Since the military seized power in October 1999, more than 220 people (mostly Shias) have been killed and over 200 seriously injured in 80 outbreaks of religious violence in 30 cities of Pakistan. The worst affected is the economically backward, religiously conservative, largely illiterate, Federally Administered Tribal Area where Sunni-Shia clashes have accounted for over 60 dead. But the contagion has spread to Karachi, the industrial hub of the country, killing 50, disrupting economic activity and undermining business confidence. What is the government doing about this malignant sectarian disease?
General Pervez Musharraf seems alive to the national threat posed by religious extremists nurtured in Pakistan’s many sectarian-inspired madaris (religious schools). On the curative side of the prescription, he has constantly urged religious groups and parties to tolerate diverse opinion and shun violence. But after failing to elicit an encouraging response, he has now banned the two leading proponents of sectarian violence — the Sunni-Deobandi Lashkar-e-Jhangvi and the Shia Sipah-e-Mohammad — and warned their “parent” parties — the Sipah-e-Sahaba and Tehrik-e-Jafaria respectively — of more serious consequences if they don’t behave. The government has also stiffened the anti-terrorist law by imposing punitive restrictions on the “glorification” of such sectarian acts by the media. On the preventive side, the government proposes to establish an institution for the rational guidance and financial care of model deeni madaris whose curricula are in tune with the requirements of a modern and rational outlook.
Clearly, General Musharraf is embarrassed by the negative diplomatic consequences of allowing jehadi groups to maintain a high profile in Pakistan. This concern follows India’s insistence in Agra last month that the issue of “cross-border terrorism” (meaning “Pakistan-based and inspired jehad”) should be treated at par with the Kashmir dialogue in any Indo-Pak peace talks. Thus the government is making a tentative effort to cap this adverse fallout by trying to veil the jehadi groups, in particular by restraining them from collecting funds in public. All these steps are commendable. But they fall far short of the drastic measures needed to halt the slide into violent religious anarchy, economic uncertainty and political confusion.
The ban on two underground sectarian organizations makes no concrete sense. Warning an incorrigible group to behave, while setting its leader free from prison, is baffling. Arresting scores of sectarian activists amidst a glare of publicity one day and releasing them quietly in ones and twos the next day is hypocritical. The idea of a new body to establish and oversee model religious schools is hardly ingenious, considering that is the job of the ministry of religious affairs anyway. Similarly, amending the anti-terrorist law by imposing restrictions on press freedom is misplaced concreteness. Significantly, too, the government has not banned jehadi organisations from collecting funds; it has merely asked them not to collect them publicly. And that too only in one province, where they are quite insignificant.
But if moderate Muslims are dissatisfied with these mock-measures, the extremists are deeply offended by them. The government’s attempt to guide or oversee religious schools is seen by their sponsors as an effort to “control” and steer them away from their objectives. Similarly, the jehadis have flatly refused to stop collecting funds. Indeed, sections of the ideological print media in accord with jehadi aspirations are advising General Musharraf to proceed with “caution” on this front.
Clearly, General Musharraf’s situation is untenable. On the one hand, he is the Chief of an army whose outlook is conservative and whose fighting spirit is inspired by religious ideals and slogans. The army’s “corporate” interests in Afghanistan and Kashmir, however mistaken they may be, also dictate a specific linkage with jehadi groups motivated in support of the army’s tactical or strategic foreign objectives. Thus it is not easy for him to sever ties with the religious and jehadi elements. On the other hand, General Musharraf is the President of a country that desperately seeks rejuvenation as a modern, moderate, peaceable, Muslim state in the community of nations. The country’s “corporate” interests also demand a resounding economic revival program organically linked to the secular dynamics of global capitalism rather than to the ideological statics of a semi-feudal domestic order. But in order to achieve this international status, he must erase all evidence of religious extremism, bigotry and extra-territorial jehadism from Pakistan’s body-politic. Meanwhile, the contradiction between the two corporate requirements or positions is accentuated by the fact that the religious extremists have an independent agenda and life of their own in which they seek to capture the command of the Pakistan state and army rather than remain their pawns for all times to come.
General Musharraf is trying to play all sides at the same time. But the contradictions in his position are becoming sharper by the day. He should lead Pakistan unambiguously into modern nationhood. If he can’t or won’t, it is only a matter of time before the country and army are engulfed in domestic anarchy and international conflict.