Hang on … we’re in for another tsunami

When our politicians talk about change, it’s not really change, just a minor adjustment in selection of the exploiters

First, there was this sign of radiant hope. Imran Khan, the man with an unblemished record, the old bluster and truculence rinsed off him, launched the first tsunami, which was going to introduce … Change. The hurricane lingered with hauteur indulgence. Then, as a sort of Hegelian antithesis, the Bilawal sun rose over the PPP horizon to perpetuate the glorious dynasty whose greatest achievement has been to render the country ripe for some kind of fresh political upheaval. Now, the country must brace itself for the second tornado, a million-strong march on Islamabad which, we have been told, is going to spawn some kind of cataclysm like the one that took place in Egypt ushering in … Change. It all looks astonishingly timely. I am no authority on Tahirul Qadri, with his post-medieval posturing and arch-posing, who reeks of priestly over-complication and is being wheeled out by the MQM as a saintly patrician do-gooder. If you want to know more about the Qadri enigma, read Khaled Ahmed’s excellent article in the December 29 issue of this paper. You’ll get a good insight into the man.

Those who are hooked, gaffed and kippered by the impending Qadri tornado have been talking about the necessity of change in the system; and some have gone as far as to suggest the possibility of a revolution taking place in our country. I haven’t the faintest idea what these people mean by revolution. In my book, it means a total upheaval, a destruction of an economic class. The insurgencies that took place in South America, with the notable exception of Cuba, used more or less the same slogans and involved a change of leadership — but not the system. There was only one real revolution in recorded history and that was the Great October Revolution of 1917 organised by the Bolsheviks, which brought representatives of the proletariat to power. The uprising that took place in France in 1789 when the Bastille was stormed and a lot of titled nobles were guillotined, was in essence a middle class revolt. It decimated the landed aristocracy, ushered in the bourgeoisie and created the delightful Scarlet Pimpernel.



Even if the system can be changed in Pakistan, which I seriously doubt, what is the guarantee that the male mindset will also undergo a transformation? When a group of Pakistani policemen allegedly gang-raped a teenager, the incident was granted a few lines in the local press — and forgotten two days later. There were no protests. No speeches or slogans. Nobody took to the streets. When a 23-year old woman was recently gang-raped in a bus in Delhi, subsequently thrown from the vehicle, suffered cardiac arrest and flown to Singapore for treatment, there was a huge, really massive public protest that lasted for about a week. The police had to use water cannons and tear gas to dispel the hostile crowd that battled the police and demanded death penalty for the rapists. Hats off to the rioters. At least there are still some people in the subcontinent who care about the protection of women. Delhi, unlike Mumbai or south India, witnesses the occasional gang rape as we do in Karachi. The difference between the two cities, however, is in the degree of awareness of the need for severe punishment for men who abuse women and the fact that many of the protesters in India are males. So, when our politicians talk about change, it’s not really a change at all, just a minor adjustment in the selection of the exploiters. That’s how we do business in Pakistan.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 6^th, 2013.