Order and Anarchy

On 27th September, 2006, the Economic Coordination Committee of the federal cabinet gave its go – ahead to a deal worth $43.13 billion, to be entered into by the Port Qasim Authority on behalf of Pakistan and UAE based real estate developer Emaar Properties. The agreement envisages the transformation of two islands just off Karachi into modern model cities complete with all ameneities to support a self contained community. Dr. Ashfaq Hassan Khan, while divulging details about the agreement on Geo News TV channel, informed that the islands, Bundal and Buddo are just 1.5 Km from DHA Phase VIII. Emaar, with 85 per cent equity in the project, will develop the city in 13 years. The PQA will have 15 percent equity, in the shape of land.

On the same news program, giving out the details of the agreement, Dr. Ashfaq informed that the government has instructed the PQA to form a panel of legal and financial experts to come up with an agreement that would be vetted by the Federal Ministry for Law and Justice and that would require adequate guarantees from the UAE firm; apparently, this has to be done to ensure transparency and to ensure that proper and suitable operational procedures are followed. On the question of transparency, Dr. Ashfaq couldn’t answer the question regarding whether the government publicized the offer through advertisements. Although he told that there were four firms in the race for the contract out of which Emaar succeeded, he was unclear and ignorant about whether proper procedures were followed in inviting these companies. So there arises the primary question of transparency in the deal. Then, it was in news today that the Sind Chief Minister, Dr. Arbab Ghulam Rahim has been saying that the Sind government was not taken into confidence prior to the green light that was given by the ECC for the deal to go through.

In May 2006, Emaar signed $18 billion accord with Port Qasim Authorities to build a mixed-use development project comprising homes, hotels and golf courses in Karachi involving investment of $2.4 billion. These developments include a series of master planned communities that will set new benchmarks in commercial, residential and retail property within Pakistan. Emaar has already commenced the first – ever international sales of its overseas master – planned communities with Canyon Views in Islamabad.

Anyways, these were only the details of what this deal and other Emaar activities are all about. Although this would result in attracting foreign investment in the country, should one look at the larger implications of such projects? Given the objectives that such projects seek to achieve – providing quality housing and a high standard of living for the population being the most important – the answer should definitely be in the positive.

Keeping aside the case of Islamabad which, surely looks like somewhat detatched from the rest of the country in terms of facilities, planning and amenities, we look at Karachi; rather, we look at the rest of the country.

Karachi is home to the most chronic of problems any community could face. All around, one finds broken roads, high street crime, severely malfunctioning drainage system, pathetic state of affairs of public transportation, lack of access to clean drinking water in a number of localities, a large portion of the city covered by slums, etc. You name a civic problem and you’ll definitely find it in Karachi. Similar is the situation in more or less every part of the country.

All this, and the government wants to embark upon a project that advertises the most luxury. Infact, the government advisor (Dr. Ashfaq) translated the new city as no less than another Dubai. Oh my God!....A palace on an overflowing gutter!!

Some time back the government, through the Karachi Port Trust decided to gift the people of Karachi a giant water fountain on the coastline near Clifton. Thinking that the people were entertainment starved, the authorities decided to be considerate towards the poor people and acted to create an entertainment spot by installing a huge water fountain that would spew sewerage many many feet into the open air. In its frenzy, the City District Government Karachi has already embarked upon constructing the tallest building of the country at Hassan Square – that same Hassan Square that serves as home to the City Government’s offices and that same Hassan Square, where even the mildest of showers or even a slight drizzle would create a pool for the relevant departments’ officers to swim in.

Another example of a project which, thankfully hasn’t materialized yet but which seems to be in the pipeline, is the bullet train project. Nawaz Sharif was quite passionate about it. So is the current government. Nawaz Sharif wanted a study to be conducted upon its feasibility. The current government has commissioned the feasibility to be prepared. Now someone should tell the assholes who run the affairs of this unfortunately poor country of ours that a bullet train would certainly put a huge drain on the already tight resources, that first these guys should try to improve and sustain the already crippled railway system.

I’m not against such projects. But we should look at our priorities. Do we want to serve a small minority who already live in the wildest of luxuries or are we here to provide relief to the common man who travels from one corner of the city to the other in a public bus, thoroughly humiliated, to earn and to strive to provide a somewhat of a decent living to his family? Such huge and expensive projects suit only those societies which have walked a considerable distance to cover the rich – poor gap and which provide adequate measures for addressing all citizens’ needs.

So why do governments have a penchant to embark upon projects that don’t serve to be of any value to the majority of the country’s masses? It’s simple reasoning. Big projects bring big publicity. The government and its ministers are certain to recieve good credit for “making efforts in transforming the fate of the country” by initiating huge projects. It doesn’t matter if the projects are usefull or not; that’s another story. But if the same ministers would act to channel public money in repairing roads and sewerage lines, in providing access to clean drinking water and all such stuff at the micro level, the efforts would definitely not come to the notice of a wide spectrum of people in the society. This would ensure that their names die out from the collective memory of the masses. So infact, useless mega projects serve the vested interests of the government of the day.

God save the people from such governments.

The holy month of Ramadan is one great period that blesses the Muslims wherever they are. It always feels nice to experience that month. One feels so nice and comes out refreshed by the general atmosphere that prevails in Ramadan. Sharing experiences regarding the holy month would also be great. For that purpose, a special blog has been created where I, alongwith a number of different bloggers have decided to post about the holy month of Ramadan. The blog is called Ramadan-Kareem. Regarding the rationale of the blog, you are invited to read this post.

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Damage already being done by the Pope’s words in his speech in Germany, he donned the damage control garb and acted to issue apologies on Sunday and Wednesday, or more precisely, what he thought ot be an apology. Rather, it a further insult for the Muslims. Instead of the apology being in the manner of something like the Pope taking back his words, he insisted that worldwide Muslim anger was the result of an ‘unfortunate misunderstanding’. First, the Islamic faith is bad – mouthed and to add salt to the wound, a so – called apology is issued in which the Muslim intellect is doubted. It’s been repeatedly insisted by the Vatican that the portions of the speech that offended Muslims did not reflect the Pope’s personal opinion and thus, should not be used to hypothesize about the Pope’s intentions.

Reality, however, speaks another language. Since Joseph Ratzinger became Benedict XVI, there has been a continuous off and on ‘teaching’ to the world’s Muslims to persuade their young to snub violence. This indicates that he clearly thinks that violence makes a part of Islam. Then, how should Muslims not take offence at such utterances when the Vatican remains highly intolerant of other churches; if this is so, there is no reason why the Vatican shouldn’t be intolerant towards another faith. Any Pope is supposed to be a learned man. It is therfore, highly improbable that the utterances were not deliberate.

Already there are great distances between Islam and Christianity. The Pope’s speech and the subsequent ‘apologies’ have further enhanced these distances. The whole episode has only acted to sharpen divisions along religious lines. This at the time when the world is facing the most humiliating divisions in the shape of the American ‘war on terror’, has created an impression that the Church tacitly approves of the Bush Adventures, that the Church, like it condoned the ‘Nazi Holocaust’ under Pius XII, has its mark of approval on the widespread killing being done in Muslim lands all over the world under the banner of ‘war on terror’.

It’s highly unfortunate that the West in general and the Vatican in particular selects to ignore that  the reason that they see Muslims embroiled in violence is not religious but has largely political undertones. It’s a madieval conjecture that the continue to harbour and emphasize at the most unsuitable of times. This only creates further distrust and does not help the cause of a dialogue between the faits in any way.

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It seems that all too sudden, the Karachi Police has become trigger happy and a lot more paranoid but for all the wrong reasons. I assume that these guys must really have become tired and fedup at their dismal record of nabbing big time criminals. So to clean their tainted record, it seems, they’ve devised a unique method using which they can start claiming that they’re now in their high gears of protecting the ordinary citizens.

Looking from the other side, it gives a totally different view and one which should be regarded as more close to reality. Thus, one gets the impression that failing to defeat the outlaws, the Police has joined them. Evidence regarding the former impression is hard to get by but there have been a number of situations which corroborate the latter impression.

Dawn reports that

The sole bread-winner of a family, 26-year-old Asif, was gunned down by some trigger-happy policemen escorting a VIP on Stadium Road late on Tuesday night.

Following the incident, the police escort accompanying Shah Sirajul Haq sped away, leaving the lookers stunned over the shooting.On Sunday also, an innocent man was gunned down by police for merely ignoring a police signal to stop on Tariq Road.

To save their colleagues’ necks, the police decided to register an FIR but with distorted information by including that the source of the firing was unknown, this obviously contrary to the statement of young Asif’s friend who accompanied him when the incident happened.

On March 21, a man and his sister, identified as Feroz and Sabeeha, were killed and Feroz’s daughter Afsana and his brother Bhola were injured when a police mobile fled after opening fire at the family.

The subsequent (FIR 122/06) was registered against unknown killers at the Taimuria police station.

However, weeks later police achieved tranquility when they claimed that the family in question had a criminal record, describing swindling as their specialty.

There was another incident some time back when it was reported in the press that a man was dragged out of a police mobile on Dr. Ziauddin Ahmed Road near D. J. Science College and was shot dead. In that case too, the police managed to successfully attempt a rescue mission of its personnel by highlighting a criminal record.

Apparently, the police thinks that anyone with a criminal record is worthy of a bullet, without a proper trial. Given such mentality of the police, I wonder how and why are the real big fish of the crime scene roam around freely making a nuisacne out of the lives of common citizens.

I wonder why, just why do exmas exist, specially of the academic variety. As for me, I’ve started getting reaaly fedup of them. I mean every now and then there comes up a test out of nowhere and we hapless souls never get a chance to take a comfortable breath. Only a couple of weeks out of the previous tests and another battery of tests stands right in front of us. Other than that, there’s a constant bombardment of surprise quizes. I mean, wtf?

It was on Thursday after the Isha prayers, that the relative calm, at that time, of the night sky was broken by a couple of menacing loudspeakers some three blocks away from where I live. We have now gotten used to it as it happens every week at the time of Friday prayers. However, I’ve observed lately quite a number of mosques where loudspeakers have stopped blaring and any activity is only performed on the public address system installed inside the mosque and the sound seldom comes out of the sacred precincts. But on the other hand, there are still a number of mosques where loudspeakers don’t hesitate to frustrate others. And yesterday, when I was discussing the issue with some friends, I was told by a person that using loudspeakers for relaying speeches to the whole wide world outside the mosque is illegal; I was surprised by this piece of information as I have become used to the practice and have been ignoring it as something ordinary.

But the instance I’m talking about relating to Thursday night shocked my soul inside out. This time, in that holy precinct, a not so holy program was organized and some cleric was invited to deliver a talk to his unquestioning and servile followers regarding the concept of Khatm – e – Nabuwat (finality of Prophethood). This seemingly important and guiding topic was turned into a mere show of accusations, stereotyping and branding a whole lot of other Muslims as being out of the fold of Islam.

That ignorant Mullah, in his bullshit of a speech, tried his best to incite feelings of other muslims by fanning up sectarianism. He started by comparing the beliefs of the Lahori Group with the principles laid out in Islam regarding finality of Prophethood. But I don’t know if it was out of excitement or what (but I’d rather believe that it was deliberate), he started comparing beliefs of other muslims’ with his own, regarding the topic of his not – so – religious sermon. To add fuel to fire, on the basis of his ‘wise’ analysis, he started branding other sects as kafirs (non – believers), abusing the other sects’ learned personalities and accusing them of misleading and trying to make hostage the whole world of Islam. I certainly would not want to name the respective sects, but I believe that persons who are in the deeper know of things would certainly identify all.

When I narrated this whole episode to my friends, as I mentioned earlier, I was told that it calls for a double criminal count. One for using the loudspeaker and the other for employing the loudspeaker for malicious intent. I was asked by that person if I had called the Police and certainly I replied in the negative as I didn’t knew at that time if it really was a crime.

But this brings out one thing – that sectarianism in all its glory is alive and kicking and the dirty mullahs are all free to incite public sentiments.

During his visit to Germany, Pope Benedict XVI addressed about faith and reason and how they were inseparable and necessary for “that genuine dialogue of cultures and religions so urgently needed today.” In his wisdom, he treaded upon the subject of Jihad and termed the concept as opposed to religion. He further opposed, quoting a 14th-century Byzantine emperor, Manuel II Paleologos, that Islam was a faith that was spread on the back of the sword and in the same breath continued to malign Prophet Mohemmed (PBUH). He showed his belief in his speech regarding the unreasonabaleness of faith being spread by force and added that violence is incompatible with the nature of God and the nature of the soul.

Although a sense has come out of the Vatican bifurcating Islam into violent and non – violent versions, the Vatican spokesperson Rev. Federico Lombardi insists that the Pope was not trying to interpret Islam by providing an analysis that Islam was violent.

Whatever the spokesperson may say and how much explanation comes out of the Vatican, the fact is that the Pope tried to venture in a territory which, for him, was not appropriate. I mean who is the Pope to give messages regarding Islam while interpreting the religion according to his perceptions? He thinks Jihad is a repugnant concept. Does the Pope actually knows what really Jihad is? I doubt. He thinks that Islam has spread by force. This argument could never have any logic behind it. If Islam was to spread on the back of the sword, it would have ceased to attract followers and grow a long time back. The western world has a huge muslim population. Even though this population consists of a large number of migrants, but a lot of the local people follow Islam too. In the ‘free’ Western society, who has forced such a large part of the population to embrace Islam? Obviously, the followers’ own hearts and nobody else.

It seems that the Pope is confusing Islam and Islamism. Islam is a faith and Islamism consists of acts done in the name of the religion of Islam; these acts may or may not be  having Islamic ideology as their underlying objectives. However, thses acts majorly have political connotations and Islam is only used to cover them under a guise of sanctity so that they may find popular support. A great number of followers of Christianity and the late Pope John Paul II advocated a dialogue with the Muslim world, but such utterings do no do any good to any such efforts.

This speech has triggered a spate of angry protests amongst muslims. To dampen the impact, the Vatican was quick to respond hat the church seeks to cultivate an attitude of respect and dialogue toward other religions and cultures and obviously also toward Islam. Is it some kind of a joke or what? Respect is the first casualty of such thinking as reflected in the Pope’s speech and dialogue is the second.

There are plans of a Papal visit to Turkey in November but, according to International Herald Tribune, Turkey was amongst the countries that came out with some of the strongest protests:

“I do not think any good will come from the visit to the Muslim world of a person who has such ideas about Islam’s prophet,” Ali Bardakoglu, a cleric who is head of the Turkish government’s directorate of religious affairs, said in a television interview. “He should first of all replace the grudge in his heart with moral values and respect for the other.”

The following has been an apt observation:

“I don’t think the church should point a finger at extremist activities in other religions,” Aiman Mazyek, president of the Central Council of Muslims in Germany, told the newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung, pointedly recalling the Crusades, the Spanish Inquisition and the Vatican’s relations with Nazi Germany.”

Such utterances are a cause of concern for dialogue seeking Muslims and Christians alike as they only increase the distrust and gap that exists between the followers of Islam and Christianity. And certainly, the Pope owes an apology towards Muslims only because he thaught he was good enough to comment on affairs that, it seems, his mind was already confused about.

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