SpicyTricks

  برسوں سے میں خاصا ہرجائی ہو گیا ہوں۔ یہ بات خود میں نے بھی محسوس کی ہے اور میرے دوست بھی یہ بات میرے نوٹس میں لائے ہیں۔ اس ہرجائی پن کی ایک نمایاں مثال یہ ہے کہ میں اپنا برانڈ مستقل تبدیل کرنے میں لگا ہوا ہوں اور ظاہر ہے کہ اس میں میرا کوئی قصور نہیں کیونکہ جس سگریٹ کو میں ہاتھ لگاتا ہوں وہ یا تو مارکیٹ سے غائب ہو جاتا ہے یا مہنگا ہو جاتا ہے۔ دو چار دن تک میں وفاداری بشرط استواری کے اصول پر عمل کرتے ہوئے وہ سگریٹ ہر قیمت پر حاصل کرنے کی کوشش کرتا ہوں اور اپنی اس قربانی پر خوش بھی ہوتا ہوں جو میں نے اپنے محبوب(برانڈ) کی خاطر دی مگر پھر کچھ عرصے بعد ہمت جواب دے جاتی ہے اور میں کسی مناسب برانڈ کی تلاش میں نکل کھڑا ہوتا ہوں لیکن ہوتا یوں ہے کہ جونہی میں کسی نئے برانڈ پر دستِ شفقت رکھتا ہوں کچھ عرصے بعد وہ بھی مارکیٹ سے غائب ہو جاتا ہے اور یوں مجبوراً کسی نئے سگریٹ سے تعلقات استوار کرنا پڑتے ہیں۔

میرے دوست مجھے یوں برانڈ تبدیل کرتا دیکھتے ہیں تو وہ ہمیشہ پریشان ہوتے ہیں، انہوں نے کئی بار سمجھایا کہ کسی ایک برانڈ پر قناعت کرو۔ روز روز برانڈ تبدیل کرنے سے گلا خراب ہو جاتا ہے لیکن مقدر میں کھجل ہونا ہی لکھا ہو تو کیا ہو سکتا ہے۔ چنانچہ میں ان کے مشوروں کی روشنی میں کسی ایک سگریٹ کے ساتھ ’’روابط‘‘ بڑھانے کی کوشش کرتا ہوں مگر نتیجہ پھر وہی ڈھاک کے تین پات نکلتا ہے۔ یعنی وہ سگریٹ بازار سے غائب ہو جاتے ہیں۔

تاہم گزشتہ پانچ چھ برس کے مسلسل تجربے سے میں اس نتیجے پر پہنچا ہوں کہ دوستوں کا پُرخلوص مشورہ اپنی جگہ لیکن برانڈ تبدیل کرنے کے سلسلے میں ان کے بتائے ہوئے نقصانات کا اندازہ مبنی برصداقت نہیں ہے۔ میں نے محسوس کیا ہے کہ اس طویل عرصہ میں متعدد برانڈ تبدیل کرنے کے باوجود گلا بالکل درست حالت میں ہے اور کبھی اگرگلے میں تھوڑی بہت خراش محسوس بھی ہوتی ہے تو مجھے کون سا کسی مہدی حسن کو کمپیٹ کرنا ہے کہ اس ذرا سی خراش سے گھبرا کر کوچۂ رقیب میں سر کے بل جائوں، یوں بھی لوہے کو لوہا کاٹتا ہے۔ یعنی برانڈ اگر ڈاج دے تو اس کا حل یہی ہے کہ اس کے پیچھے کھجل ہونے کی بجائے اس کا نعم البدل تلاش کر لیا جائے کہ اس تلاش کے دوران بسا اوقات زیادہ بہتر چیز ہاتھ آ جاتی ہے اندھے کے ہاتھ بٹیرا بھی تو اسی طرح آیا تھا۔

اور اب اگرآپ سچی بات پوچھیں تو اپنے محبوب برانڈ کی خاطر قربانیاں دینے کی بجائے ذرا سی پریشانی کی صورت میں کوئی نیا برانڈ تلاش کرنے کی منطق ہمارے بعض سیاسی دوستوں نے مجھے سمجھائی ہے وہ مجھے مسلسل یہ سمجھانے میں لگے رہے ہیں کہ وفا داریاں صورتحال کے ساتھ بدلتی رہتی ہیں۔ اس دنیا میں زندہ رہنے کے لئے ضروری ہے کہ انسان اپنے مفادات کو تمام اصول و ضوابط اور قدروں پر ترجیح دے۔ ان سیاسی دوستوں کا کہنا ہے کہ تم کسی ایک برانڈ کی خاطر ذلیل و خوار ہوتے رہو گے اور ’’برانڈ‘‘ ہو کر رہ جائو گے اس کے برعکس تمہارا پسندیدہ برانڈ جب چاہے گا تم سے منہ پھیرلے گا اور اور اس کے نتیجے میں تم:

پھرتے ہیں میر خوار کوئی پوچھتا نہیں

اس عاشقی میں عزتِ سادات بھی گئی

گنگناتے پھرو گے۔ مجھے ان دوستوں نے اپنی بات ماضی اور حال کے متعدد حوالوں سے بھی سمجھانے کی کوشش کی ہے اور مثالیں دے کر بتایا کہ جن لوگوں نے بوقتِ ضرورت برانڈ تبدیل کرلیا وہ نہ صرف یہ کہ فائدے میں رہے بلکہ ان پر ہرجائی کا لیبل بھی نہیں لگا اور جنہوں نے پرانے برانڈ کے ساتھ چپکنے کی کوشش کی انہوں نے شدید تکلیفیں اٹھائیں۔

اپنے دوستوں کی یہ بات میرے دل کو لگی ہے لیکن مصیبت یہ ہے کہ میر تقی میر میرے گوڈے گٹوں میں بیٹھ چکے ہیں اور جب کبھی برانڈ تبدیل کرنے کی نوبت آتی ہے وہ میرے سامنے آن کھڑے ہوتے ہیں اور ارشاد فرماتے ہیں:

اپنی تو جہاں آنکھ لڑی پھر وہیں

Published in The News , November 11th, 2012.
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Published in The Express Tribune, November 11th, 2012.
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Published in Daily Dunya , November 11th, 2012.
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Published in Daily Express , November 11th, 2012.
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The Supreme Court showed its anger yet again with the government. This time it was about not taking care of the Taliban threat in Karachi. Thus, the Sindh government was ordered to cancel the bail of about thirty-five odd people who have been freed on parole. It is indeed heartening that an important institution of the state has taken notice of the problem. However, the process of belling the Taliban cat cannot happen without strengthening a number of inter-connected processes.

First and foremost is the issue of reassessing the state’s strategic goals and changing the manner in which such decisions are made. I would imagine that the ‘Taliban’ was being used by the superior court as a generic term which includes all sorts of jihadi groups operating in Karachi, in particular, and Sindh province in general. The Court must ask how and why the jihadis are so comfortably ensconced in Sindh which is reputed for its strong Sufi tradition. For example, there is now the Lashkar-e-Taiba, spreading its network in upper Sindh, especially in areas where there is a Hindu population. Then there are others like the Sipah-e-Sahaba who are spreading their tentacles as well. At this pace it can be safely assumed that the cultural character of Sindh will undergo a change in the next five to ten years.

In Karachi itself, some of the friendly jihadi outfits are now resurfacing like the Jaish-e-Muhammad, which once had greater say in the affairs of the city but then went partly underground for a while. Some segments of the state are even gently arming and training militant groups, perhaps, to counter the non-religious violence and force of Karachi’s main political party.

Solving the Taliban issue in Karachi and the country at large will have to begin with the question of how and why does the state persist in arming groups, and then creates even more groups to counter/challenge those made earlier. More important, the superior court has to question the mechanism of strategic decision-making in the country — especially how are decisions to make and support militant groups made and who makes them? If put under a microscope, the Supreme Court will realise that it is not the political government which can be held responsible for the mess.

Second, at an operational level, can the problem be solved through improving the performance of the police? Indubitably, the police have to perform their duty and make sure cars with dubious licence plates do not operate in the city, or anywhere in the country. However, there is a larger debate which needs to be opened up on how much should the state and society commit to law enforcement as opposed to the amorphous military security that poses as national security? We often forget that law enforcement, especially policing, is more of a public good that requires serious intellectual and financial investment. The policeman doing his job needs to have the confidence that every time he apprehends a criminal or a “Taliban”, the culprit will not be freed with just one phone call or that people in authority will not come and secretly whisk away the culprit. You can give plenty of weapons to the police but unless they are empowered and trained to take action they will not have the confidence to do so. Policing is now almost a science and should be dealt with in this manner.

Intervention from the top, however, is not a police man’s only frustration. He is totally impotent in the face of a judicial process and system that depends on archaic methods of dealing with terrorism or other crimes. The fact is that Pakistan’s rate of conviction in terrorism cases is abysmal. The current legal system lays emphasis on the first information report (FIR) and identification of the convict by the complainant or affected. So, a case becomes automatically weak if a name is not there in the initial FIR or there is no one to do physical identification, known as shanakht parade. But how do the police produce an identifier, for instance, in the case of a suicide attack? Resultantly, there are cases after cases in which terrorists were arrested but then freed by courts because the evidence did not meet the specified parameters. Over 30 FIRs were registered in the Lal Masjid case and these are still pending, waiting for evidence, or dismissal — which is more likely to happen.

Even when there is evidence, as in the case of Malik Ishaq accused of committing about 70 murders, it were delays and hitches in the legal system that allowed enough time to pass and as that happened, the police officer and others who contributed to his being charged and eventually convicted, by a lower court, for being involved in the attack on the Khana-e-Farhang-e-Iran in Multan were targeted and killed. Interestingly, the judge, who had convicted Ishaq, left the country hours after he wrote the judgment. What is even more intriguing is the fact that the highest appellate court in this case, which is the Supreme Court, did not consider some of the evidence admissible and because of that Ishaq was freed. Some sources even talk about threats to senior judges as the case came up for hearing.

The Supreme Court is quite right in asking the government to pull up the police. But what the judges must also understand is that fighting the Taliban is a highly intense and integrated process that will not happen until all stakeholders come together, decide that they intend to fight this battle, and re-evaluate the operational mechanism of their respective institutions. The judiciary has a critical role to play in this and when some judges themselves have a reputation of being latent-radical, then the battle can’t be fought, let alone won. Perhaps, the senior judges may read decisions as in the Mukhtaran Mai case once again to assess how their notions of justice and what is right and wrong are so problematic that a battle against terrorism can’t be waged. The said decision is not about individual conservatism but about a certain mindset that can only strengthen the Taliban.

The writer is an independent social scientist and author of Military Inc.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 10th, 2012.

“THE army chief does not express personal opinion. Whatever he says is the collective view of his institution.”

These were General Jahangir Karamat’s words a few hours after he ceased being Pakistan’s chief of army staff; his tenure prematurely over after his controversial call for the setting up of a National Security Council.
In his second term in office, a ‘heavily mandated’ Nawaz Sharif wasn’t willing to brook any ‘nonsense’. He asked for his army chief’s resignation. A BBC colleague suggested we try and get the general’s view.

We called Army House from London expecting a rebuff. But the operator put us through to Gen Karamat in the shock and confusion that must have followed the chief’s decision. The general denied he was sacked: “I resigned because I didn’t want this controversy to damage the country”.

I put it to him: “Was the NSC statement your personal opinion or did it represent the collective wisdom of the army?” He responded with his “collective view” statement.

We also interviewed Sharif’s top aide Mushahid Husain. With unmistakable triumphalism, he said the decision showed who was boss.

It wasn’t long before it emerged that many generals, and most notably the CGS (chief of general staff) Lt-Gen Ali Kuli Khan (Khattak) who was in Peshawar for the day,
later protested to the chief that he had decided to go quietly and not allowed them to sort out the government.

Sharif handpicked Lt-Gen Pervez Musharraf because he was advised his choice didn’t have a big constituency in the army, given his ethnic origins. Therefore, he would remain grateful at being elevated and follow orders without question.

It wasn’t long before the all-powerful prime minister found out how wrong he was. After a disastrous Kargil misadventure and continued defiance, when he tried to sack the army chief, he was overthrown, jailed and exiled.

Whether it was an ‘individual’s decision’ or the collective will of the institution manifesting itself, Pakistan was going to be set back another 10 years as, following in the footsteps of Ayub and Zia, Musharraf declared himself the monarch.

Frankly, as the Supreme Court proceedings in the Asghar Khan case and its ruling demonstrated, even when the army wasn’t directly, blatantly in power, it or its key individuals were still controlling most of the levers of power, even to the extent of manipulating elections.

In fact, just before the PPP government was sent packing in 1990, I was working for the Herald and wrote a story on how politicised even Gen Beg’s spouse was. Addressing a Rawalpindi Garrison Women’s Club meeting, she let loose on PPP’s ‘atrocities on the poor Mohajirs in Sindh’.

The PPP had already had to climb a mountain to form a government as another ‘individual’, the then ISI chief, had created an alliance to block its progress in the 1988 elections.

Anyway, after I wrote the Herald story on Mrs Beg, the then corps commander in Karachi requested a meeting. Gen Asif Nawaz Janjua was a bellicose officer who was supposed to be feared. As one prone to living dangerously, I agreed.

Ushered into his office and introductions over, the aides left the room. The general didn’t offer me a seat. I pulled a chair and lowered myself into it anyway. He reached into a drawer, pulled out a copy of the Herald with each of my stories marked by a coloured flag.

“Yaar, what’s this?” He barked, opening the page to the Mrs Beg story. “The chief called me from ‘Pindi. He was very upset.” I responded: “Is it untrue? If the chief wants he can issue a denial. But I have a number of witnesses who heard the speech.”

The general almost exploded: “I am sure she said it. But national interest bhi koyee cheez hotee hai (is also something). Do you have to report everything?” My current sense of realism, pragmatism … Ok, Ok … cowardice was still several years away. No family, no material possessions, nothing to lose.

“General, I thought this was going to be a grown-up conversation, a meeting to share our respective perspectives. Not a lecture on national interest. Had I known, I wouldn’t have bothered to come.” I started to get up.

The corps commanders, or at least Gen Asif Nawaz, had desks the size of football fields.
The big, burly officer got up and started to storm round his colossal desk. I rose to my full five-foot-nothing frame and braced myself. As he neared, I saw a half-raised right hand. Then I realised he was offering me his hand as he said: “Good. Now we understand each other perfectly.”

There was no mention of my journalism anymore and none either of national interest. He ordered tea, biscuits and a friendly chat followed. All my quirky views were heard without a frown. Things have moved on over the past two decades.

Now, Gen Kayani voluntarily says he has no monopoly over defining national interest. He says there is a need for all to follow the constitution. He acknowledges mistakes have been made in the past but calls for the rule of law to deal with those at this ‘defining moment’ in our nation’s history.

The army chief’s statement and the chief justice’s apparent retort to that have been described as ominous signs of this and that. I firmly believe that the past is another country. It will haunt us but we’ll never return to it.

I don’t feel the need to qualify criticism of the military by paying a perfunctory tribute to the several thousand soldiers who have laid down their lives valiantly battling the forces of darkness. Where I stand ideologically, they are my heroes anyway.

As for whether some generals indulged in corrupt practices or are clean as a whistle, we’ll wait for the due process of law to tell us. But we won’t abandon, or abdicate, our right to ask questions because a former head of ISI says: “Shut up, idiots.”

The writer is a former editor of Dawn.
abbas.nasir@hotmail.com

Published in Dawn , November 10th, 2012.

Published in Daily Dunya , November 10th, 2012.

Published in Daily Express , November 10th, 2012.

My Lord Chief Justice and Generalissimo Kayani both swear by constitutionalism and the rule of law. To hear them on the subject it almost seems as if these concepts were discovered first in Pakistan.

If constitutionalism were to mean anything His Lordship would be more inclined to the gift of brevity than he seems to be at present. To Lord Bacon’s wise admonition he would pay greater heed: “And an Over-speaking Judge is no well-tuned cymbal.”

If my words are not taken amiss, the essay from which this comes, Of Judicature, should be affixed in stone at the entrance of all the High Courts and the most august Supreme Court, so much distilled wisdom in it.

“Judges ought to remember,” says Lord Bacon, “that their office is To Interpret Law, and not to Make Law or Give Law: else will it be like the authority claimed by the Church of Rome...” We are close to the Church of Rome in this regard, judicial pronouncements, and too many of them, sounding very much like papal injunctions.

He goes on to say, “Let judges also remember that Solomon’s Throne was supported by Lions on both sides; let them be lions, but yet Lions under the Throne; being circumspect that they do not check or oppose any Points of Soveraigntie.” In today’s context, under the throne would mean under the arch of constitutional authority, as defined in the Constitution as opposed to the idea of sovereignty propagated by the SC.

So many of us took part, in varying degree, in the justly-celebrated struggle for the restoration of the Justice Chaudhry-led Supreme Court (SC). But it is a moot point whether we struggled for this desi version of the Church of Rome.

The Inter-services press release, conveying the agitated thoughts of the army command, seems to be aimed at judicial over-reach: “...trying to assume more than one’s due role will set us back.” It is hardly a revelation that in several instances – NLC, Royal Palm, the judgement in the Asghar Khan case – military feathers have been ruffled. This press release also comes dressed in the colours of the rule of law. But Gen Kayani surely knows that such a statement in a more established democracy and he would have received his marching orders by now.

Public lectures on constitutional propriety by service chiefs: not quite what the Constitution visualises.

But we hardly need reminding this is Pakistan where a different culture of power prevails, where the army has been in the driving seat for long, where the army is still the last voice in the framing of national security issues, and where generals will continue to speak out in this manner until democracy comes of age and Pakistan’s political class grows up and is in a position to talk to the military class on equal terms – equal in terms of understanding and intellect.

The military’s version of the national interest will be supplanted, or fine-tuned, only if any doctrine propounded by the political class is more logical and convincing. Too many politicians, sadly, are given to ranting when it comes to security issues. And they are taken for a ride by the army command fairly easily.

Twice Gen Pasha appeared before parliament in secret session. On both occasions a professional violinist could not have played parliament more skilfully than he did. On the second occasion at least – this after the Bin Laden outing – he should have been on the mat, sweating. Instead he read out a patriotic psalm and had most of parliament, mercifully not all, singing with him. He should consider a career in politics. He is a persuasive speaker.

To return to the issue at hand: as if our other problems weren’t enough we now face a problem of philosophy. In laying down the extent of the SC’s powers My Lord Chief Justice sounds very much like the nation’s moral arbiter: “There seems to be no cohesive efforts in terms of a national framework wherein the mega issues have been tackled in an appropriate manner.” This in his latest remarks to senior bureaucrats-in-training. And the conclusion he draws is that heavy responsibility therefore lies upon the SC judges as guardians and protectors of the Constitution.

Who, pray, has envisioned this role for the SC? Is it for his lordship to speak of mega issues and weaknesses in the national framework? Recall Bacon, the court’s duty is to interpret laws, not make them. As for guarding the Constitution, enough if the higher judiciary, now and for the future, does not come to the aid of military takeovers by giving them constitutional sanction. To go no further back than the recent past, the SC validated Musharraf’s coup in near-record time. On that historic bench sat, among others, My Lord Chaudhry.

To be sure, times are different and we have moved on. At least that is the illusion we nurture. Still, a little humility would not be out of order. The past being the past and every institution, without exception, having earned its rich share of infamy and blame, it is only proper that stones if they must be cast should be cast lightly.

Generals have done the country much harm. No need to go over this familiar ground. But then their collaborators were both judges and politicians. And if the higher judiciary seeks to derive moral authority from the restoration movement, the army can claim redemption from something more sacred, the blood of its martyrs.

No army likes being ridiculed even if sitting in peacetime barracks. But this is an army stretched out from the eastern border up to the heights of Siachen and fighting constantly, one operation scarcely ceasing before the need for another arises, on the western marches. An army at war and the skeletons of the past being made to emerge from their gloomy cupboards in a selective manner.

Accountability? Of course but convincing only if evenly spread out. If generals should be called to account for past sins this is a healthy development. But then what about judges and politicians and robber barons and the cartels of cement and sugar and all the other activities which make the Islamic Republic, God-gifted as we never tire of asserting, a carpetbagger’s paradise?

South Africa went through tougher times than we can imagine. But after the curtains fell on the black night of apartheid the leaders of the freedom movement, Mandela in the forefront, sought to heal the wounds of the past by preaching tolerance and reconciliation. But look at us: give any of us a bit of power and who can match our armchair heroism?

This is not to deny the great good this SC has done. My Lord Chaudhry has gone where others have feared to tread. The ultimate test of wisdom, however, is to know the limits of one’s power and authority. To hear pronouncements from the bench the impression often is not of the judiciary speaking but of an overbearing executive issuing directives and implementing policy.

The dictatorship of generals we have known. The dictatorship of mediocrity is an enduring reminder of our national inadequacies. Is it now our fate to suffer the dictatorship of morality?

“Remember, Caesar, thou art mortal,” a slave would whisper into his ear as he heard the acclamations of the multitude. No true Romans here... agreed. Only the tin-pot variety, figures of straw and cardboard, but a whiff of power and good sense goes out of the window, making the office of slave, whispering that timeless admonition, a constant necessity in the hallowed confines of the Islamic Republic.

Email: winlust@yahoo.com