Living in Fear

Shia Gynaecologist Dr Suraiya Nisar was shot dead in Dera Ghazi Khan on Sunday June 6th. The event did not create much furor. It was one more death, one more statistic added to the every growing number of slain Shias in Pakistan.

I remember, a few years back, after a majlis, one of my relatives took out a white dupatta from her bag and wore it before leaving. “They can tell you’re Shia if you wear black in Muharram” she explained. What she left unexplained was, that if you are Shia, your life is at risk, especially in Muharram, a time when lots of Shias suddenly emerge. That incident left an impression on me. Another time, I recall going to a majlis in one of the city’s “sensitive” areas and seeing policemen stationed at the entrance. They weren’t really stationed, more like watching from their blue jeeps…once again, my mind registered it. I realized we lived in fear and as more and more “sectarian” attacks take place, our fear grows. But we are Karachiites after all, accustomed to occasional gunshot sounds and political unrest. After a while, life goes on.

I take issue with the way newspapers portray these attacks. It is made to sound as if there is some reciprocatory dynamic between Shias and those that kill them. One only has to read up a little to appreciate that this is a one-way brutal killing of a people. The murderers go unpunished and therefore seem elusive. Yet ironically we all know who they are. Inhuman men that preach hatred – self proclaimed servants of God whose sole mission is to rid Pakistan of Shias, one by one, going for the doctors whose mission is to rid people of ailments, to cure people, to help their community. Going for the driving force of society, the ones that help others, that help their community.
I ask myself why I want to go back to this country where scores of people have been persecuted due to no fault of their own? People who are killed in cold blood while they worship the same God that their killers vow to kill for the sake of, while they go on with life, unassuming, not expecting to be murdered in the next instant. And when shia youth burn tires and banks, they are arrested. Indeed causing damage to property is wrong, but what of taking lives? What is the recourse of these individuals who see sheer injustice done to their relatives, fathers, brothers and friends? What is our recourse? What do we do to avenge these killings? Who do we turn to when the state turns a blind eye and even some within our very community look to reasons within us to explain these killings?

This is personal and it is painful.

We need to address the misconceptions, the bigotry, the disguised hatred that many Muslims have for Shias. On this very site, a seemingly moderate member proclaimed how shias aren’t even real Muslims. Well, I ask you: who are you to decide? And I ask you to prod these stereotypes, this view you have of Shias as being chest-beating, fanatical, Hussain-Hussain chanting heretics. Address these deep-seated yet unacknowledged beliefs you hold. And I ask you: does anyone deserve to die this way?

Dr. Suraiya Nisar – an inconspicuous name for a shia. It wasn’t Zenab Abbas or Zehra Mehdi – but they knew. Doctors have changed their names to escape this prosecution – another indication of our fear. But what exactly is one to do under such circumstances? Every morning I check Pakistani newspaper sites with a lagging fear, paranoia, a hesitation, dreading that piece of news. 2 killed, 40 killed…and every time it isn’t there, I say a silent prayer of thanks. Will it ever end?