Political Dens

It is very difficult for the common man to understand the psychology of the folks of Heera Mandi. Heera Mandi is the legendary prostitution center of Lahore, Pakistan. Ironically, it is located right next to Badshahi Masjid, the legendary biggest and oldest mosque of Lahore, Pakistan.

The psychology of a human being is ruled by his/her basic instincts, culture, education, foreign influence and religion. A person’s basic instincts refrains him from feeding upon a minor, a female and the weak. The Pakistani culture at least sniffs its nose for the earnings of a female. Education, because it has been infiltrated by foreign and so-called modern ideology, is somewhat confused on the matter. In it, the concept of equality has wrongly burdened the woman to herself earn her livelihood while our religion dictated that she earned her livelihood inherently by the presence of male members in her family.

Prostitution is a concept whereby a woman not only earns for herself but is considered the chief bread winner of the family. That too, by a method, which is a shame to basic instincts, almost all cultures and all religions. Since she takes the chief role of bread winning, the birth of a girl is more celebrated in the prostitution clans than in the regular society. A fact about which they are proud of, for it sets them apart from the cultural stigma of male chauvinism. Ironically, it also exposes the fact that it is not about having a boy or a girl but about the glitter of money then.

Brokers, generally male, are key players in the prostitution profession. They are the ‘caretakers’ of the prostitutes, handle the financial deals and also fish customers for them, thereby ‘earning’ their share and/or heading the business in case they own the den.

While much is said about the Quranic verse,

“Men shall take full care of women with the bounties which God has bestowed more abundantly on the former than on the latter…” [The Holy Quran, Surah Al-Nisaa, Verse 34]

The Holy Prophet SAW further detailed the idea of headship in Islam by the Hadith,

“Your heads are your servants”.

Thereby completing the circle of balance, equity and organizational behavior as shaped by Islam, and unquestionably giving the reasons of chain of command, roles and organizational structure for a society.

The headship mentioned in this Hadith applies equally to heads of families and heads of nations.

Now let us reflect upon what the servants of our nation, our heads, have been doing. They have been earning their living and security by selling their family members, including women and children, as proclaimed in the book ‘In the Line of Fire’. They trade off the natural resources of the nation for petty prices in lieu of fast cash into their personal pockets. They cut-off life supplies to neighboring family clans in order to earn luxury lifestyles for themselves and security of their prolonged headship. And all this happens in Islamic Republics of the World.

Yet Pervaiz Musharraf, you are no more. Yet Hosni Mubarak, you are no more. Yet Mr. So-and-So, you shall be no more. But you will not learn and you will not change. History awakens you again and again about the miserable end of Mir Jaffars and Mir Sadiqs. Yet you are blinded by greed and gluttony. You continue to run your den, knowing that it is a characterless stigma in this world and a painful remorse in the Hereafter.