To Mourn the Death of a Political Activist

On 27^th March, “unidentified persons”, shot dead an MQM activist, within hours of the incident numerous buses, hotels and shops were set ablaze and several casualties were reported in the aftermath of the killing. Then on 29^th March, some ANP activist was killed by some “unknown people”.

Those people who think that setting ablaze shops and buses would somehow quench their thirst for vengeance, are wrong, it is not right. It is never right, by any law, by any code or by any moral standard to injure and maim people in vengeful anger and the political parties are utterly and entirely to held in blame for this carnage.

These knights of vengeance forget that when they set about to avenge the death of their comrade, the people would only mourn for the loss of their own personal property or worse their loved ones. Just for the death of two political activists, 7 Karachiites were killed,

is there any justification for that?

I ask you, how many of us actually shed a tear for the death of a political party of any standing. Majority of us do not, because we have other important things to do in life, struggle to earn bread for the family, study for exams or look after kids. Well, if we don’t care as a nation then why does the ticker on the news channels reads like, “ aaj------kay karqun ki halaqat kay sog per Karachi main shutter down hartal”, so are these news channels telling me that the Karachiites are shutting down their businesses and educational institutions as a protest?

As a consequence of strikes and shutter downs Pakistan suffers a loss of 15 billion rupees and Karachi alone suffers a loss of almost 2.5 billion rupees.

Would a hard-pressed shopkeeper actually even think of closing down his shop for a day just because some activist died?

Would a day laborer actually sit at home as a protest against the target killing of some obscure political activist?

Would a CEO actually think of bearing a loss on revenue for a day just because a political activist died?

No, nobody ever does that, except of course the political parties. How can I think of mourning the death of a political activist of any party when my city burns, when my city loses billions of rupees, just because of political chaos? How can shed I tear for those dead activists when innocent patients cannot get treatment because nurses and doctors fail to turn up at the hospital as a result of the strike. How can I grieve the death of those activists, when a day laborer is unable to feed his family because he could not go out to earn money, just because “some political workers died”.

No, in all honesty and sincerity, I would not grieve, mourn, or protest against the death of the political activist if it means chaos and carnage in my city.

We are much intelligent beings then what we consider ourselves to be. As intelligent beings, God has given us brains to analyze and process complex thoughts, surely we can figure out better ways of protesting, but no, we have to kill, maim and torture our own people to avenge the death of our comrade in arms. All I can say is that the Quaid would be disgusted.