SHIA worshippers Killed:The forgotten war

EDITORIAL:PAKISTAN TODAY

The horror. The Shia worshippers on their way to a pilgrimage, who were intercepted and murdered in Mastung, were all taken out of a bus, lined up and shot mercilessly. Bombing places of worship is no less stark a barbarity. But somehow Tuesday’s viciousness is a reminder of the point-blank rage that sectarian divides fuel in the radicalised.

The Lashkar-e-Jhangvi has claimed responsibility for the attack. This is Pakistan’s forgotten war. The turf war in Karachi gets enough media attention. So do the Taliban up north. And so does (sparingly, albeit) the Baloch insurgency. But it is the dragon’s teeth of militant networks that make themselves visible from time to time in the form of sectarian violence that have constantly been evading attention. As opposed to those who lord over Karachi or the bulk of the TTP, these networks are present all over the country. Much has been made of the presence of militants in South Punjab but that would mean to imply, erroneously, they aren’t active in north and central parts of the province.

In terms of constituency realpolitik, the campaigns of election candidates can be absolutely gutted if they manage to get on the wrong side of these networks. The political class, open always to debate, discussions and, usually, the maintenance of inclusive values, might make it to the chambers of legislature and even local executive positions, but in vast swathes of the land, it is these seminaries and their allied militant wings that call the shots; they are increasingly making those who are elected to power irrelevant. For those Pakistani hypernationalists who chuckle at India’s Naxalite red corridor, perhaps a look at Pakistan’s own soft underbelly would be in order.

That is indeed a depressing answer to the question that members of the Hazara community have been asking of late: where is the state?

This war, when it is finally fought, just might turn out to be bloodier than the ones we are currently engaged in. But it is one that cannot be avoided. Be it in Balochistan or the Punjab.