The Grand Old man of Karachi: Chapter I

Chapter 1: Jinnah & Bhutto: Secularism & the rule of law
 Also read  
 Chapter II: The murder of Bhutto, Zia's blasphemy & his protege
Chapter III: Lost causes, murder, spooks & the storming of the courts (1990-2000)
Chapter IV: Karachi, a lovers quarrel and the more things change.
I begin with this acknowledgement, I learnt much by reading DAWNs columns by Ardeshir Cowasjee. The 85 year old columnist, activist, businessman and charity worker was an important introduction for me to the 'other' narrative of Pakistan's history. He would talk about historical figures as human beings with odd eccentricities and human strengths and failings. He would be brutal in his criticism, lavish in his praise and did not give out the latter often. He also had his biases, he was urban centric and saw the world from a  Karachi-centric view, the city that had gone through an unprecdented boom till the 1970 election. It defied the national trend by voting in the religo-political party's and against the Pakistan Peoples Party.

So while I did not always agree with Karachi's him as I read his works, I more often then not learnt from them. This is the history of Pakistan that I learnt through the words of the grand old man of Karachi. It begins with something central to Cowasjee, that is his emphatic belief in Muhammad Ali Jinnah, Pakistan's founder and 'Great Leader'. Here he links in Jinnah with the story of his family:

He needed a shipping company, so his trusted lieutenant Yusuf 
Haroon was asked to request the premier shipowner of Karachi, 
Rustom Cowasjee, to come to Bombay to meet him. Jinnah told Rustom 
what he wanted, and that was the start of Muhammadi Steamship 
Company. Rustom delivered, and within one month of Pakistan's birth 
Muhammadi's flag was flying on Muhammadi's ships.

This in turn highlights two core themes that run through his articles, his belief that Pakistan was conceived by it's founder as a secular state, defined by the rule of law. He invokes two famous speeches by Pakistan's barrister founder.


"You are free, free to go to your temples, you are free to go to 
your mosques or to any other places of worship in this State of 

It has nothing to do with the business of the State."

Now, this Pakistan. Now, this particular passage has always been the main bugbear of the insecure, the feeble of faith, and the cowards who live by  self-deception. The very next day it was found to be too irksome, it inspired fear.

In his speech, Jinnah also proclaimed that "the first duty of a 
government is to maintain law and order, so that life, property and 
religious beliefs of its subjects are fully protected by the 
State." Amongst the evils which he vowed would not be tolerated 
were bribery, corruption, blackmarketing, and "this great evil - 
the evil of nepotism and jobbery."

Despite his love for Jinnah, Cowasjee is in fact influenced far more by  one man whom modern day Pakistan owes far more too and yet whose legacy is now so little.


Cowasjee on Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto


Ilahi Bakhsh and I have known each other since 1943 when we both read 

science at the Dayaram Jethmal Sind College, Karachi. Later he moved to the 
Nadirshaw Eduljee Dinshaw Engineering College to do his BE, and then went 
off to America to do his M.Sc from Columbia Polytechnic. In 1951, it was 
Illoo who helped arrange for our mutual friend Zulfikar Ali Bhutto to be 
married to his second wife Nusrat, much against the will and wishes of 
father Shahnawaz and his family. Illoo produced a Maulvi and the two were 
wedded very privately, with only Karamdad Junejo and Ilahi Bakhsh standing 
by on Zulfikar. and  father Sabunchi with Nusrat.

 
..

We first met in 1951, introduced by our family lawyer Dingomal 

Narayansingh Ramchandani. 'Meet our latest entrant,' said Dingo, 
'Shahnawaz's son.' My father and I shook hands with a young affable 
man. We talked of generalities; my father wrote him off; I was 
impressed. When I next met him (Dingo having put him on one of our 
cases) he seriously declared his ambition to be foreign minister of 
Pakistan.
    
He was helped by Iranian Nusrat Sabunchi, his second wife, to 
further his single-minded purpose via her countrywoman, Naheed 
Mirza, wife of Iskander Mirza, defence secretary, then interior 
minister, then, in 1955, governor-general of the Dominion of 
Pakistan, and in March 1956 the first president of the Republic of 
Pakistan. Zulfikar had the knack of climbing and worked himself 
into Mirza's good books,. He was given his first official 
assignment in March 1958, as leader of the Pakistan delegation to 
the Law of the Sea Conference at Geneva.

 
This in turn was followed by his quoting of Bhutto's letter to President Iskander Mirza 
 
 Power seekers are adept in the art of sycophancy, if adept in 

nothing else. Declamations of 'my imperishable and devoted 
loyalty,' 'you are not merely an individual, but an institution,' 
'your services are indispensable for the greater good of the 
country,' 'you embody the national interest,' all roll glibly off 
many servile tongues, and are transferred with the greatest of ease 
from each transient master to the next. The supreme example of 
adulation : 'When the history of this country is written by 
objective historians, your name will be placed even before that of 
Mr Jinnah,' written to Iskander Mirza by loyal Zulfikar Ali Bhutto

 
Bhutto, Mujib & Yahya Khan 

Defying the stereotype of Yahya Khan, the destroyer of united Pakistan, Cowasjee in fact tells us the story of
Yahya Khan through the eyes of his son. Unsurprisingly Cowasjee would agree with Yahya 
who was to lay the blame on the feet of Bhutto and Sheikh Mujib.

Basit has now compiled a book The Breaking of Pakistan, containing papers 
written by Yahya in which he describes the interaction between him, Bhutto 
and Mujib that led to the disintegration of the country. Most of these 
papers were those submitted by Yahya to the Hamoodur Rahman Commission, 
plus other sworn statements and affidavits. In his introduction, he 
explains:

Yahya thinks that it was the Mujib-Bhutto interaction which broke 
rity leader, who insisted to be treated as equal to the majority 
leader. Be
Pakistan. Indeed, he puts the major share of the blame on Z. A. Bhutto, the 
min
otween these covers the reader will find Yahya's perception on the 
subject. He is obsessed with the theme that 'a congruence of objectives'

Zulfikar Ali Bhutto was a power-hungry person who exploited the social 
climbersechniques of projecting special relationship with the Army 
Brass. He was a narcissist with a tendency to megalomania as well as 
intrigue. He had no commitment to any doctrine or to Pakistan. He 
manufactured his own charisma without any ethical scruples.

Sheikh Mujib was a greedy and immature person who never outgrew the role 
of an agitator student leader. Indians had bribed him to launch an anti-
Pakistan movement in East Pakistan to which extent the allegations in the 
Agartala Conspiracy case were true. They had also implanted a phobia in his 
mind that even if he were to win a general election and become the prime 
minister real power will not be transferred by the Pakistan Army.

Bhutto & the 1973 Republic

Despite Cowasjees early closeness to ZA Bhutto, this relationship was to change 
dramatically after ZAB was to assume power in 1971. 
As the increasingly authoritarian ruler started to to turn on 
his former friends and best man.  

 This constitution, the constitution of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, father of 
Benazir, was drafted and redrafted during 1972-73 and finally 
promulgated on Aug 14, 1973.

Zulfikar Ali Bhutto promulgated our
Constitution in 1973 and within four hours had the fundamental
rights enshrined therein suspended and had many members of the
opposition jailed.

The feeble and acquiescing president, Fazal Elahi Chaudhary, and asked him to sign 
ead and digest it. (Cowasjee November 2007)
it, which of course he did without demur and probably without bothering 
to 

Halaku (Asghar Khan of Bhakkar) I have known since 1972, then a dreaded policeman who was sent to 
Karachi by Bhutto to question me. Bhutto was desperately trying to find 
some evidence against Altaf Gauhar who had been arrested on a trumped-up 
charge and jailed. Halaku, quite happy to call a machine gun 
,ordered his sidekick to pick up Cowasjee Ardeshir, also bearded, 
also a Parsi. This unfortunate man, totally ignorant of what was going on, 
was taken to the police station and questioned late into the night, until 
at last Halaku realising he had the wrong man, arrested me, the machine 
gun, and released him, the gun machine.

He then writes movingly about another era of darkness in Balochistan and Pakistan when another generation of unaccountable 'agencies' mercilessly hounded the people of Pakistan.

hand in hand with the nebulous 'agencies', 

let us take Sherbaz's story of the elimination in 1976 of young Asadullah

Mengal, son of that most upright Baloch Sardar and gentleman, Ataullah.
Asadullah and his friend Ahmad Shah Kurd were ambushed outside the house of
Balakh Sher Mazari. Asadullah was killed, and his body dragged along the
road and dumped in the back of a car. Ahmad Shah was taken alive, put in
the car, driven away and then killed. No one was ever charged, no one ever
found out the who's, the why's or the wherefore's.
    
One night in December 1973, a hand grenade was thrown down the ventilator
of the Quetta house of NAP Pakhtoonkhwa leader Abdus Samad Achakzai. The
grenade exploded, killing Achakzai. No one was ever charged or apprehended.
    
Sherbaz spoke also of 'Johnny' Dass, son of the highly respected Air
Commodore Balwant Dass, one of the most senior officers of the PAF who
served his country with distinction. Dulip Dass, known to his family and
friends as Johnny (and Later known to the Baloch as 'Dilu') at the age of
25 returned to Pakistan from England in 1972, where he was doing his
chartered accountancy - 'to do something for his country', as he put it. He
and a few other idealistic young men went to Balochistan. Johnny was
accused of being a sympathizer of the Baloch insurgency and was put on the
'wanted' list. On his way out of the province, betrayed by an informer, he
was ambushed at Jhatpat, taken away by the 'agencies', kept in custody (in
Quetta jail for a while, it is said). The story has it that he was tortured
to death. Where or when no one knows. His father spent months on his trail
in Balochistan; despite his rank and standing neither the army nor the
'agencies' gave him any help or information. His body was never found.
    
In March 1974, Maulvi Sahmsuddin, Deputy Speaker of the Balochistan
Assembly of the opposition party Jamiat-i-Ulema Islam, left Quetta for Fort
Sandeman in his official vehicle. Malik Haji Gul Mandokhel left Quetta by
car later the same day and found Shamsuddin shot dead in his car near Qila
Shagal. It was later learnt that a man called Shah Wazir had visited
Shamsuddin at Quetta, stayed with him for three days and had insisted on
accompanying him to Fort Sandeman. Shah Wazir was never found, dead or alive.
    
Dr Nazir Ahmed, MNA of the JI, was an outspoken critic of Mr. Bhutto's
politics and style of government. One evening in June 1972 a man entered
his clinic in Dera Ghazi Khan and shot him dead. The case was ostensibly
investigated by the police. Two men were sent up for trial and both were
discharged by the court, the judgment saying: "The investigation seems to
be intentionally dishonest." The public prosecutor submitted before the
court that the police had intentionally 'spoiled' the case. Jassarat, in a
front-page article, wrote: "the motive behind the murder is political and
the police investigation are ridiculous." Information Minister Kausar Niazi
suggested that action be taken against the paper and Bhutto approved,
noting "certainly this needs to be done."

Then there were the six Hurs - Mehrab Sinjhrani, Umaid Ali Sinjhrani, Jan
Mohammed Sinjhrani, Hanzo Bahnejo, Syed Ali Sher, and Allah Dad Wadho. Pir
Pagara posed a problem for Bhutto, so in 1973 a plan was prepared to
diminish, if not demolish, his influence by subduing his followers. Chief
security officer Saeed Ahmed Khan and provincial minister Jam Sadiq Ali
were ordered to undertake the anti-Hur operations. Ali Bakhsh Junejo of the
Sanghar district PPP, a close associate of Jam Sadiq Ali, was murdered by
unidentified men. The following day, the six Hurs were ordered to attend
the court of district magistrate, Sanghar, Imdadullah Unar, where
proceedings under the 'Goonda Act' were pending against them. The
magistrate handed them over to police custody. They were confined in
Sanghar police station and that night were taken out handcuffed, and driven
towards Kanan Mori. Jam Sadiq Ali, Imdadullah Unar and SP Ghulam Shabbir
Kalyar followed them in another vehicle. At Kanan Mori the six Hurs were
shot dead in "an encounter with the police." The police party was rewarded.

(to be continued) 

References

1. Cowasjee, (13 November 1999) Jinnah's Pakistan
2.  Cowasjee( 1 March 1997) Toil and tears
3.  Cowasjee (12 September 1996) General Agha Mohammed Yahya Khan
4.  Cowasjee (28 June 1997) the missing chapter

Karachi: No hope for the city by the sea?

A few years ago I was at a lecture in which the speaker observed that how in modern society we seem to think complex things are easy and simple things are hard. I was reminded of that comment, the other day when  Ahsan Butt posed the question, asking what, if anything, can be done to save Karachi? Now despite the positive comments at what he had written, solutions offered were few and far between. To put things in perspective, Karachi  is Pakistan’s former capital, Sindh’s provincial capital, Pakistan’s biggest city and its financial nerve centre. It is a cosmopolitan fruit salad, consisting of predominantly Urdu speakers who migrated from India in 1947 after partition.  Politically, it is dominated by the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM), which despite being in coalition with the present government, has seen its former iron grip over the city being challenged by both the Pakistan People’s Party and another coalition partner, the ethnic Pashtun Awami National Party. With gravely rising death toll every day, you have power shortages, water shortages, a collapsing infrastructure, sectarian violence and seemingly unstoppable street crime. Not to forget, both the MQM and the Awami National Party have been on the receiving end of the Military’s wrath for their moderate credentials and their alternative view of the Pakistani establishment (to put it simply they don’t like them). The irony, however, is that despite the similarity in their political views, the two parties’ are nowadays openly calling for the military to intervene in the city.

Sounds complicated enough, doesn’t it? My take, however, was a bit different. Reason being, I view Karachi’s situation as part of a broader problem. To put it plainly, the government and people look at specific problems in Pakistan and Karachi in particular in isolation and miss the crucial point that status quo is part of the problem. 

There are several problems that afflict the city. First and the foremost, there is the decline in the 'writ' of the state and apprehensions over government’s ability to enforce its authority. You have the police, which is on one hand, politicised, under-equipped and undermanned, and a judicial system with barely 5% conviction rate. In the former’s case, situation is far worse than the rest of the country, as Karachi has had to put up with presence of paramilitary forces along with police for the last 20 odd years. There has never been a serious effort to establish a professional, efficient, depoliticised metropolitan police force. Even when it dominated Karachi from 2003-2008, the MQM was content with the status quo. So to expect the police to suddenly be interested in their duties when for 20 years somebody else has been running the show for them is unrealistic.

At the same time, both Altaf Hussain’s and Ghulam Bilour’s suggestion for a military operation in the city are historical inaccuracies. The military operation in 1992 was not what led to a drop in violence in Karachi. It was, in fact, the brutal paramilitary operation, led by Naseerullah Babar. This was followed by the MQM’s rehabilitation by working with PML-N and finally attempts by the Musharraf’s government to reinvest in the city. It was no single event but the whole  process that brought a semblance of peace to Karachi for a few years.

Moreover, as  a consequence of the Musharraf era, the political economy and demography of Karachi changed markedly, Musharraf’s rule was noted for, lop-sided development in certain regions within the country with Karachi being the prime example, as the megapolis underwent a drastic makeover under the mayorship of Mustafa Kamal of MQM, as the city experienced a mini economic boom.

The downside was, this growth exacerbated simmering tension in the city and was amplified by the dominance of the MQM in the province and federation, the presence of the MMA in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa along with the debacles in FATA. However, massive demographic balance changes were witnessed post floods last year which triggered a third major influx of migrants from those regions into Karachi.

Finally, there is a historical generational change that analysts and writers do not factor in. The MQM was defined by several key events in its history such as its soaring popularity post Bushra Zaidi incident in 1986  and finally its ouster from Karachi’s local election scene in the late 90s.

In that period a new generation of MQM leaders have grown up. These are people who came of age in the Musharraf boom, and have only a brief memory of the dark days of operation clean up. For them, the military is not seen as a threat as much as their local opponents are seen.

By contrast, the defining moments for the Pashtun community in Karachi, were the Riffat Afridi case in 1998, followed by the clash between ANP-PPP and the MQM in May 2007 and finally culminating with the 2008 election and ANPs first win in Karachi. This, in addition to the PPP’s closeness to the ANP, created a strategic alliance which is challenging the MQM’s hold on power in the city. Generationally, the people leading this movement are a new middle class amongst the Pashtun community, they are people who are not from traditional ANP dominated areas and have essentially been driven to the party more out of a dislike of the MQM than love for the ANP. They want access to state machinery to improve their lot in the city, but are instead coming across the MQM’s near decade hold over the local and in part the provincial state machinery.

When you add all of this together with the criminalisation of the militant wings and the loosening of the leadership’s holds over their members, here you have the crux of the immediate problem. How do you stop ‘political’ violence when the people committing target killings might not be under the control of the local political party?

The solutions to all this are not “complex-easy ones”. They are not the restoration of the Commissionerate system, keeping coalition partners happy with plots and quotas, nor are they military operations. They are not quests for mythical leaders who will save the people or all or nothing political brinkmanship which also likely to be ineffective. 

The answers are the “simple-hard”:An assertive local government system which is inclusive of all stake holders, a police force which is independent and local, a judicial system which is effective. But above all, the realisation that while developing cities, a uniform approach is required or else one will be compelled to migrate to where the work is. These in themselves are basic first steps, and like all simple things, they start at square one.

QOTD: Pakistan's One Unit

In 1954, forty-two years ago, when the One Unit issue was 
to be voted upon in the provincial assembly, the then chief minister, 
Mohammed Ayub Khuhro, in cahoots with his minister Pir Ali Mohammed Rashdi, 
realising that the honourable Mirs of Talpur would vote against their 
proposal, acted. Mir Ali Ahmed Talpur was arrested on a trumped-up charge, 
Mir Rasul Bakhsh Talpur managed to escape and hide, and the smallest and 
gentlest of the three, Mir Ghulam Ali Talpur, was bodily picked up and 
bundled off on the back of a camel to Mitthi, the same old Mitthi in the 
Thar desert.

- Ardeshir Cowasjee (18th July 1996) writing in the DAWN 

I have always found the creation of Pakistans one unit something of an amusement 

considering the intent behind it, the dominant West Pakistan elite fearing the 

Bengali majority wanted some form of parity with East Pakistan. So simple enough

solution ignore the ethnic, administrative and historic divisions in 'West Pakistan'

and just amalgamate them together into one unit. As a sop to the Pakhtunistan movement

inititally Peshawar was supposed to be West Pakistans provincial Capital but this was later

changed to Lahore.

I find the Bengali political leaders willingness to sacrfice their inherent majority 

status for the sake of national unity unusual and tragic. They obviously believed in the concept 

of Pakistan to an extent that they were willing to forego their own basic right of 

representation. It is tragic for several reasons, one is I cannot imagine something similar

happening in present day Pakistan. A ethnic group willingly surrender its unfluence 

somewhere for the greater good. Secondly is the simplistic approach that one unit reflected

sure enough when you look into its history you see the good old military establishments

finger prints over this overly simplistic solution to Pakistans problems. 

So if you have corrupt politicians ban politics, if you have tensions between ethnic groups

ban any reflections of ethnicitiy or diversity. And as the above quote shows...you do whatever it

takes to achieve the figleaf of legal support for your moves. 

It really would be funny if it wasn't so sad... 

Caption contest of the day

Maulana Fazlur Rehman talking to Nawaz Sharif..any guesses on what they might be saying to each other? Answers in the comments section please!