Afghan war tore apart fabric of pluralist Sindh, says Murad

The chief minister said on Monday that the people of this province rate coexistence above religious or sectarian differences, because Sindh is the land of Sufis and it is under the influence of saints such as Shah Abdul Latif Bhittai, Sachal Sarmast and Lal Shahbaz Qalandar.

“This is why not a single terrorist has emerged from this land, though it has been plagued by extremists and fanatics who have moved here after the Afghan war.” Murad Ali Shah was addressing a 50-member delegation of faculty and student officers of Quetta’s Command and Staff College who had called on him at the CM House during their study tour.

The chief executive said Sindh has suffered a lot at the hands of dictators, adding that Gen Ziaul Haq brought more than a million Afghans to the province. Murad said heroin and Kalashnikovs were introduced to this land by these immigrants, thereby tearing apart the fabric of a pluralist Sindh, adding that people were divided on sectarian and linguistic grounds during this period.

He said the law and order situation in the entire Sindh was rendered unstable to the extent that Karachi turned into a no-go area while bandits took over the rest of the province. Highways were unsafe for travelling and kidnappings for ransom had become the order of the day, he added. “In Karachi different gangs, terrorists and outlaws had challenged the state’s writ. Kidnappings for ransom, target killings, extortion and terrorism tore apart the city’s socio-economic fabric.”

The CM said that successive provincial governments launched clean-up operations across the city, but none of them could produce the desired results, adding police officials who had participated in these operations were targeted later on. He said police had lost confidence in their abilities and their morale was at an all-time low, affecting their efficiency.

“The Sindh government, with its political will and the support of the people of Karachi, launched a targeted operation and restored law and order, which had been worsening for the past two decades. The law enforcement agencies worked hard and made the operation successful.”

Murad said his government made police recruitments on merit, helped their capacity-building through special trainings by the army, increased their salaries, equipped them with the latest weapons and compensated the families of those who sacrificed their lives in the line of duty. These measures improved our policing system, he added.

Talking about his development efforts, the chief executive said that after restoration of peace, he had given special focus to the development of infrastructure in Karachi, Hyderabad and other districts of the province. “Sindh is the only province of the country that has constructed two bridges on the Indus River,” he said, adding that the third one would be built on the Indus River at Kandhkot-Ghotki.

He said 80-year-old drainage lines have been replaced in Saddar, storm-water drains have been reconstructed, underpasses and bridges are being built, apart from attracting investment in the province so that employment opportunities can be generated. He briefed the visiting army officers on his government’s efforts in the health and education sectors as well as for poverty alleviation.