End of the tether

Ever wonder at what point a fissure grows into a rupture? Salmaan Taseer’s murder was one such occasion. It was brewing for quite some time, and we had assumed immunity since all our games — political, politico-religious and strategic — have only come back to hound us but never so ferociously as to challenge the make up of society.

We tend to forget; a nation-state has the prefix nation before it. So, while we play on with the state with crass callousness, in pursuit of our sublime beliefs and objectives, we are fragmenting into groups which have claimed ‘right’ against the ‘wrong’ that falls in the other’s share. This game-playing between my ‘right’ against your ‘wrong’ has finally coalesced into two groups. Salmaan Taseer’s murder crystallised the formulation; the nation stands ruptured. Fissures had grown deep while we had merrily stayed on an existential fault-line. There, again, the matter has been that of our ‘right’ vs their ‘wrong’, never a possibility of ‘accommodation’ and ‘consultation’ — the Greco-Roman equivalents of ijtihad.

The question of whether Salmaan Taseer’s murder was justified has become a rallying call. A co-religionist’s murder in the name of religion, while the original sinner sits awaiting judgment. They say that no person has so far been executed under the law and yet another man has just been killed.

It must scare us all that vigilante justice has justification. I have seen perfectly rational people blabber concurrence to the murder, perhaps out of fear of speaking their mind. Television anchors have wallowed in the glory of playing one side or the other, usually always their ‘right’, and extorted intellectual submission of many who have dared a screen appearance. Did you all notice unrestrained glee on some of the faces as soon as the ‘talk-show’ industry went to business in the aftermath?

What are the politicians doing or, for that matter, the establishment? Precious little. The PML-N was kind to the late governor’s memory and granted a three-day respite to the government before the 72-hour ultimatum of meeting certain demands went into effect; not a word on what becomes of the nation and with that, what befalls the state. Questions are being asked of the ‘establishment’, if they have learnt their lessons and realised that old courses are fatal. Some have sought solutions of the same establishment. The difficulty lies in changing the course of a behemoth. And while we may lay some, or all, of the blame at its doorstep, the establishment holds only so much sway in enabling a rectification process in society. A society lends itself to vulnerabilities that tend to be exploited by all hands; that remains the tragic story of this nation.

Who owns the society? Politicians, who remain listless, though it is their prime task to mould the people into a nation; religious leaders who seem to seek opportunist sheen in the wake of a religious controversy and feed on it to show greater relevance and accrue political benefit as a spin-off; the civil society that has been pushed into submission and resigned, showing futility in the face of looming dangers to their lives, especially when the killer of Salmaan Taseer is seen being showered with rose petals and hailed as a hero; and finally, the media, where everyone has an agenda and a point to prove, and will continue to cement every fissure into a rupture till the state submits. This is the end of the tether.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 7^th, 2011.