Murder Most Foul

Re: digit

I understand what you are saying. Let us look at the roots of the present situation. Both India and Pakistan inherited similar legal institutions and law enforcement infrastructure. Both the nations had relatively similar cultures. The political leadership of Muslim League and Congress were part of the same political environment. So what was different between how India and Pakistan have developed ? The difference lies in the post-partition agenda set for the nation by the political leadership.

India was lucky that its political leadership was able to rise above the partition holocaust and concentrate on the development of the nation. A positive, inclusive agenda was developed and people were encouraged to think along these lines. The implementation may not have been perfect but it was able to bridge the vast ethnic, religious and linguistic divisions relatively well. This agenda has also helped Indians to transition from a backward to a modern society. Just to give you an example, recently a South Indian friend of mine from Kerala had a love marriage with a Sikh girl who was his coworker. Nobody even bothered to object. You should have seen the combination of South Indian rituals and Bhangra. This sort of thing is becoming common.

In Pakistan, the political leadership has only one point on the agenda - competition with India. This all consuming obsession has hollowed out Pakistani society. Who has the time to improve the economy or develop a better society when all the energy is spent on India bashing ? Consider the situation in Bangladesh. Bangladesh is also a relatively large muslim nation in the subcontinent but it is not obsessed with India. It started out in a very bad shape but it has managed to chart out a positive agenda. As a result it has made significant progress and it is surely not dominated by India. Unfortunately Pakistanis just do not get it. If they give up the India fixation and concentrate on becoming the best possible muslim nation, it will be a totally different place.

Amit -

Interesting...you make good points. Pakistan is a society that seems to be infatuated with ``the enemy``. However, I think the issue is more deep than that. It`s pakistani`s unwillingness to take action that makes things bad. A very, very small minority performs the crime - we can`t outright blame the entire society for each specific crime. What troubles me is that there seems to be no impedement to the crime. Laws are useless without a functional legal institution, coupled with a functional law enforcement mechanism. India is light-years ahead of Pakistan in this area...

Zakkk -

Interesting tid-bits. Good to hear news of demonstrations. Hopefully they`ll spread...

Also interesting to hear on Saima`s ex...innocent until proven guilty. Hope he`s well...

Naxal -

``If a woman is shot by her family while trying to obtain a divorce from her husband it is a crime

against a woman...``

Technically, but that doesn`t qualify the crime is better or worse....

``Crimes against women are crimes against all of society and effect all

people in that society but they are still gender based.``

So what? Some are racial based, some are religous based, some are based on individual grudges, some are done in the process of other criminal actions.

The nature of the crime stays the same: it`s barbaric. People find their own reasons to kill. The end result is the same.

``If i talk about a crime against women i do

have a political agenda becuase it has to stop!``

Feminism is not about stopping violence. That should be the goal of every Pakistani. Feminism is about molding society to fit a particular group`s narrow view of what it should be. They`re no different from the much loathed and bearded ``fundamentalists``. I`ve met feminsits who hate just as much as religious-bigots, i.e. people who hate becuase they think their religion is a social club, and non-members (who need-not apply) are scum. I don`t want such fanatical people using this tradegy for their own objectives (which in the end will do nothing to stop the violence).

Re: Ferozek and others

Have you ever wondered why Pakistani society has become so brutalized and violent ? It was never like this before. North Indian muslims were known for their civilized, polished and cultured behavior. During the middle ages, there were liberal rulers like Akbar and Sher Shah Suri who valued merit and included every community including hindus in running India. I wonder what they would think of Pakistan or the Taleban. Even in the past two centuries, you see leaders like Sir Syed, Maulana Azad, Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan and Jinnah. These people were visionaries. Maulana Azad and Ghaffar Khan were of Afghan/Pathan extraction, yet they were extremely learned and liberal in outlook.

I feel that the basic mistake made in Pakistan was to let the partition refugees from India, especially east Punjab and UP to take over the newly created nation. The trauma that these refugees went through, left an irreversible hatred of India and hindus in their hearts. This hatred became the defining force in establishing the policies in Pakistan. The Muslim League leadership always had an opposition mindset to the Congress. The net result was a new nation that was shaped completely by negative emotions. The establishment in Pakistan has a vested interest in maintaining this hatred via Kashmir in order to keep their privileged position. This generation after generation of hatred that is propagated in families, schools, mosques, media etc. has resulted in the brutalization of Pakistani society. It is finding its outlet as violence against anyone that disagrees with you or is slightly different from you.

India could have also gone in this direction, if it had allowed the refugees from Pakistan to set the agenda. These people such as the Advani types have the same intensity of hatred against Pakistanis. Fortunately India was able to rise above these emotions and it is to the credit of Nehru that he was able to stamp out the possibility of communal hatred setting the agenda in India.

Via a vis the ongoing debate between AA and FerozK ( both of whose opinions I have come to value , during my time on the chowk ) ..I was reminded of something the writer Ayaz Amir said about Pakistani`s ..their 2 distinctive characteristics ..their fatalism and their emotionalism

To answer a few questions ...

about the lack of outrage or action ..there was a demonstration in Peshawar against what happened ..as well as in islamabad ..and Lahore ..the dangers ..that the ones in pesh came close to facing can be read in Zeejahs other article ..if u guys want I`ll get her to put that up as well ...

At present Samia`s father is said to be hiding in the homes of his friendswho are either MNA`s or Senators

My own personal belief about Capital punishment is that it can be justified ..when u take in the cost of keeping a person in prison for their whole life ...and the firm belief that some crimianls are habitual and beyond any form of rehab .

Another point is about Samia ...and what has been said in the newspapers ..which claim that her ex husband was abusive ..he was not ...the maraige was incompatible ..although the guy was infatuated with her ..she wished to remarry to some guy in the army ( that her parents thought were below them socially ) ..besides that her rep was not good generally as far as what ppl would say ...but in comparison to what her father was and is she was an angel ( and even if she was not ..it does not allow the taking of a life ) ...it is sad though her ex husband ...is said to be near suicidal now ...

In response to ``I`m also sick of how people are trying to use this murder to further their political agendas. Feminists try to blame the acceptance of this crime on Islam, tribal customs, etc. They`re trying to make this stricly an issue of gender-related violence.``

If a woman is shot by her family while trying to obtain a divorce from her husband it is a crime against a woman. She was shot becuase she was a woman. Honor killings, karokari etc are crimes aginst woman. Crimes against women are crimes against all of society and effect all people in that society but they are still gender based. If i talk about a crime against women i do have a political agenda becuase it has to stop!

FYI

4000 or so copies of the Economist were confiscated by Pakistani Customs officials at Karachi airport. The rot in Pakistan can read... apparently.

Mo-I atish dida hai Halqa meri zanjeer ka!

Re: jay

I have never believed that religion is a solution to anything. On the contary, I have always thought that religion should be ignored all together.

Re; Temporal and SR

Points well taken; no sense in beating a dead horse and then blaming it for being dead! :)

Re: digit

Completely agreed!

Re: AA

First of all this was an interesting tete a tete.

Couple of things about me, which my help to explain my irreverence to you et al; one; never take anything I say personally, because if you do, I will find ways to offend you and will know how to emotionally upset you. I have a real, real twisted sense of humor coupled with a morbid cynicism, which just irks people to no end. Secondly; given what I do, I have learned that there are causes one can fight for and then there are other causes, which are just pipe dreams and you should pick your fights when you can win them. I do not believe in Phrryic victories.

You are more than welcome to formulate a ``language of resistence``, but do not be suprised if the world refuses to listen to it. Also, passing a slew of laws will not help, because making something illegal is not a preventive measure against it happening again. If the world wants to safe itself, I will give it a helping hand, but it has to ask for my help. As to lost causes and false hopes, I have no time to invest in such ventures.

Lets say, for argument`s sake, how will the laws stop this crime from happening again.

What laws would like to see passed in Pakistan to prevent such things and who is going to enforce them?

Which laws and based on what legal doctrine, sharia or civil-common law, should they be passed upon and who should decide, which laws should be applicable and who will enforce these laws and according to what criteras?

This problem, as you suggest, can be solved, but it will not be solved until Pakistani society determines under which legal system it wants to judged under. As long as there is a legal tussle to settle this issue, there will never emerge a coherent body of law, which can restore the legality of Pakistani courts to enforce justice. Pakistani needs to decide if it wants its legal system based on sharia or the Anglo-Saxon legal traditions, which the British bequeated to it. It can not delay the resolution to this problem, because it only reinforces anarchy in Pakistan.

Before we get ready tom pass all sorts of laws, we have find a way of dealing with the logistics of enforcing such laws. What you are suggesting is too far in the distence and Pakistan`s basic needs are a restructing of its insitutions to perform effectivily and not giving them more resonsibilities, which they are ill-equiped to deal with at the present time.

I am sorry to say this, but his crime is merely a symptom of what is wrong with Pakistan. Pakistan`s problems are much deeper than ``honor killings`` and to understand why it happens, we have to delve further into the internal workings of the Pakistani society in order to understand what happened to our post-independence dream.

Again, I am sorry if my generalized characterization of Pakistanis offends people, but we, as a nation, have moved beyond the discussion of mannerisms. Pakistan`s problems need to be discussed honestly and with dispassion and if reality offends people, then they should get over it, because our problems will not be solved by being nice to each other, but by making hard choices. If we as a nation are willing to make those choices then Pakistan`s future can be salvaged, but if we are not, then all we do to help Pakistan is a moot point.

AA, and to all like you who feel strongly about this issue, I wish you all the best in the world, but remember some times there are fights you can not win and there are people who do not want to be convinced otherwise and in such cases, it is better walk away and live to fight another day than to risk all on a losing roll of the dice.

PS: Thanks for the critque of my grammar skills!

Understanding Ferzok,

The argument of Ferzok is fascinating. Murders will continue as long as some one is determined to commit it. The only way to prevent it is to change the minds of every one. Pretty simple and straight forward, this is usually the contour of arguement of all the `johovas witness` and other religious one dimensional thinkers. They recommend more dose of religion, the variety they are selling.

The sad aspect of the events in pakistan is that the much condemned acts have sanctions in the religion, or at least that is what many think.

Ferzok mind does not appear to recognise any scope for political and legal action. A simple legal statute that all `un-natural` deaths will be investigated could be a starting point.

Ferzok wants to change the human mind, punishment meted out to the criminal could help his cause.

This is not just an issue of gender related violence. Crimes of such a nature are a part of a greater problem. In so far as I know, any kind of violence is met with the same degree of apathy. Most people feel it sufficent to feel ``heartsick``.

Where is the protest? Where is the demand for justice? A handful of people can`t do it alone. There must be a MASS uprising. A show that this kind of stuff WILL NOT be condoned. But the people never seem to care enough....



I recall my cousin (an accountant) who worked as a civilian for the army being killed by a medium ranking officer (a leutenant or something). The police simply laughed. The army ignored his mothers requests for an investigation. All my family could do was bury the man. Civilians can`t do anything against the army...

Even the media wasn`t interested in this story. Perhaps because this kind of thing happens very frequently. Mose likely because they didn`t care. Our neighbours reaction, although they felt pity, was that of acceptance. As if they were saying ``Oh well, get on with life...you`ll get over it``. As if this was a death by natural causes!

I mourn Saima`s death because it was a great injustice. What makes me sick is that (like in the case of my cousin) nothing is being done about it. What makes me sick even more is that people *accept * the murder.

On another note, I`m also sick of how people are trying to use this murder to further their political agendas. Feminists try to blame the acceptance of this crime on Islam, tribal customs, etc. They`re trying to make this stricly an issue of gender-related violence. The so-called religious parties, not to be outdone by the femminists in their insanity, are somehow trying to pin this on Asma Jehangir.

The issue is much more deep than we like to admit. This sickness of apathy is something that affects Pakistanis as a whole, whatever their creed, status, or political bias be. Pakistan is an anarchy...plain and simple. Anything goes, and the Pakistani people seem to submit themselves to this kind of life. Murder....no problem for Paki`s. Survival of the fittiest. Law of the bloody freakin` jungle.

Re: Ferozk

Here we go again. As usual, you do not bother with giving any arguments to support your positions. As usual, you try to pigeon hole people who dont agree with your inane and useless analyses to be ``liberals``...

You say passing draconian laws will not change anything...only you can call a law which recognizes Domestic Violence as a crime draconian...only you can call a law which repeals the hudood laws draconian...

As your ``deep and insightful`` analysis shows, you are incapable of seeing that the laws of a society and the social consiousness are not independent but feed off one another...

Few people are shocked by this particular crime because most of us know that these things go on in our society...however, why should people not have a discussion and use it as a rallying point for social change the starting point of which will be lobbying for passing of laws which protect the oppressed in this case...(oh I am sorry, may be my language is beginning to smack of liberalism)...to you, those laws are probably draconian...to most sane people, they are absolutely required.

On collective impotence and general misbehaviors:


That`s a nice phrase, temporal and thanks for shaking us out of the land of personal insults. I agree with your analysis. It probably is a general impotence that we all feel in reaction to the situation in Pakistan. Impotence, bitterness, cynicism...and although I do not wish to converge all these emotions into personal insults, some constructive critique could be good. Ferozk, I realize, is not all fangs and fur. A deeply responsive human emerges within these spaces. A person who responds immediately to anything he can to put others down; if I pose arguments, he calls them ``emotional rhetoric``. A true Pakistani trait, he reflects, is to assassinate the person the Pakistani disagrees with. It saddens me to see ALL Pakistanis (a nation of how many million?) to be cast as disagreeable assassins. If I argue at this point that calling a nation this,is ridiculous, and to his main point: reducing all wrongs to ``personal responsibility`` is not (may not be) a viable argument when there are institutional failures: instead of responding directly, he expects MORE from a person of my caliber. While his disappointment in me doesn`t quite shatter my psyche, his conclusory, baseless, assumption that Pakistan is not ready for a pluralistic society, is intolerant of dissent, grounded in ONLY my intolerance for dissent, shatters me with quiet laughter.

If I respond with dismissal or emotion to ferozk` jokes- his calling Pakistanis assassins, his calling me intolerant, his saying let dead people deal with dead, and kicking the world over the edge..:), I`ve played into his trap. He has succeeded in pushing all my right buttons, and has riled me up. I ask friends for sincere advice: who riles people up just for fun? Why does one feel the need to push people`s buttons to invoke a mind game series? He says: ``In all honesty, my little plan worked! As a habit, picked up a long time ago, I love to rile people up and I guess, I pushed all your right buttons..``

Yes you did ferozk. I understand you better now. Not all fangs and fur..through my computer screen, my imagination helps me conjure up the image of a real human being ...albeit evolutionarily challenged..:) oops sorry wrong button.

Re: AA & FerozK

I join my friend, Mr. Temporal, in requesting both of you good people to give each other the benifit of doubt and side step the verbal land mines. This kind of `antagonism` can be easily resolved with a friendly outcome in a face to face discussion where people can hear the intonation of voice, see facial expressions and the body language etc. In this forum, however, it is more likely to create misunderstandings and aggrevate both of you to the peril of the general discussion.

Please do not be offended by this `interference`, it is meant as a friendly request, not a reprimand.

...SR

FYI:

Couple of items a friend sent me.

Following is an article from The Economists` latest issue, May 22-28,
1999.
----


The rot in Pakistan
¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯

This is not the time for the IMF and the World Bank to be lending money
to Pakistan


“DEVELOPMENT”, wrote James Wolfensohn, the president of the World Bank,
earlier this year, “requires good governance, meaning open, transparent,
accountable public institutions.” Over the past year or two of economic
turmoil in Asia—turmoil caused, in the view of many, by a lack of
governmental accountability—Mr Wolfensohn’s prescription has become a
favourite theme in the corridors of the World Bank and the IMF. So when
a government sets about undermining the institutions designed to hold it
in check, it is time to start thinking about shutting off the flow of
money.

Pakistan has been run by such dreadful governments for so long that it
seems barely worth remarking on any deterioration. But whereas previous
governments were chaotic in their awfulness, this one has turned out to
be systematic. Over the past two years Nawaz Sharif, the prime minister,
has been picking off individuals and institutions that he believes pose
any threat to his own power. He has seen off a president and the chief
of the army staff, and is now trying to push through a constitutional
amendment that would give him sweeping powers to ignore Pakistan’s
legislature and provincial governments in the name of Islamisation.

The judiciary at first tried to check Mr Sharif, but has given up. When
the chief justice of the Supreme Court, Sajjad Ali Shah, took the
president’s side in an argument with the prime minister in 1997, a mob
from Mr Sharif’s party stormed the Supreme Court and Mr Sharif sacked Mr
Shah. The courts have given Mr Sharif little trouble since.

This year it is the turn of the press. A few months back, the Jang
Group of newspapers had its bank accounts frozen and its newsprint
confiscated. Now Najam Sethi, a newspaper publisher and editor (and a
former correspondent of The Economist), is being held without charge,
accused, by government press releases, of working for both the CIA and
Indian intelligence. The government insists that his arrest has nothing
to do with a campaign against the press—which makes it odd, then, that
all copies of his paper, the Friday Times, were seized last week, and
that its website has been jammed.

All this is unfortunate for Pakistanis, of course, but should it really
matter to those who hand out the money? Yes. Without an independent
judiciary and a free press, there is little chance of the accountability
and openness that Mr Wolfensohn regards as essential to development.

Signs already abound that money which should have been spent on
development is being wasted. A scheme to help poor Pakistanis become
taxi-drivers has involved the distribution of concessional loans at
politicians’ discretion. Neither the grand Islamabad-Lahore highway nor
the unnecessary new airport at Karachi is justified by economics.

Mr Sharif’s predecessor, Benazir Bhutto, has just been sentenced in
absentia to five years in jail for corruption. Mr Shah, the sacked chief
justice, had agreed to hear corruption charges against Mr Sharif, but
was sacked shortly afterwards. Mr Sharif’s family has been tainted by a
High Court judgment in London against his father and two brothers in
March, ordering them to repay $32.5m in loans taken out from a Saudi
finance house for a paper mill owned by the family. Mr Sethi had written
a sharp editorial commenting on this judgment the week before he was
arrested.

Before the end of the month, the IMF’s board is due to consider
releasing the next tranche of a $1.6 billion loan. It should think long
and hard about whether Mr Sharif’s Pakistan is really likely to use the
money well. Of course, there are many badly governed countries in the
world, but some of them, often thanks to prodding from outside, have
been moving in the right direction. Pakistan under Mr Sharif is moving
in the wrong direction. It seems perverse to give it more cash to speed
it on its way.

The counter-argument that carries most weight with the United
States—which has much influence in these matters—is that the
alternatives to Mr Sharif’s government are even nastier. Afghanistan,
over the border, is run by the Taliban, a bunch of fearsome Islamic
zealots. Pakistan is a nuclear power. Nobody in the West wants a nuclear
Taliban.
Who’s the bogeyman?

This argument is favoured by many unattractive governments. It often
works. It got the sanctions that had been applied after Pakistan’s
nuclear test last year lifted only six months later. It got Boris
Yeltsin boatloads of money: all he had to do was hold up the spectre of
the ultra-nationalist Vladimir Zhirinovsky, or the Communists, or both,
and another cheque was written. The procedure has the merit, sometimes,
of genuinely preventing villains from taking over. Its flaw, though, is
that it usually prevents any decent alternative to the gang in power
from emerging.

Anyway, the bogeyman threat is even less convincing in Pakistan than it
was in Russia. Pakistanis show little enthusiasm for Taliban-style
politics. Fundamentalist parties got 5% of the vote in the last
election. They hate each other even more than they hate the secular
elite, so it would be hard for any one group to impose its views on the
country. And the further Mr Sharif goes in undermining the few checks on
his own power, the harder it will be to tell the difference between him
and the bogey that might replace him. Pakistan needs an accountable
government; then the money can follow.
----

here is an addendum.

Tuesday, May 25, 1999 Published at 13:16 GMT 14:16 UK

Economist magazines seized in Pakistan


Economist magazines seized in Pakistan

The Pakistani authorities have seized four-thousand copies of the
Economist magazine at Karachi airport.

The Asia edition of the issue carries a cover story highlighting recent
disputes between the government and the press, and arguing that the
government is trying to undermine
institutions designed to hold it in check.

A London spokesperson for the magazine said it had been given no reason
for the edition being blocked and it hoped the Pakistani government
would allow copies to be distributed. Ten
days ago a Pakistani newspaper, The Friday Times, also had distribution
problems when its copies were seized in the city of Lahore.

It`s editor, Najam Sethi, is currently in detention being investigated
for anti-state activities.

The Pakistani government insists that it is committed to press freedom.

From the newsroom of the BBC World Service

Sohail:

Stand corrected. Totally mis-read your line.


AA & Feroze:

It is a sign of our collective impotence when we wish to bash each other`s head to smithereens. As far as I can understand from these and previous inter acts you two express the same thinking, albeit in different words, on most subjects.

Granted, Samia is gone and tomorrow another thousand thousand Samias will meet the same fate. And we will cry and suffer in agony over their fate; in public or in private.

This impotence is suffocating. For all tears shed nothing changes. Worse, there is no hope over the horizon.

That one time small shopkeeper, turned President of Sarhad Chamber of Commerce Ghulam Mohammad Sarwar (Samia`s father---re: Faisal) has registered an FIR implicating Asma and Hina and Dasstak et all in Samia`s murder! What mockery!

Chief Justice Ajmal Mian dismisses the case against those who stormed the Supreme Court last year. Lack of evidence? Who were those faces in the video that Cowasjee supplied you with alongwith eyewitness statements under oath? Muppets? What mockery!


Can we lodge a case against these jokers in the World Court?

Sharing your pain, AA, Feroz and others,

impotently,

Re: AA

It would help you to discuss this issue with me if you kept to logic and not to emotionally laden rhetoric and besides, calling me C3PO will not help your cause either! :)

Couple of things. First, it is such a true Pakistani trait to assassinate the character of the person one disagrees with and secondly, it is almost reaching the proportions of a national past time in Pakistan to ignore the message and shoot the messenger.

I was extremely disappointed, because I had expected more from a person of your calibre and not a personal tirade directed against me! On the other hand, your example confirms my worst fears that Pakistan is not ready for plurism in its society, because it can not tolerate dissenting opinions.

In all honesty, my little plan worked! As a habit, picked up a long time ago, I love to rile people up and I guess, I pushed all your right buttons, because you seemed to be seething at me through your posts. :)

I love to be irreverent and if I see a scared cow, I just get ready to BBQ it!

My advice, if you should care to accept it, would be to rein in your emotions and learn to tolerate opinions that anger you to no end. Learn to relax and quit taking life so seriously, because life is a bad joke and you need learn how to laugh at its little pecucularities. :)

An FIR was filed against Asma and Hina. This news comes at a time when the government has launched a systematic assault on NGOs especially those doing women`s and human rights work, and a crack down on press freedoms. What next? People`s reactions do matter. Whether we express our sense of outrage through cyberspace across borders, protest on the streets, or write to the government. It may not achieve anything. However, it is still better than not crying, lamenting, speaking out - apathy is not a choice as we articulate a language of resistance.

Re: ferozk
It is useless to have a meaningful discussion with you Ferozk. When it boils down to the dead dealing with the dead and kicking the world over the edge, and individualist philosophy to the extreme, it definitely doesn`t help me place a face and mind to your words, except fur, antennas, fangs, rabies, metallic stuffs, and a scattering of wiring..