What to Do after the Multan Blast?
By Syed Kamran Hashmi
Westfield, IN

 

A bomb blast in Multan rocked the city of saints last Sunday, killing at least ten people and injuring dozens more. Among those who survived there would be many who would lose their arms or legs, eyes or ears, rendering them permanently disabled and dependent for the rest of their lives. Would they ever be able to forget what had happened to them on the bus stand? Past this week though, I am sure all of us would.

What about the families of the wounded? They endure the trauma too, an injury of a different kind which does not inflict physical pain but hurts just as much, if not more. We will not remember them either. Five days from today, I bet we will just count the dead bodies at the most and move on with our lives, while some survivors would stay in the hospital for weeks or months after the incident. And when they leave, they would leave on a wheel chair, to be pushed by someone else for years to come. Have you ever thought about them?

As a nation, we do very little, if anything, to acknowledge their contribution in this war. No one talks about their lives after the attack or their discharge from a hospital. How do they survive? How are they treated by the government, by their friends, and by the society? Imagine if you are the sole provider of a family with four school-going kids, your parents living with you, and you lose your right arm? Without your income and without government assistance, how long would it take your family to fall apart? Who is going to educate the children and how are you going to make the two ends meet? These questions, pressing and relevant, slip our minds. Don’t they? We always remember the children of Peshawar in our prayers, which we should. But the people who can in fact benefit from something more than prayers, we tend to disregard and ignore.

I think it is time for us to recognize the disabled citizens and their families as the real heroes of the war on terror. No,. I do not think the ones who have passed away have offered less to the country. Of course, they have sacrificed their most important asset, their lives, for the motherland which cannot be undermined. However, the slow death that kills the disabled takes the suffering of the martyrs to another level. I think it is the obligation of the government to provide assistance, both financial and social, to the affected families as an integral part of its ongoing effort to curb terrorism. Can the government do it alone? Surely not. The civil society has to step in too. NGOs need to make it a priority to raise awareness. And the media has to stop chasing Ayyan Ali and follow some real people, people who suffer even today from an attack of 2008.

I understand if the terrorists had attacked the city five years ago like they had targeted Lahore and Peshawar, we would have just thought of it as the price that every nation has to pay for supporting the war on terro. Back then, it was widely understood that the jihadists attack their fellow believers because somehow Muslims do not resist their ruler’s decision enough for becoming a US ally on the war against terror. And by doing so they have become an accomplice, betraying their Muslim brothers, and endorsing the crusade unleashed upon them. Shouldn’t their cowardice be dealt with accordingly then? These meaningless and shallow arguments have plagued us for years sweeping the ‘moral justification’ away from people in favor of the jihadists who were portrayed by some enthusiasts as the ‘freedom fighters.’ A ‘freedom fight’ in Pakistan for a war that was fought in Afghanistan or Iraq or Palestine. Under those ambiguous circumstances, people who died or were left disabled were not regarded as martyrs, not even human beings, they were considered as ‘collateral damage,’ the losses one has to incur to achieve the higher objective.

Things are not the same anymore though. After the failure of negotiations and the Peshawar massacre, the terrorists have lost their moral authority, if one ever existed before. Indeed, it would not be too wrong if I said the war is not debated on religious grounds anymore at all. It is now a war against the criminal gangs, who have taken up arms against the state and its people: men, women, children, old, young sick and healthy, everyone. Have you met anyone recently who wants to negotiate a peace deal? People say: find them, try them and kill them. Even the most outspoken proponent of negotiations, Imran Khan, keeps quiet on this issue, although it remains uncertain if he agrees with the use of force. For years, he stood against it. But, as a populist he understands how not to exasperate people’s opinion even if he does not understand how to end an insurgency or how to quell a rebellion.

 

So what should be the response of the provincial and the federal government now? Sheepish like before, pleading to the Taliban to spare Punjab as Shahbaz Sharif did in 2009, explaining them that both the PMLN and the Taliban stand against protecting the US interests in the region. Or should the government reassure people that it really is committed to eradicate violence in the name of religion? I do not think appeasement is a policy that can help the PMLN any longer. Areas of Punjab need as big an operation as in Karachi. Would it muster enough courage though? I doubt that. The Chief Minister is too busy in running and messing up the power projects, one after another. The heroes of Multan will not grab his attention. They will be forgotten soon after a couple of emotional speeches.