Karachi,
today, is a violent urban jungle with an assortment of lowlifes keeping the
population hostage to their bastardly instincts. Consider the list of culprits.
There are the scions of Baloch and Sindhi sardars and waderas who move around in SUVs with guards
brandishing weapons (note that they do so because their elders are bigger scum,
thank you). Then there are the children of the urban rich who, having failed to
instil urban values in the sardars and waderas,
have adopted the latter’s rural-medieval mindset. There are crooked
politicians, their guards, political storm troopers; criminal gangs, ranging
from thieves and robbers to land grabbers to extortionists and murderers to
hired guns; cops on the take; a government split along ethnic lines; anyone who
can rent a gun and settle a score. Finally, add to this list the Taliban
terrorists and sectarian killers and you have, dear non-Karachi-ite reader,
what is Karachi.
At the centre of this is the majority of Karachi-ites, resigned
to their fate, living from day to day, a terrified, terrible existence.
Nothing I’ve said in the preceding paragraph will surprise
Karachi-ites. Karachi was not always like this but that’s another story. For
now, this is about what it has become.
Some of where (and how) Karachi became this hell is contained in
a long-forgotten report by a commission Mr Nawaz Sharif had set up in the 90s
under one General Shafiqur Rehman. This was the time the Marwat brothers were
running amok. My friend Mazhar Abbas, a journalist of high merit, who has seen
Karachi go to the dogs (or seen dogs come to Karachi, whichever way one puts
it) tells me that the then chief minister of Sindh, Jam Sadiq Ali, would not
provide security to the commission. They were holed up at the Sheraton and
people deposed before them in the hotel. Still, the report is worth a read.
Extortion is common practice.
Speak to businessmen and shopkeepers in the city and one realises the extent of the menace. People of all
ethnicities and political affiliations are involved in it. A very senior
journalist who constructed a house in Gulistan-e Jauhar received a call from
the Baloch Aman Committee and the caller, after congratulating him on the new
house, demanded that he pay up Rs100,000 to ensure safe living in his home.
The journalist went to the Sindh governor, the Sindh CM, the IG
Police, the CPLC, PFUJ, KUJ, the Presidency, you name it. Result: zip, zilch
and zero. He locked his home and has shifted to Islamabad. The man has a home
in Karachi and he is living in a rented house. Welcome to Karachi.
I asked Sheheryar Mirza, a young, freelance journalist, what the
hell is going on. He had more stories to tell. A police officer said the police
could clean up the city if only “we were given a free hand”. What does ‘free
hand’ mean, I asked Mirza. “In the case of Karachi, it means that police
officers will be allied with whoever is in power and their master’s enemies
will bear the full brunt of police’s coercive power.”
So, the answer is not just giving a free hand to the police but
creating a professional force that is politically neutral and whose work cannot
be hampered by politically influential individuals. “They know, for the most
part, what is going on,” says Mazhar, adding: “See, how quickly they have
rounded up the accused in Shahzeb Khan’s murder case with the SC’s backing.”
The young man’s murder was what got me talking to people.
Karachi has seen many killings. But for the most part they are either
politically motivated, are the result of extortion and land grabbing, or are
owed to terrorism. These menaces have come to define the city, unfortunately.
But what about the upscale localities of Clifton and Defence; why are they
insecure?
That is where the ‘respectable’ scum come in, treating citizens
like serfs, driving around with guards, drunk, partying, picking up girls and
very often raping and dumping them. “Why are such cases under-reported,” I asked
a friend. Because, he said, people are afraid. These families are influential
and killing a human being for them is like swatting a fly. Even if a case is
reported, the rich and influential criminals never get punished.
And the government? There is no government. Karachi has
political factions, even within the ruling coalition. The home department is
dysfunctional. Zulfiqar Mirza, who huffed and puffed about security and
governance, patronised criminals in Lyari. According to some estimates, he
issued licences for some 400,000 weapons. We are, of course, told no weapons
licences will be given until the elections. Is someone frikkin’ kidding us?
Shakir Husain, entrepreneur and writer, says it’s not just the
feudal families that act like this. “This is a mindset. They break traffic
rules, drive people off the roads; they can get away with anything.”
Some people are buying guns and acquiring guards as deterrence.
The trend will continue. Those who bend will crouch and take it lying down.
Those who say enough will also get into the killing game. Because what else can
one do, living with constant indignities and governmental apathy, but take the
war to the lowlifes, whether they reside inside or outside the government?
The police are not only corrupt and criminalised but also lacks
manpower, equipment, investigation skills and professional integrity and independence.
This is a recipe for disaster in Pakistan’s financial hub. To
imagine that the Sindh government and, by extension, the federal government can
mount effective counterterrorism operations in a city that the vermin of all
types hold by the short and curlies is to try and find one straight bone in
Rana Sanaullah.
Karachi needs to be cleansed;
from upper crust pests residing in upscale localities as much asfrom the thugs holed up in Orangi, Lyari and elsewhere. It needs political
commitment and an effective police and civil administration. This is obvious.
The question is, how.
You want to know when a system has become totally dysfunctional?
It is when the highest court in the land has to take suo-motu notice of a
murder case because the nation is being ruled by criminals.
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