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Friday March 29, 2024

D-Chowk, Qadris and dharnas

By Zaigham Khan
April 04, 2016

I want someone to help me understand how two thousand unarmed protestors, sitting, eating, defecating, and swearing in front of parliament for four days made the capital and a nation of two hundred million people hostage.

I also want to understand how we can call protestors marching from Rawalpindi to Islamabad as ‘yalghar’ – invasion of Islamabad’s sacred territory, an act so shameful that it made the interior minister go into hiding, and when he was found again, he looked like a chastised schoolboy. Was the sky really about to fall upon us?

Let’s look at the series of events chronologically to make our own story. On the morning of February 29, Mumtaz Qadri, killer of Salmaan Taseer, was hanged. Most of us had believed till then that the government did not have the courage to send him to the gallows because he had been consecrated by many mullahs. For those who gathered at his funeral the next day, Qadri’s saga was a re-enactment of the myth of Ghazi Ilm Deen. They did not see Qadri as a killer but someone who had sacrificed his own life for the sake of the honour of the Prophet (pbuh). Absolute nonsense? Exactly, but since when have human become rational creatures?

Religious parties saw these crowds and smelled an opportunity. Using the Punjab Protection of Women against Violence Act as a pretext, they formed a united front and announced to launch a movement from March 27. They badly needed something like this as they had seen their fortunes diminish considerably in the wake of Operation Zarb-e-Azb. Before recent setbacks, they were the spoiled brats of Pakistani society; the state smiled like a doting mother when they made money in local currency and in foreign exchange, grabbed state land, raised private armies and did a lot more. Pervez Musharraf, the most loving nanny they have ever had, handed them two provinces to play with for five years. Those were the days, before the establishment abruptly turned into a rough Pakistani father.

However, this privileged treatment had not been available to the Barelvi groups. Though the majority sect, they have watching helplessly as the state took away their shrines, thus clipping their wings and influence, while their mosques were snatched by more stout maulvis from other sects. They were not even invited to the banquet when Ziaul Haq dished out Kalashnikovs, riyals and dollars. Their rivals have constantly nibbled at their following with the help of huge mosques and madressahs. Within a generation, they have lost all of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and much of southern Punjab – and the game is not over yet.

In Karachi, where traders have enough money and the fear of God to sustain all shades and colours of extremis, Barelvis formed their own militant group – the Pakistan Sunni Tehreek, which has long aspired to be the Barelvi MQM. When Bhai is in trouble, the ST’s destiny also hangs in the balance. Sarwat Ejaz Qadri, president of the Sunni Tehreek has every right to dream of becoming the bearded Bhai of the city. But, according to news reports, law-enforcement agencies have their hands in the ST’s cupboards, which are packed with skeletons. So Karachi’s Qadri can go the Bhai way before even getting an opportunity to become the Bhai.

In such circumstances, the crowds in Rawalpindi were the stuff miracles are made of. When religious parties announced to hold the protest on March 27, the Sunni Tehreek trumped the move by announcing the chehlum of Mumtaz Qadri on the same day. Once again, a large crowd gathered in Rawalpindi. Sarwat Qadri and his fellow scholars led the crowd to D-Chowk in Islamabad to hold a dharna on the template of another Qadri – Allama Tahirul Qadri.

As Rawalpindi police dissolved and Islamabad police disappeared, the march went ahead well and the protestors were able to peg their tents at D-Chowk. There was some mayhem and loss to property – a big thing by standards of Norway and Denmark, but not a big deal by our own Asian standards. A set of outlandish demands was announced. But the dharna could not even take shape because the Pindi boys, who had thronged the chehlum, left their guests at D-Chowk and went back to their houses to watch the remaining show on their television screens.

The game was over before it started. With a huge army of two thousand men, face saving was the only victory that could be snatched from the jaws of the government. Even to get a small face saving sugar candy, he had to call upon some Brelvi leaders from Karachi and had to visit the house of a minster. And unlike Allama Tahirul Qadri, he left behind dozens of protestors rotting in the Adiala Jail.

Perhaps, it is the history of dharnas in Pakistan that make our media link it with the day of judgement and makes some minister run for cover. Before the JI’s Qazi Hussain Ahmad Islamised it in 1990s, the word dharna was associated with Gandhi and Congress politics. Qazi’s dharnas would mysteriously lead to overthrow of governments in that decade of political instability. Though Qazi Sahib and JI used to garland themselves for overthrowing the government, everyone and their aunt knew that these dharnas were only a kind of foreplay, meant to prepare the nation for something more serious to follow. It is this association, further reinforced by Imran Khan’s dharna, that has lingered.

For those not familiar with Islamabad, the Red Zone is an extremely misleading term. D-Chowk is not located inside the State Bank of Pakistan or in the precincts of an army installation. It happens to be a bit close to parliament and that, to my mind, makes it the most natural place to hold a protest. In fact, it was the main venue for all kind or protests till a few years back. It is strange that parliamentarians do not feel insulted by the fact that protests are now held in front of the Press Club instead.

Chaudhry Nisar, therefore, must be stopped from turning D-Chowk into a place as secure as a nuclear installation. The speaker of the National Assembly and the chairman of Senate must take steps to facilitate protestors at D-Chowk by ensuring their security and basic needs like shade, water and toilets. At the same time, a comprehensive code of ethics, or legislation, should be agreed to regulate protests at this much coveted site. Law can take its course when these rules are flouted.

Things will go wrong from time to time. But democracy is like a live volcano that releases its energies continuously; this is far better than sitting on top of a dormant volcano that can go off at any moment, like it did in Iraq, Libya and Syria. Despite whatever I have said, I fully support our holy men’s right to protest and it includes the right to protest for wrong causes.

Those who think that the sky was about to fall or some meteorites did land in our front lawn should look at the Jat reservation agitation in India just a few weeks ago. The protests are estimated to have caused a loss of $5.1 billion while 30 people were killed in the violence. The protests ended with the government conceding to the demands of protestors.

The writer is a social anthropologist and development professional.

Email: zaighamkhan@yahoo.com

Twitter: @zaighamkhan