KARACHI:
Karachi is gripped with fear as two bombs were discovered in the past week alone. One at Jinnah hospital was defused by the bomb squad and another failed to go off outside the ICRC office. However, as another bomb scare in Saddar turned out to be just a false alarm, it seems fear is morphing into paranoia.
A little past lunch hour on Tuesday afternoon, shoppers, browsers and shopkeepers at Zainab Market rushed out of stores and on to the streets - there were rumours about a bomb in the building.
The semi-commercial complex, Rex Shopping Centre, houses outlets for famous clothing brands and franchise offices. This major shopping district is frequented by thousands of people every day.
A shop manager raced into an outlet selling threaded wares, ordering his staff to close up shop and evacuate. His staff and customers rushed outside to find the bomb squad waiting.
The fear was palpable as evacuees huddled on the sidewalk across the street. Anticipation, fear and general curiosity was etched in their expressions.
Some seized the opportunity to brush up their cell-phone video-making skills. Others simply used the time to catch up with co-workers while the rest called up friends to tell them all about their brush with death. As the bomb squad searched for the rumoured ‘suspicious package with a blinking light’, samosa vendors got to work advertising their treats.
About 30 minutes of high drama later, residents, shoppers, store attendants, and passers-by, hooked by the live action, slowly returned to their otherwise mundane lives. The bomb squad wrapped up the search, having identified the blinking light of doom as just that - a blinking light from a torch.
Published in The Express Tribune, June 29th, 2011.
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