Balochistan: Two Attacks, Two Problems — I
By Dr Mohammad Taqi
Florida
Two attacks ravaged Balochistan last week. Despite coming within hours of each other -- and efforts by many to tie them together — both violent attacks were distinct. In fact, two very different groups have claimed responsibility for the assaults. The distinction is imperative as one-size-fits-all solutions do not work.
The Baloch Liberation Army (BLA) took the responsibility for destroying the Ziarat Residency, where Quaid-i-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah had once stayed. The Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ) has claimed the twin terrorist attacks in Quetta. The LeJ said a female suicide bomber deployed by them struck the Sardar Bahadur Khan Women’s University’s bus in Quetta killing 14 girl students. The second attack came in tandem on the Bolan Medical College’s teaching hospital where the survivors were being treated, killing at least 11 before the security agencies fought off the terrorists and freed the hostages.
The Ziarat Residency attack evoked feelings among people that range from a sense of dejection and national loss at the destruction of a monument closely identified with the Quaid-i-Azam, to indifference among many in Balochistan and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, to a victory claim of sorts among the Baloch radicals. All sides might have a point here.
For starters, the destruction of cultural and historical sites cannot be condoned. The Ziarat Residency was not exactly the Bastille that the radicals have stormed. It was not an imposing or stately structure that the Urdu media has described it to be, using the word ‘pur-shikoh’. With its manicured lawns, surrounded by the famous juniper and walnut trees, the building was a resort cottage with atmosphere befitting of a summer retreat that it was meant to be for the British colonial chief commissioners and political agents. The Residency had been built circa 1891. I recall from a visit several years ago that Mr Jinnah’s bedroom had very simple furniture. His personal artifacts and documents were also housed at the Residency and have been lost in the attack.
Mr Jinnah stayed in Ziarat from the end of June 1948 through August 13, 1948, when he was moved to the lower altitude of Quetta upon his doctor Colonel Ilahi Bakhsh’s advice, as his lung condition and breathing got worse. Mr Jinnah spent his very last month in the Quetta Residency and not Ziarat. His ADC Mazhar Ahmad’s account of a very ill Mr Jinnah’s Ziarat to Quetta journey in a truck is included in Professor Sharif al-Mujahid’s book In Quest of Jinnah. The work is based on the journalist Hector Bolitho’s diary, notes and correspondence. Stanley Wolpert has titled the final chapter of his epic book Jinnah of Pakistan Ziarat, meaning a mausoleum in Pashto. The hill station was called Gwashki or Ghoskai till the name was changed in 1886 to Ziarat after the tomb of a local saint Mian Abdul Hakim alias Kharwari Baba. I digress. But the point is that for anyone with emotions anchored in Wolpert’s deeply moving account of the Quaid’s terminal illness and death it is easy to miss the Baloch perspective. However, this is precisely what needs to be averted. While Mr Jinnah is revered as the Quaid-i-Azam across Punjab or in Karachi, elsewhere, especially in Balochistan, there still are mixed feelings due to the historical rifts dating back to the eve of India’s partition. Politics is at the heart of these schisms. Unlike the Quetta attacks, the Ziarat incident remains an act of political violence and has political motives and implications.
The Baloch gripe goes back to Pakistan annexing the Kalat State through use of force on the Quaid’s watch in April 1948. Some Baloch trace it another year back to when the Quaid served as the Khan of Kalat Mir Ahmad Yar’s attorney, formulating his case to the British for an independent Kalat State at the 1946 Cabinet Mission. The Baloch also cite that the Quaid agreed to the Kalat State’s independence through an agreement signed between him as representative of the future government of Pakistan, the British and the Kalat State on August 4, 1947. The Pakistani side has its counterclaims that three Baloch states acceded to Pakistan and another three chieftains endorsed Pakistan at the June 1947 Balochistan Shahi Jirga. There is enough blame to go around on all sides. But it is the Baloch getting the short end of the stick post-1947 that remains the crux of their grievances. The Pakistani security agencies’ sordid abduct-kill-dump-a-Baloch policy is one of the most tragic human rights disasters in the world today.
The electoral rout — whether actual or engineered — of the Balochistan National Party led by Sardar Akhtar Jan Mengal did little to assuage the Baloch. Getting Dr Malik Baloch with his measly mandate to form a minority government may be a feel good exercise for the rest of Pakistan but did nothing to allay the Baloch fears. The radicals do not necessarily feel threatened by a government that got only a minuscule percentage of votes from the Baloch electorate. They also feel that it is merely to buy more time to consolidate what they perceive as a colonisation of their lands. The establishment looking set to exploit the Pashtun-Baloch fault lines has also not gone down well with the Baloch.
The Ziarat Residency attack is perhaps a watershed event in the Baloch nationalist-Pakistan relations but it is not exactly a 9/11 equivalent as claimed by some. Over 3,000 people died in 9/11 but as despicable as the Ziarat attack was, the radicals appear to have avoided harming civilians. The LeJ did the exact opposite in Quetta, inflicting maximum casualties on the innocents. This difference is not lost on the Pakistani leaders and intelligentsia, but while many advocated negotiations with the jihadists, they have started beating the drums of war against the Baloch. If the BLA wanted to provoke further military intervention and derail the political process, it may have succeeded, with several pundits calling for using maximum force against the Baloch radicals.
Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) had five years to prepare actionable Balochistan and anti-jihadist terrorism policies. They should have hit the ground running but seem to be only reacting to events. The Federal Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan has said little of substance except rightly chastising the security agencies. The PML-N plans to announce a security policy shortly. The Balochistan narrative seems to be slipping from their hands. The carnage in Mardan adds urgency to the need for comprehensive counter-terrorism plans. The PML-N has its plate full. There is no room for fumbling. (To be continued)
The writer can be reached at mazdaki@me.com and he tweets @mazdaki
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