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| Long March for justice |
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Sunday, June 15, 2008
Dr Farrukh Saleem
Ambassadors of law are here
Missionaries of justice are here
Messengers of virtue are here
Emissaries of due process are here.
They seek no seat of power
No umras at state expense
They demand no foreign junkets
They long for no bullet-proof limos;
All they seek is justice
Justice for all their only call.
They carry no guns, no bombs
They threw no stones, they hurt not a soul;
They danced on dhol, they danced on chimta
They danced on tumbi, they danced on tabla
They sang baliyaan, they sang kafis;
They sang all night long
They danced all night long.
Alternative power centres are here
Media and the civil society are here
Geo and Aitzaz are here
Here to stay they are
Here to take care of autocracy
Both military and civilian;
Here to reform
Both state and society;
This is historic and monumental
Substantial and consequential.
March 9 was a first
'Iftikhar-bug' has since been contagious
Contaminating and vitiating
An infection, infective and infectious;
No one says 'no' to a dictator
Not in Pakistan, not in the Muslim world
Never in 60 years, never in 1,400 years.
March 9 was historic and monumental
Substantial and consequential.
February 18 was a first
All through Muslim history
Power changes hands through violence
And never through the ballot box
Never in 60 years, rarely in 1,400 years;
February 18 was historic and monumental
Substantial and consequential;
Pakistan will be the same never again.
Pakistan's wound is deep, getting deeper
Lack of justice the root of all evil;
We are a 60-year-old hell-hole
A 60-year history of pain
Lack of justice our real badge of shame.
May 12 was another first
Driven neither by a general's uniform
Nor by our fickle politicos
After 60 years of inequity
Civil society finally won the day;
Deposed judges were paid salaries
An admission they are judges still
The court expanded restoration won.
Long Marchers have come a long way
What is their significance, they say
It's a seeding machine, says Mao
A living revolution
A manifesto and a proclamation
A declaration and an announcement;
Our pursuit of justice can't be subverted
Can't be obstructed or diverted.
Without the Long March, said Mao
How would the masses know
The existence of truth
Dispensation of justice
And the rule of law.
Long March has sown many seeds
Seeds in all four provinces
Seeds in Karachi, Quetta and Multan/ Lahore, Hyderabad and Sukkur
Seeds in Bahawalpur, Lodhran and Peshawar
Seeds in Mansehra and Azad Kashmir too/ These seeds, said Mao
Will sprout, leaf, blossom and bear fruit/ Yield a harvest in the future;
Pakistan will be the same never again.
Long Marchers march into history
Long Marchers march to reform
Both state and society;
Long Marchers have stood up
Stood up and refused
Executive dictatorship acceptable no more
Judiciary subservient to executive no more
Pakistan will be the same never again.
Parliament is supreme not judiciary, they say
What rotten eggs they lay, frauds they play
Constitution is what's supreme
Both parliament and judiciary its offspring;
With both their roles well defined
Let them play within their own confines.
For 60 painful years
Justice has been standing still
No justice no peace
No justice no sanity
No justice no progress
No rationality, stability or economics
No justice no balance
No justice no future
No justice no reason to live.
Why is their chaos, I say
Disorder, anarchy and turmoil
Inequity, poverty and illiteracy
Hunger, lust and frustration
Shame, sorrow and discontent;
Lack of justice the root of all evil.
Lithuanians had neither guns nor bullets
Their songs their guns and hymns their bullets
They sang for four long years
At the end, guns lost songs won.
The world has seen Rose Revolution
Orange and Tulip too
Wait, here comes Bhangra Revolution
Has neither a parallel nor an equal
They danced in wajad (ecstasy)
They danced in qabd (despondency)/ They danced in bast (happiness)/ And, they danced in sahu (awakening)
Imagine; peak summer Punjabi heat
Imagine; a hundred thousand roar
'Go Musharraf go'
Imagine; the PPP getting caught
Caught on the wrong side of history.
Geo here to hold governments accountable
Now that's truly meaningful and plentiful
Tangible and valuable
Considerable and weighty
Historic and monumental
Substantial and consequential;
Pakistan will be the same never again.
The writer is an Islamabad-based freelance columnist. Email: farrukh15@hotmail.com
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ISSN 1563-9479 
