Saturday, December 29, 2007

Was yesterday's carnage in Karachi all PPP's doing or did MQM have a hand in it? - An Eyewitness Report

I would like to share with you an email sent to me just now narrating the experience of a person who tried to get home yesterday amidst the rioting and the chaos. The government and the media continues to point fingers at emotionally charged PPP supporters but instead we kind of forget that this city (Karachi) is controlled by yet another party called MQM who happened to show its full colors not to long ago on May 12th. Did we just see a repeat telecast of that 5/12 massacre yet again

I know many are attributing the violence, burning of cars, looting of ATM machines etc in the city to the reaction of PPP workers but allow me to share something that I observed last night. Like many I was also stuck in chaotic traffic for 4 hours. The Rikshaw driver refused to go beyond Quaids mazar and abandoned me there and took off. I don’t blame him. Anyway I had no choice but to ride with a total stranger on a bike to take me home. While moving through small streets to find our way to Gulshan-e-Iqbal, I witnessed many vehicles being torched. On one such small gali, I recognized a face, in the armed mob which was about to torch a parked Hi Roof, from my previous Mohala. He is a devout MQM worker. He had a riffle in his hand and was ushering a crowd of young men with lathis in their hands.

The interesting thing is that the guy who gave me lift was also MQM supporter. So he was taking all the safe passages of MQM dominated areas to avoid getting in any trouble. I can even tell you where i saw this activity. So MQM burning vehicles in their own areas are trying to create an excuse to counter-violence? start an ethnic war in sindh? this is very scarry.

So, as far as Karachi is concerned, we cannot rule out the fascist MQM gundaas, who can capitalize on this tragedy to settle scores, indulge in looting and malign the name of other political parties. Besides, looting of money and snatching of mobiles, as is reported in some cases, is more of a MQM style gundagardi than any other party’s.