I have been a resident of Islamabad since 1986. That makes about twenty-five years to date. I remember some electricity load-shedding, while there used to be no gas load-shedding. And the electricity load-shedding would not exceed a limit that would cause our daily routines to disrupt. Rather, in the summers, that one hour load-shedding at night would give all of us a great opportunity to take a break and have a nice stroll in the street under the star-decked night-sky. With all the black out on ground, the stars took stage to shine piercingly. In the winters, the same hour would see the family huddle in front of the heater, eat peanuts and talk.
It was the winters of 2007. I sat huddled in a cold, dark room, holding my one-month old first-born. No, God forbid, I was not in any kind of detention center (After the mind-blowing abduction of Aafia Siddiqui along with her children, such descriptions bring detention centers to the mind). This cold, dark place was my very own home which had always been used to lights, warmth and laughter. This was the first winters I was experiencing with electricity and gas load-shedding happening together. We had resorted to candles for light. The rooms were so cold. And there was no warm water in the taps, for the geyser was not running. I was so scared my new born baby would fall ill and die.
Why this dreadful situation? I thought. And my mind rocketed back to the tragedy of three months ago…
Islamabad, Operation Silence, July 2007: Lal Masjid was attacked by the Musharraf regime for the so-called crime of demanding rule-of-Shariah-Law within the land, setting a deadline for it and attempting a couple of incursions to implement it. Prior to the attack and during the siege, the dwellers of Lal Masjid were subjected to food-supply cut-off, electricity, gas and water supply cut-off, harassment and terrorism.
Soon after, Pakistan was afflicted with the worst kind of wheat and sugar shortage, electricity and gas crisis, drone attacks by the US escalating from four to thirty-three per annum and the onset of suicide attacks. Indeed, The Islamic Republic of Pakistan had committed a suicide attack upon itself when it sought to crush an Islamic movement to appease its dollar-masters.
The pattern match was not lost to the observant eye and heart and very soon the print media was buzzing with the commentary of Nature’s recompense upon the Pakistani nation for staying mute upon the Lal Masjid Operation in the heart of Pakistan’s capital, Islamabad.
Today, the whole nation; men, women, children and senior citizens, are turning out on the streets protesting the horrendous electricity and gas load-shedding which has wrecked the most basic routines of people. Despite the record-breaking inflation of sixteen percent this fiscal year, even if people are managing to buy some ration for their kitchens, their children are still going to schools without breakfast for there is no gas to cook food on.
However, these protests will lead to nothing. For Nature’s rule works upon ‘An eye for an eye…’, and Nature will not forgive and restore our facilities until we restore the facilities of those whom we rooted out unjustifiably. Jamya Hafsa, Lal Masjid’s girl’s madrassah was demolished to the ground post Operation Silence. A year later, in 2008, the Supreme Court of Pakistan gave the ruling for the reconstruction of Jamya Hafsa. Three years later, in 2011, the court order still remains unheard.
The civil protests on the roads today might not have been needed had these protests been made prior and during the days of Operation Silence when religious students and religious social workers were subjected to hunger, thirst, electricity, gas and water cut-off, harassment and terrorization. Today the whole nation is suffering exactly the same. Perhaps we can get out of this mess if instead of taking to the streets to get back our basic facilities, we go back a little way and seek the reconstruction of Jamya Hafsa and restore their basic facilities to them through donations. For the students of Jamya Hafsa are resilient students; when their roof was taken away, they did not choose to go home or to other fancy universities as President Musharraf had offered at that time, but continued to study in make-shift arrangements, eat meager meals and sleep at night in open, windy corridors during the piercing winters of Islamabad.
