Unholy pligrimage
November 23rd, 2010
Massive corruption and mismanagement in the conduct of Hajj affairs would seem to be the very bottom of the abyss anyone can sink to. It seems all the more ironical that the Hajj scandal that has been hitting headlines for some weeks now should take place in a country like ours — where a great display of public piety is often put on and claims of religiosity made by people everywhere. This is matched by what appears to be a growing lack of morality. The allegations of wrongdoing have been particularly widespread this year. We have already heard complaints made publicly by a Saudi prince who alleged that apartments given to pilgrims from Pakistan had rents that were exorbitant and that they were located much further from the Kaaba compared to other available housing. He further alleged that the reason for this was that officials had made money on the side and that he was willing to furnish evidence to this effect. The director-general in charge of the operation was asked to come back to Pakistan and eventually arrested — but only after the Supreme Court intervened. The matter did not end there. Hamid Saeed Kazmi, the religious affairs minister, has been accused of mismanagement and even one of his colleagues, the science and technology minister, has stepped in and suggested that Mr Kazmi cannot claim innocence.
In some ways ,of course, all this is hardly new. We have heard much the same many times before. It is, after all, no secret that corruption is rampant everywhere. But if we can sink to depths in matters that hold a central place in our religion, if we can so ruthlessly exploit poor people who have saved for years to make the pilgrimage, then what does all this say about us as a people? We are told the matter is being investigated. It has indeed created some embarrassment in Islamabad. But whatever comes of this inquiry nothing will change the fact that thousands have suffered during an occasion of key importance to their lives due to the unscrupulous actions of various individuals. We can only hope — and pray — they receive the punishment they deserve so that such acts are not repeated in the future, at least as far as the conduct of Hajj affairs goes.
The shame of Aasia Bibi’s blasphemy charade
November 23rd, 2010
Punjab Governor Salmaan Taseer has gone to a Sheikhupura jail where a poor Christian woman bhatta mazdoor (brick-kiln labourer) has been sentenced to death by the sessions judge. She was accused of having blasphemed against the Holy Prophet (pbuh). The governor, unexpectedly for a politician, called it an outrage and has pledged to draft an amnesty letter to the president asking him to pardon Aasia Bibi. Most other politicians have kept quiet while human rights workers and NGOs working for women’s rights have protested at yet another shameful prosecution under the universally condemned blasphemy law in Pakistan.
Aasia Bibi did hard labour for the local bricklaying industry in Nankana Sahib and had the usual complaint about unfair and violent labour practices. She, however, also ran the gauntlet of living in the midst of an increasingly narrow-minded Muslim community of poor labourers presided over by a bigoted blasphemy law-loving cleric. Two reasons are related to why she was entrapped by an equally colluding police: that she was provoked by other women drawing water when they said that she was ‘napaak’ (impure); and that she had asserted to other women that the meat of Muslim qurbani (sacrifice) was haram (prohibited) for her.
Whatever the reason for her entrapment, the politician was stunned into silence. Only the Punjab governor proved that he was not a mere drawing room liberal but had the courage to rise to Aasia Bibi’s defence. No one from among the big politicians from small parties like the Pakhtunkhwa Milli Awami Party, Tehreek-i-Insaf and the Awami National Party raised their voice even after there was international outrage led by the Pope at the Vatican. The PPP, which had just handed over the Council of Islamic Ideology (CII) to a cleric of the pro-Taliban ferocious variety, was loath to follow Governor Taseer’s example.
The PML-N was expected to stay out of it — because of its past role in stiffening the accursed law further — reaping mileage when the clergy was to bare it fangs at Governor Taseer, although Nawaz Sharif had gone to a Christian charity school and had probably seen members of his family visit the city’s Christian charity hospital. Punjab Law Minister Rana Sanaullah criticised the governor’s action with his ear cocked to what the Sipah-e-Sahaba would say about the case. The clergy did not take long to respond. There was a collective frog chorus saying the blasphemy law could not be changed after a column appeared in this newspaper in which it was argued that the law be repealed. The Barelvis, crushed by the Taliban in numerous suicide attacks, came out saying Aasia Bibi could not be pardoned because pardon itself was un-Islamic.
It takes eight to nine years for a person convicted under the blasphemy law to get out of jail after a final benign judgement by the Supreme Court. The sessions judge, in most cases himself a bigot, is usually scared into handing out a conviction by the hostile madrassa clergy standing outside his court and baying for blood. Aasia Bibi, while agreeing to ask for pardon, has also appealed the case at the High Court; but the bitter truth is that finally it is the Supreme Court where ‘justice’ is delivered in the midst of a most defamatory campaign by concerned states at the international level. With their hopes at an end, human rights workers led by the president of the Supreme Court Bar Association, Asma Jahangir, have recommended that all blasphemy cases be heard at the High Court level instead of the sessions.
After the massacre of the Gojra Christians on the charge of blasphemy in 2009, the National Assembly’s Standing Committee on Human Rights had urged the government to re-examine the blasphemy law and improve its procedure. No one in the committee was convinced that anything could be done. In the past, procedural changes such as making blasphemy cases subject to the scrutiny of the divisional commissioner before making arrests and registering FIRs have been ignored. Minorities are increasingly under pressure from the mischief of this deeply-flawed law and there is no one who would agitate the way some of us are agitating for the release of Aafia Siddiqi from an American jail.