Balochistan takes another
Sadly, all that can be said with any guarantee about Balochistan is that it will remain cause for trouble, people will continue to disappear and die because of it, and there’s no telling if things will ever get any better. And those few that do raise their voice are more likely than not to have it silenced, like Sabeen Mahmud. Another bright, young, spirited intellectual and activist met an untimely, and brutal, death just because for all her provocations, Balochistan was a step too far for those who have become the law in this Islamic Republic.
Who among the usual suspects could have done this one? Remember this land has a disputed history and its cursed people have paid the price of one sinister intrigue after another. Once part of it was disputed territory with Iran. Then it was mostly about crooked nawabs and sardars who skinned the people to bloat themselves. The oppressor state was ever-present, of course, stealing the land’s riches. Then came foreign agencies; RAW, etc, always fomenting dissent and funding attacks on the state. But those that often stepped forward to helpk were no more sincere or any cleaner. Be it Marxists from London, militias funded by god knows who, or self-professed intellectuals and experts who have taken the ‘seminar’ route, they too were always fighting others’ wars in this land. The people had no option but to bear with their suffering.
But how do people like Sabeen get mixed up in this madness? She’s as far detached from the so called leftist guerillas that once tried to save this place as from the sardars that have choked the people. She was a progressive entrepreneur whose café doubled as a debate club; where a rare glimpse of the old, liberal Pakistan could be found. And among the ideas she debated was the Baloch finding their freedom; from all those forces, foreign and domestic, who have wronged them over long decades. Others like her say the same thing, because there is a fresh wave of awareness sweeping Pakistan. The phenomenon has won the Baloch friends from unexpected quarters. But they are in grave danger and, like Sabeen, could be ‘silenced’ at the drop of the hat. As to who did this one? The sooner the state figures out the better. And unless it wants the wave of awareness to turn on it one more time, it had better get its act together and bring these villains to book. Nothing less will do.
