws to combat extremism in the city, groups comprising young people huddled together to discuss ideas and come up with practical measures to counter terrorism across the country.

Held at the Rangoonwala Centre, ‘Pakistan fights back’ — a hackathon accompanied by a small art exhibition — was organised by HIVE Karachi, a resource centre that aims at combating terrorism by giving a platform to different organisations which want to promote peace and harmony.

With first round shortlisting five teams, the hackathon saw groups sharing their ideas about fighting extremism through art activities, music, literature, indoor games, helpline for minority groups among many others. The ideas were judged by artist and founder of Pakistan Education Network (PEN) Laiq Qureshi, media professional and entrepreneur Arsalan Khan and IT entrepreneur Mohammad Hashim.

While almost all ideas were workable and impressive, four ideas which made it to the final round were ‘Helpline for Minority Rights’, ‘Civic Sense Through Language’, ‘Viral Videos’ and ‘Aithay Rakh’.

The third place, which was shared by ‘Aithay Rakh — indoor games with thought-provoking messages’ and ‘Viral Videos’, had both groups address the issue of extremism by using social media and engaging people of all ages. In the age of social media where everything goes viral, ‘Viral Videos’ will focus on sharing short videos centred on three things: positive side of Pakistan, scholars telling teachings that would encourage harmony and removing misconceptions from the history taught in books. ‘Aithay Rakh’ on the other hand will bring out indoor games like cards, Ludo by replacing ordinary patterns with pictures hinting at problems like freedom of speech, animal rights and others.

‘Civic Sense Through Language’, which bagged second position, aims at building municipal sense through inscription of Arabic, being considered a holy language, on walls to ward off people from littering.

The winner was ‘Helpline For Minority Rights’ that aims to help victims of forced conversions by arranging lawyers to help them fight a legal case.

Speaking about this project, Mr Vishal said many families remained quiet because they were unable to afford lawyers. He said if lawyers fought their cases to bring perpetrators to justice, it was quite possible to purge the society of this menace.

Although there has been a decline in targeted killings and other terror activities across the country, an art gallery has been set up as a tribute to all those who have lost their lives in different tragic events.

With blaring headlines about killings and terror activities tied to a rope on top, red drops symbolizing blood were placed on small glass plates inserted in half burnt candles signifying that all those who lose their lives have the same blood in them.

Mir Askari, the curator of the gallery, said the headlines also showed insensitivity of everyone living in the city. “These headlines have made us insensitive and our reaction to one death or 200 remains the same. Some protest, light a few candles in memoriam but few understand the gravity of such issues,” he said.

Jaffer Mirza, a HIVE representative, said the resource centre also provided room to all those who wanted to research on different ways to counter extremism.

“We are working to counter the extremist narrative by building a strong presence on social media. We have made videos that portray sufi culture and have also focused on the plight of Pushtoons who are labeled as terrorists. We also have a Social Innovation Lab (SIL) in which we funded young people to present their ideas on practical lines like ‘Crime Watch’, ‘Extremism Timeline’ among many others.”

Azal the band also performed at the event.

Published in Dawn, August 1st, 2015

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