LARKANA: People and the government should play their due role in warding off extremists from the province and help create a peaceful and tolerant society.

This was the gist of a message of the one-day literary and cultural festival organised by the Strengthening Participatory Organisation (SPO) Sindh chapter at the Arts Council of Pakistan here on Sunday. The deputy commissioner said the administration was playing its due role in solving problems of people. Unreasonable criticism of government functionaries should be avoided. He said people should help the administration in eliminating problems of their localities.

Presided by Pakistan SPO CEO Naseer Memon, he said his organisation held the event to provide people an opportunity to entertain themselves with cultural and literary activities. The message of the festival was peace and tolerance. He said Sindh was the land of the people who had tolerance in their attitude. “We are determined to block the way of terrorism and extremism in Sindh.”

Larkana SSP Kamran said the people of Sindh were quite attached to their good cultural traditions, which was a positive sign. He said police were always ready to protect people.

SPO provincial chief Mustafa Baloch said Sindh historically has been a peaceful, tolerant and accommodating state throughout centuries. It was the land of Sufis and tolerant people. Even after the creation of Pakistan, Sindh continued to remain a peaceful province where people belonging to different sects, religions and schools of thought lived like brethren and respected one another’s beliefs, he said.

It was the history that Sindh never had any terrorists and extremists belonging to its land. No one practising its culture had till the recent past had been a member or abettor of any extremist and terrorist organisation, he claimed.

He said the sporadic incidents of terrorist acts in Shikarpur and Jacobabad on sectarian grounds had agonised the whole of Sindh. These two incidents were a wake-up call to all peace-loving people of this province, he added.

A large number of people, including schoolchildren and their teachers, from Larkana, Jacobabad, Khair­pur and other cities also took part in the festival. Students presented tableaus and different literary, cultural and educational organisations set up their stalls where cultural artefacts, books and other informative literature were displayed.

Nazim Chandio, Nayaba Sarkash Sindhi, Mukhtiar Samo, Fayaz Latif and Rizwan Gul presented their poetry carrying the message of peace. Prominent singers presented Sufi music.

Larkana Deputy Commi­ssioner Jawed Jagrani and SSP Kamran were the chief guests while Abdul Razzaque Soomro, Prof Mukhtiar Ahmed Sammoon, Larkana District Historical Society Secretary Prof

Dr Ameer Ali Abro, Mumtaz Bukhari, Dr Fayaz Latif, Rizwan Gul and Nisar Khokhar were guests of honour.

Published in Dawn, November 23rd, 2015