............and the day is coming to an end..... we sit back and think..... where we have been and where we are, and of course where we are headed. I do that, and I'm sure a lot of people think and analyze their own place in their lives, their needs, their wants, their aspirations and desires. Do we then spin our own home grown philosophies of how life should be led, of what's important? what must be given significance and what all is to be ignored. We all have our little set of rules, and norms and ways, by which we live our lives. But, how does one live in a war tortured city, where the next minute isn't assured, where people are falling like pins and no one seems to care?
Since the last 3 days Karachi is the scene of horrific ethnic violence and warfare. What started as gang wars for turf and territory has now taken the form of pure Pathans pitched against Mohajirs. Why? the pathans have had a sizeable population in the city for years on - they have leverage over some businesses such as public transport, manual construction labor, petrol pumps and so on. the Mohajirs generally form the lower and upper middle class, and by and large the salaried class in the city. Karachi is a metropolis - a large, in fact one of the largest cities of the world that is home to people who migrated from India in the partition of the Sub-Continent at the hands of the British in 1947. Since then Karachi being a port of entry in Pakistan became the economic hub and people moved from upcountry to get a share of the pie. And Karachi welcomed them all, there was space and work for everyone, areas became identified with members of certain ethnic origins as they tend to make houses close to people of their own culture, so we came to have Benaras Colony, largely populated by pathans and Orangi Town, a city within a city inhabited with Urdu speaking people. These were natural and automatic divisions, not intentional, but they have now come to represent separate and antagonistic polarities. Now they represent areas of conflict, fault lines, and generally sensitive divisions.
It is heart-rending to see Karachites becoming pawns and puppets at the hands of selfish leaders who do not have the courage to come back to this country. Why are pathans being riled by the PPP? Do they actually believe that making the Urdu speaking people enemy of my friend into my enemy they are serving their own long term interests or are merely playing in the hands of a greedy and myopic leadership.
How are we, the residents of Karachi, to respond to these mind boggling events? Do we just sit in front of our TV screens and computers and see the massacre that's taking place and abide the time till it ends as the day wanes, and then get up tomorrow morning as if nothing of consequence really happened and go about with our work? Isn't that what we have been doing since the past 15-20 years, since this ethnic chasm has been brought to the fore front and highlighted by the MQM, ANP and the Sindhi Mohaz. Are we to live in a war-zone today as in the past three days, suspend all work, and other plans of normal life, sit at home in fear, talk on the phone with friends and relatives about the 'Halat,' and ponder our lives and what would become of it if this is allowed to escalate, and then come morning start afresh as if nothing happened that is to be debated upon, thought of, and considered.
What is it to be living in these warped times and highly volatile unstable incendiary times where the next minute is not assured? Aren't the people of Karachi subject to and victim of "fear, paranoia, panic-attacks, anxiety, stress and mental anguish resulting in many compulsive-obsessive disorders." Have we a study of what is the impact of living in these dangerous times on the mind of our populace? Are we generally more depressed and show signs of mental lethargy more as in people living in far more stable and peaceful environment? How does this see sawing situation of war and peace impact the minds and emotions of our young children who are growing up in perpetual terror of things they do not understand? is there a correlation between sickness and these episodes of lawlessness in the city? Is my son sick of fever because of what he is hearing for the past two days --- "don't step out, you cannot possibly go to Seaview, nope to swimming" am I unable to sleep at night because somewhere not so far away some house ifs being burned, some woman is desperate for the return of her husband, her brother, her son -- who is most probably lying dead in a most undignified manner on some dirty road in a pool of dark congealed blood, which now looks less like blood and more like oil seeped out from an old car. Are we not humans any more? that we can just simply carry on living in comparative calm and not be constantly bothered and angry and sad and upset at whats happening around us!!!
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