An action plan without good intentions

It’s hard to see a rainbow when the sky is black

NAP is making news again. Not for the ground it has covered but for the ground it never took off from.

We all know we have a problem and that it goes by various names. Sometimes it murders in the name of sectarianism, other times it brings mass death with divine wind on its back and still other times it billows up in smoke from the flames of ethnic hatreds. This particular problem, in all its shape-shifting perversity, happens to be a mindset. A mindset that views all of life as a partitioned frame between good and evil, us and them. And to defeat this deadly mentality was conceived the NAP; the magician’s patter.

Because ‘never again’ was the mantra from those at the helm after the Peshawar APC tragedy. And from there all frenzy ensured. Military courts, summary executions, blocked SIMs and just a slew of panicked, flailing actions of a people who had suddenly seen the face of death. This was all promised by the NAP, a final ‘take that!’ to the terrorists. But while slick in theory and rich in bravado, the NAP soon came down from its initial high down to the blood and gut littered ground like a deflated balloon.

The issue at hand is unfortunately multivariate. No one really knows who is behind the recent spate of killings. The usual culprits are always quick to raise their hands and take responsibility, but some suspect the external hand in all this

Granted, this may all sound tediously cynical, almost melancholic. But it’s hard to see a rainbow when the sky is black. Just this year alone, there have been attacks on Imambargahs in Shikarpur and Peshawar. But more recently, the attack on the Ismaili community, a massacre that claimed 43 lives, brought the beast’s face in closer view. ISIS pamphlets were retrieved from the site. Yes, ISIS — that special band of caliphate claiming lunatics that’s busily perpetuating its militant discontents in whatever is left of a war ravaged Middle East; President Bush’s parting gift to the ‘Moslem world’. One may ask what the Ismailis have done to deserve this? That peaceful minority to which nbso online casino reviews Pakistanis owe much. After all, it was Sir Sultan Muhammed Shah, Aga Khan III, who was the founder, patron and the first president of the All-India Muslim League. Even the founder of Pakistan – Mohammad Ali Jinnah — was born into an Ismaili household. And have we forgotten all the good work our Ismaili brothers do? Anyone heard of AKUH, AKESP and FOCUS with all their investment in infrastructure, education and modern medicine? Well none of it matters in the militant takfiri worldview. A view that draws much from centuries old Islamic jurisprudence as it does from its corrupted distortions. But that’s a discussion better left to the few remaining bona fide religious scholars left in our Islamic Republic.

The issue at hand is unfortunately multivariate. No one really knows who is behind the recent spate of killings. The usual culprits are always quick to raise their hands and take responsibility, but some suspect the external hand in all this. Who would likely benefit most from jeopardising the CPEC initiative? Who feels threatened most in light of China’s recent 46 billion dollar overtures to Pakistan? Who would gnash their teeth at the prospect of a soaring Gwadar? But of course, without evidence, all talk is conjecture.

Regardless of who is behind all this, what people want are solutions. Will the civil institutions rise to the task? Will law enforcement finally enforce law? Will the underpaid police force ever dispense its duties? Will the criminal justice system experience some kind of, or rather, any kind of reform? Will the taxation system evolve so that for once we have some tracking mechanisms for shady charities and black funds? Or will we only see quick-fix action thriller histrionics complete with all the semi-automatics, combat boots, military fatigues, sash and beret regalia? That stuff of Rambo movies.

Behind the curtain exists a reality more disturbing. There appears to be a satanic inter-twining of interests between some political factions and the militant jihadis. Take JuD with its many dispensaries, ambulances, hospitals, educational facilities, etc

And what about the army? Will it continue to encroach upon civil writ while running trial courts, meeting foreign heads of states, dictating policy both foreign and domestic? The prevailing state of affairs is the dictionary-definition of a soft coup. And The Karachi incident has increased the military’s responsibility because the civilian federal and provincial governments seem a little challenged in controlling terrorism.

But the problem is more complicated. Behind the curtain exists a reality more disturbing. There appears to be a satanic inter-twining of interests between some political factions and the militant jihadis. Take JuD with its many dispensaries, ambulances, hospitals, educational facilities, etc. It is the face mask that LeT wears to go about its nefarious works. Really makes the government’s commitment to the “regulation of religious seminaries and dismantling of proscribed terrorist groups” the stuff of comedy central. No wonder the Information Minister Pervez Rashid, who recently called madrassas “centres of ignorance and illiteracy”, received blowback so strong that it was demanded that he be removed from office and declared an apostate – a term of endearment among the Deobandi types. The poor man had to issue a clarification to calm the howling hordes.

It seems that what requires most changing is the national narrative. A narrative steeped less in divisive enthusiasms of antiquity and more so in a cohesive, modern and preferably secular conception of a collective identity. For this the curricula will need revision, history will need to be sanitised, Ghaznavis and Ghauris will need to be replaced with Abdus Salams and Edhis.

As for NAP, without good intentions, it’s just a long, tedious string of words.