Politics of Blood: Is MQM the Target?

Farheen Rizvi on 15, Mar 2013 | 12 Comments | in Category: Debate Desk

Farheen Rizvi

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How did Karachi lose more than 50 people in Abbas Town with hundreds of apartments and shops reduced to rubble? One bomb-packed car rampaging around the neighborhood rummaged it all? Government announced the day of mourning on the incident but is anyone willing to claim responsibility for the act? No. Is anyone accountable for that? No. This only shows that meeting political ends in Pakistan mean far more than human values and all our law-enforcing agencies have failed.

We, Karachiites have seen countless sectarian eruptions since1980s where Shiite processions and neighborhoods were attacked by other sects. Last riot witnessed were during Zia era in Liaquatabad had many houses were burnt and Shiits were forced to leave the neighborhood. Then, the mercurial rise of Muttahidda Qaumi Movement as Muhajir Qaumi Movement changed the entire perspective of the city. MQM united both the sects under a common flagship and out of sectarian skirmish.

The “sectarian harmony” turned out to be the core strength of MQM, and both sects started to live peacefully under slogan of “Muhajirs”. The recent attack in Abbas Town is the example of that harmony; in this attack not only Shiite but many Sunni brothers living in a common locale lost their lives too. MQM has been enjoying this unique power over Karachi by winning more than 85% of the mandate of Karachi for decades.

Suddenly a new wave of Shiite killings has started in KPK, Baluchistan, South Punjab and Karachi. But this time it is worse and of fairly different nature. There are no neighbors or commoners involved in the killings but groups of terrorists under different labels are playing hooligans.

Unfortunately, there have been instances where politicians are found pulling each others’ collars for the mighty blame game and accusing intelligence agencies of having ties with these groups but no institution has so far taken any action against the cold-blooded killers. Let me add, Hamid Mir, in his recent column titled “A day in Khuzdar’ has proven the ties between intelligence agencies and some extremists groups in Baluchistan.

Reportedly, the electoral allies Ahle-Sunnat Wal Jamaat (ASWJ) with PML-N and Muttahida Wahdatul Muslemeen (MWM) is now allying with PTI for the upcoming elections. Both alliances will only affect the election results in Karachi by bifurcating the Urdu speaking vote bank among Shiites and Sunnis – just like before it was divided among Jamat Islami and PPP.

The described political scenario is no different than the concerns showed by MQM chief. Although Rehman Malik insists these attacks are only a part of delaying the election process because some hidden forces don’t want to see democratic process in Pakistan. Recently, he has accused two banned outfits, Tehreek Taliban and Lashkar Jhanvi, playing role in sabotaging election process. If the dots from Hamid Mir’s journalism to Rehman Malik’s information are correct then Altaf Hussain has correctly analyzed that these attacks in Karachi are against MQM’s democratic vote bank.

If banned outfits are playing the worse role for establishment then ASWJ and MWM are playing the clean role by dividing a democratic vote bank of MQM. But the two groups are unaware that they are throwing the 85% population of Karachi in the deadly sectarian division.

It is precisely the time for people of Pakistan especially Karachiites to come out with sectarian harmony against the forces bend on dividing them. We can’t forget the fact that Abbas Town is the Shiite dominated neighborhood but more than 30 Sunnis were killed in the attack too. If we live together and die together then we have to muster together to defeat the bad and evil forces. Whether Altaf Hussain’s concern is right or not but Karachi is not ready to go back in the history of sectarian riots and bloodshed which will not only cost us lives of our innocent people but also the solidarity and sovereignty of the country.

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Bijli

No – MQM is the source….have a you forgotten May 12 ? They are opportunist as always ..
truepakistani

MQM has been in power politics for long time. They have been taking extortion and land grabbing for long time. Do not see the MQM personal faces on media. The real MQM on the ground is entirely different. Their lofar and budmash workers terrorize common people. They have destroyed generations in college and universities. They even did not spare Urdu speaking people. They are wild pigs. They could do alot positive to save karachi. They are traitors. Imran khan is true leader. I am Urdu speaking karachite and my vote is for PTI.
Furkan Awan

According to my Observation and my Experience , MQM and COAS is upto something seriously ! and ABSOLUTELY NOT that MQM is innocent
fkarmymqm

so far shit-sunni under the flag of MQM u r right, but how do u classify other war (i.e. urdu speakings VS non-urdu speakings), were 1992, 1995, 1998 killings were a fight between shia and sunnis? was 12th may 2007 arena set in karachi were for killing shia and sunnis?

in karachi daily 5+ die, r they shia sunni clashes too?
Sameer Bezenjo

aHi
Vicky

Great article. Love it and agree with it.
Umar Farooq

they kill their own member and asking for sympathies by blaming other…thats the tactic….now u cant blame killer to be specific…it has become clearly generall..any1 can be…unless proven by evidences.
S Nasrullah

What characters? Certainly not Ali Imran, Safdar, Khawar, Tanvir, Juliana, Sir Sultan, Mr Rehman, T3B or Sing-hi? Even during my higher education in England, I regularly visited Town Center Library to read adventures of Imran in late 70s.
Anonymous

It is not a shame one is being a “Mahajir”. Those are all Mahajirs who migrated from their birth place and docile in other area. Islamabad is also a city of Mahajirs on becoming the Capital of Pakistan as its local population is about two and half percent Dehli (India) was also a city of Muhajirs (Migrated Peoples) as it remained hundreds years capital of Muslims India, British India and now Secular India. Historical heritage, names of old Mohallahs/colonies indicate this fact of Dehli that peoples docile there from all over the country. After Independence Karachi also become the Capital of Pakistan. In 1800 there was no sign of any population in this area. When British decided to establish a port in 1829 a small Goth of Baluch fisherman Kalachi was found near the port. A new city started growing by the businessman of Bombay comprising on Hindus, Parsi, Muslims specially Memon, Bhora etc. After partition peoples of all over the country migrated to Karachi from all over the Pakistan and the peoples migrated form India because it was the capital and the only port of Pakistan in search of jobs and better environment. Gen. Zia-ul-Haq, was a Mahajir, Nawaz Sharif is also a Mahajir, our Prophet Muhammad was also a Muhajir in Madina. Urdu is the language of all Muslims of India and Pakistan specially KPK (old NWFP) and Punjab. If the work of Pathans and Punjabis is ejected from Urdu there would be no language Urdu exist. The work of Mirza Asaullah ‘Khan’ Galib, Sir Syed Ahmed ‘Khan’, Moulana Zafar Ali Khan, Faiz Ahmed Faiz, Ahmed Fraz etc. can be excluded from Urdu?, Similarly Alama Iqbal, Mintom and number of urdu scolars of Punjab. But why Karachites are isolated by the word of “Mahajir” and “Urdu Speaking”. In cities specially in the capital city of a country, wise peoples accumulated there of that country and the Cities are the wisdom of that country. When the first dictator Ayub Khan occupied the country by force in 1958, the peoples of Karachi opposed his act and started movements against him for democracy until he was compelled to hold General Election in 1964. Mohtarma Fatima Jinnah fought election against him. Ayub Khan won the election, according to peoples through bogus voting. Karachites started protests against him and in response protests started all over the country against the dictator. To punish the Karachites Ayub Khan seeded the hatred amongst the peoples. He manage a group of Pakhtoon militants to attack the other all innocent peoples and they looted and burn dozens of houses in Nazimabad and Liaqatabad calling them “Mahajir” and the son of Ayub Khan leaded them and he himself on a jeep shoot gun fires on the streets of Nazimabad, Liaqatabad, Korangi, Landhi and many other areas to spread the harassment amongst the peoples of Karachi. Thus Pakhtoon Mahajirs (as they were also migrated to Karachi from NWFP) separated from other peoples to refrain Karachites to play leading roll in the countries politic. To protect the culture of unity of Pakistan in Karachi, the Karachites opposed the abolition of one Unit on the linguistic territorial basis instead proposed that all the 17 Divisions be upgraded as provinces on administrative basis (4 in East Pakistan and 13 in West Pakistan) and if it is not possible than at least Karachi should given status of Province to protect the culture of Unity that had colors of all areas of Pakistan. The Sindhi politicians and PPP called that Mahajir Suba Tehrek. and started to divide and divide Karachites in groups sects etc. because they afraid by the wisdon of the Karachites. Thus the political wisdom of Karachites become the enemy of them. Karachites were compelled to accept to be called Mahajirs due to continued addressing them Mahajir or Urdu Speaking by politicians before MQM and the word ‘Mahajir’ made like abuse or bad name. .
faisal

You sound like a typical Punjabi.

FYI, Muhajir is derogatory term used for “my people” by the natives, we never called ourselves Muhajir. But decades after the creation of Pakistan “my people” saw their communities discriminated against by the “son of the soils” in the name quota system, and we started using this term as a matter of pride to reflect that despite all the injustices we are still here and struggling.

We love Pakistan as much as anyone else, calling MQM anti-state actor exposes your hatred towards a community.
faisal

Listen brother, IMO, being a Sindhi or Balochi etc entails that you are born into that community or practice their great historical languages, customs and part of their heritage.

I don’t call myself a Muhajir, never seen or heard anyone in my family or circle use it to describe themselves, thats a derogatory label others give to me or my community. We are happy to call ourselves Pakistani. Despite that we take the label Muhajir as a matter of pride, it signifies the sacrifices our fathers made for this country.

We don’t speak native language, custom, heritage etc, not because we believe they are inferior, but we because as people, we have our own language and customs to practice and we are happy and comfortable with it. Calling ourselves Sindhi or Balochi etc will never solve our problem(quota system) as a community, because others will never accept us as part of their community anyways.
faisal

He is not from Karachi.

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