Sights and smells: Till demands met, protesters promise to stay

Garbage and human waste in the area pose health hazard for area residents, protesters

ISLAMABAD: The religiously motivated crowd of roughly three thousand people – mostly from south and central Punjab – present at Islamabad’s D-Chowk are now suggesting that they would stay at the protest venue for as long as their leadership demands.

The situation could, however, change quickly if the government follows up on its own Tuesday announcement to forcibly vacate the area.

Unlike 2014’s Pakistan Awami Tehreek (PAT) and Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) sit-in participants – the zealous protesters present today brought no supplies to prepare them for a long sit-in, but still they claim they would stay till the very end.

Until the filing of this report, no face-offs between protesters and law enforcement agencies had been seen or reported on the day, as protesters adhered to directions from their leadership and stayed at the protest site.

The police were also not seen arresting protesters as they did on Sunday night and for most of Monday.

Food and water supplies to the area were suspended until a close aide to Finance Minister Ishaq Dar held an hour-long meeting with the leadership of the protesting religious parties at the site of sit-in. Soon after the departure of the businessman, the administration allowed vans carrying food to enter the area.

The leadership continues to deliver ‘colourful’ speeches to the participants, who continued to chant full throat slogans, from a make-shift stage equipped with loudspeakers.

The administration has also barred food vendors from setting up stalls inside the protest area, while protesters, fearing possible arrest, seemed hesitant to leave the area to buy food and other essential items from nearby market areas.

Meanwhile, in the absence of public toilets, participants have been defecating on greenbelts along D-Chowk, creating a foul odour in the area, while the food waste and other garbage strewn in the area has begun attracting flies and other vermin, which could cause diseases among protesters and residents of nearby areas.

Rai Azhar Ali, runs a bangles factory in Sheikhupura and came to Rawalpindi to participate in the Mumtaz Qadri chehlum procession.

“I did not come to participate in a sit-in but simply to attend the chehlum,” Ali said, but added that he is fine with the change of plans. “If the [leadership] will ask me to stay for my whole life, I would stay,” he said.

Mogheesur Rehman, a participant from Muzzafargarh, said he had come to defend Mumtaz Qadri’s mission and that he would do it without worrying about food or water.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 30^th,  2016.