Asian HRs Commission Hongkong Says Army Supported Al Qaeda Candidates

Pakistan military intends to back Al-Qaida candidates for the next parliament

There have been some developments recently that reveal that in the 2013 elections elements of the Taliban and Al-Qaida had been offered seats in the parliament. Before these developments the security agencies with the help of right wing parties have also allowed 53 sectarian candidates to contest the elections without passing through the sword of the articles 62 and 63 of the constitution which debar any candidate known to be involved in cases of sectarian violence, hate campaigns or having been charged with murder and killings through sectarian violence.

The military officials were remained busy in the Bajur agency, FATA, close to Afghan border, to make a deal with the agents of Al-Qaida for the coming elections.

During the time of filing the nomination papers the Military Commander of the Bajur agency, Brigadier Ghulam Haider, held a meeting with the local leadership of Jamat-e-Islami (JI) who, in the past had direct links with the militants of Al-Qaida and master minds of 9/11 and had provided shelter to them. There are two national assembly seats from the Bajur agency and these two seats were assured to JI and in return the JI and other jihadist organization will provide:

(1) logistic support to those who want to join Jihad in Afghanistan from Pakistani side and extend ‘melmastia’, the traditional tribal hospitality, to Mujahideen coming back from Afghanistan;

(2) JI will not oppose any operation in Bajaur but rather support any military operation in Bajure in future;

(3) JI will not oppose but rather help in constructing the road that connects Afghanistan with Pakistan (The road connects Chakdara via Munda-Bajaur-Ghakhi Pass-Kunar and Chakdara-Munda-Samar Bagh-Shahi-bin-Shahi-Asmaar-Kunar) and (4)the arrangement will remain intact between the two parties until a favourable government in Afghanistan is installed.

The reasons for such developments are described as the USA and Allied Forces are leaving Afghanistan next year so the military has geared up its contacts with those political-cum-religious parties who could help in furthering the interests of Pakistan and the military to establish their major share as a stake holder.

When the US and Allied forces entered Afghanistan, the religious parties in Pakistan were brought into the power in 2002 elections by the then military dictator, General Musharraf. Now, when these forces are leaving Afghanistan, there are hectic efforts to bring fundamentalists again into the power particularly in the province of Khyber Pukhtunkhwa (KP).

The May 11 elections are the first ever party-based elections in FATA history after the political parties order was extended to the tribal belt as part of reforms to the Frontiers Crimes Regulations (FCR) in 2011.

Mr. Haroon Rasheed and Sardar Khan of JI are contesting elections from the constituency of National Assembly 43 and 44 respectively.

Haroon Rasheed was also elected in 2002 on the JI ticket when military needed religious parties to help military government. He was providing shelter to the Al-Qaida militants at his house who were wanted at international level. In 2009, during the military operation, 10 Al-Qaida militants from the Arab countries were recovered who were hiding there since many years. His brother and nephew were arrested but brother was released and nephew is still behind the bar to safe him. His house has also been destroyed with many other houses in the Loi Sim area of Bajur. All destroyed houses were not allowed to be reconstructed but Haroon Rasheed’s house has been renovated as a special case.

The JI and its leaders were involved in providing shelter to Al-Qaida militants. The mastermind of 9/11 incident, Mr. Khalid Shiekh Mohammad was arrested from the house of Ahmed Abdul Qadoos, a leader of JI from Rawalpindi, Punjab, in March 2003 but with the help of Musharraf government Qadoos was released and no action has been taken against him. The same was with former provincial mister of KP, Mr. Siraj ul Haq, the president of JI from the province. He handed over one Al-Qaida man to his friend’s house in Durgai, the Malakand Agency. After some years the Al-Qaida militant was arrested by the military but no action has been taken against Haq and his friend, it was in the era of Musharraf government when Haq was the senior minister of the province.

Last January in Karachi, two Al-Qaeda operatives were arrested after a shoot-out in the house of Sabiha Shahid, another leader of the Jamaat’s women’s wing. Dr. Khawaja Javed and his brother, who are facing trial on charges of harbouring senior Al-Qaeda operatives and their families, in their sprawling residential compound outside Lahore, are closely related to a senior Jamaat leader.

According to the newsline report of 2003, Similarly, in Karachi, Jamaat (JI) activists were involved in the shoot-out which helped a third Arab to escape. “We have strong evidence of the Jamaat’s involvement with Al-Qaeda,” said a senior government official.

The Jamaat boasts the most active women’s wing of any political party. They have been in the forefront of the protests against the arrest of Al-Qaeda leaders. Many political leaders accuse the Jamaat of using its women members as human shields. Security officials maintain that Jamaat activists, who actively participated in the Afghan war against Soviet occupation, developed close contacts with the Arab fighters and the links continued after the war was over. “Their association with the Al-Qaeda is not surprising,” said a senior official. Faisal Saleh Hayat, the federal interior minister, said it was a matter of great concern to the government that top Al-Qaeda operatives were found to be harboured by the Jamaat. “How can they claim that Al-Qaeda fugitives are their guests?” he asked. In a press briefing on March 10, an ISI official maintained that individuals from the Jamaat were associated with the Al-Qaeda.

This time the military has again contacted the JI and other religious groups to induct religious candidates in the parliament so that the liberal and secular political parties should not come in majority and can not change the Islamic colour of the country. In the recent days the chief of the Army staff, General Kiyani has come out with the announcement that the Islamic Ideology is the basis of the creation of Pakistan and it can not be separated from the country. This announcement has been termed by media circles as the ‘pre-poll rigging’.

A deal is under way with many Jihadi groups and they were assured that the military will make their way in to the parliament but in return they have to extend their help in furthering its interests in Afghanistan by providing safety and security to the Jihadi elements. This is the reason that JI have been taken as the best via media for the militant organisations and in return JI will be given good numbers of the seats in the parliament.

The three political parties, the PPP, MQM and ANP and other political parties from Balochistan province, who are liberal and secular have been threatened by the Taliban that they would not be allowed to have freedom of election campaign. Their public meetings are continuously under the bomb attacks and the Taliban claim the responsibility. Those political parties who are supposing to the ‘friends of Taliban’ have the full freedom for the election campaign. The security forces are also not providing any security to stop the attacks of the liberal parties. A great divide has been made by the military, the caretaker government and election commission between the centre right and liberal political parties and all arrangement have made that those political parties must win who have the inclination towards Al-Qaida and Taliban.

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About AHRC: The Asian Human Rights Commission is a regional non-governmental organisation that monitors human rights in Asia, documents violations and advocates for justice and institutional reform to ensure the protection and promotion of these rights. The Hong Kong-based group was founded in 1984.

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Asian Human Rights Commission
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Hongkong S.A.R.
Tel: +(852) 2698-6339
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Web: humanrights.asia
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Finally the Tender to Run Pakistan…Thank God

Tender for running Pakistan

Vaqar Ahmed

Tender No. GOP 2013/193CTR/PTL/TEN/420

Tender Notice for Running the Country
The Government of Pakistan requires the service of an International Organization to run the country for a period of twenty-five years.

Country Background:
It is generally believed that Pakistan was created for the Muslims of India. However, there is still debate in the country regarding the ideology of Pakistan. Some say that Pakistan came into being so unexpectedly that no one had the time to define its ideology. The state of Pakistan can be categorized as one of the following (or any combination thereof):

• Islamic
• Secular
• Democratic
• Autocratic
• Militaristic
• Autistic

Since the creation of Pakistan, following governments have been in place:

1947 – 1948 Mohammed Ali Jinnah, founder of Pakistan was the first head of the state. Unfortunately, he passed away in 1948.

1948 – 1958 During this period 10 governments came and went. During this time a prime minister was assassinated and another exiled.

1958 – 1968 First Military coup and Martial law. The new Chief Martial Law Administrator and later President and Field Marshal, Mohammed Ayub Khan, ruled for ten years. People got sick and tired of dictatorship and went out in the streets calling the gentleman-soldier a dog. This broke his heart and he resigned. He was a decent sort of a chap who enriched only his own family and in return built many dams and a new city. He also authored a book titled “Friends and Masters”. Following the poor performance of the subsequent governments, he is today remembered as a Saint.

1971  The job of running the country became easier as the enslaved half of the country was freed through the goodwill and humanitarianism of the Pakistan military. The freed slaves made their own country called Bangladesh. The people of Bangladesh proved to be very ungrateful and now refuse to play cricket with Pakistan.

1972 – 1977 A young Oxford educated feudal Mr. Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto became the Chief Martial Law Administrator and then the Prime Minister. His main strength was his fiery speeches in good English and bad Urdu. He was such a good Muslim that he accepted all the key demands of the clerics like declaring the Ahmedis non-Muslims and banning alcohol. Being a man of conscience he started drinking heavily to lessen the pain of taking such horrid decisions. He also wisely purged all the left wing troublemakers in his party and replaced them with solid, reliable and wise men from the feudal class.

1977 – 1987 Mr. Bhutto’s top general Zia-ul-Haq did not see eye to eye with Mr. Bhutto. One part of the reason was that he was squint eyed and the second that he did not think that Mr. Bhutto was Islamic enough. So he did “Istikhara” (requesting guidance from God) and after receiving permission deposed the Prime Minister in a coup.

He announced that elections would take place in 90 days. However, the people were so pleased with the General that they beseeched him to stay. Being a true democrat the General could not turn down the request of the masses and decided to stay on to serve them. Just to make sure that he could serve the people with his full attention he declared that the pesky Mr. Bhutto had hanged himself in a fierce police encounter. Being a hospitable man, he invited all the Muslim Afghan brethren to live in Pakistan. He also helped them fight the infidels from Russia. He had a rich uncle named Sam who provided the required finances.

This pious man would be still in power if it were not for his love of mangoes. He filled up his plane with so many crates of mangoes that it crashed due to the excessive weight. Many in Pakistan were deeply saddened by the loss of such good mangoes.

1988 – 2013 The period from 1947 to 1988 was a game of musical chairs and no one remembers who came and who went and where and why. It is not clear who is running the affairs of Pakistan; in an opinion poll majority felt that it was God.

Scope of Work of the Bidder: 

The bidder will be solely responsible for running the Government of Pakistan.  This will include (but not limited to):

1. Disbanding the band of thieves that has been running the country for the past 65 years and deporting them to their home countries like the USA, Saudi Arabia, Dubai, Great Britain, and Canada.

2. Ensuring that containers are used for the sole purpose of transporting goods.

3. Banning spitting of phlegm, tobacco, niswar, and paan peek in public places and particularly on stairwells.

4. Removing all garbage strewn around the country and dumping it outside.

5. Arresting all the religious extremists and putting them in a rehabilitation centre run by Doctor Maulana Tahirul Qadri.

6. Removing all the political talk show anchors and using them as anchors for the boats in the oily waters of Kemari.

7. Changing the foreign policy from misaligned to non-aligned.

8. Eliminating the police force by making it mandatory for them to have a 32 inch waist.

9. Making Hijab mandatory for men and optional for women.

Bidder Qualification:

• Bidders from countries deemed to be more corrupt than Pakistan in the Transparency International Rankings will be subject to immediate disqualification.

• Bidders from previous colonizing countries like Great Britain, The Netherlands, Belgium, Spain and France will be given preference.

• Bidders from the USA are not eligible to bid as they are already running the Government of Pakistan.

• Bidders from Nigeria need not apply.

• The language of the bids can be any as long as it is English.

• Influencing the bid evaluation process by means of bribery is strictly prohibited unless it is at least $50 million and made through proper channels.

Submission of Tender:

• Tenders will be submitted in quadruplicate in hard copy by courier.

• As per normal procurement rules 10 per cent of the bid price will be deposited as “goodwill”

• Tenders will be submitted to the following address:

The Section Officer
Services and General Administration Division
Pakistan Secretariat
Islamabad

Closing date for the Tenders is 14 August 2013.

Taliban: Enemy of Our Enemy is Our Friend

Tribal elders pressurised to sign peace deals with Taliban

by Kahar Zalmay

Yet another policy change by the army indicates that the Taliban are now an asset in the new develop of the region

As the time of the withdrawal of the USA and the allied forces is coming closer the Pakistan army has suddenly changed its stance against the Taliban.

The army has developed its new policy from “Crush the terrorists” to “Our enemy’s enemy is our friend” and included the Taliban as its partner for the coming changes in the region. Since 2001 Pakistan has received huge amounts of foreign aid against Al-Qaida and the Taliban and internally a policy was adopted against terrorists which were generally bracketed as ‘Taliban’. The government and the army have divided the Taliban into the Pakistani and Afghanistan Taliban and showed a strong inclination towards declaring the Pakistani Taliban as enemies of the country. They are mainly operating from the tribal areas into the major cities of Pakistan.

In their latest policy statement the army has declared the terrorists as the major threat to the security of Pakistan. This is a policy shift as the main ‘threat’ to the country was previously India.

It is claimed by the Pakistani army that almost 40,000 armed forces personnel have been killed by terrorists, mainly by the Taliban. However, once again, a policy shift has been observed where the military is now forcing the tribal leaders of the FATA to make friends with the Taliban and sign peace deals with them. FATA is a semi-autonomous tribal region in north-western Pakistan, bordering Pakistan’s provinces of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan to the east and south, and Afghanistan’s provinces of Kunar, Nangarhar, Paktia, Khost and Paktika to the west and north. It comprises of seven tribal agencies (districts) and six frontier regions, and is directly governed by Pakistan’s federal government through a special set of laws called the Frontier Crimes Regulations (FCR).

Malaks are the tribal elders of different tribes and the Khan is the leader of the Malaks. The Malaks in Bajaur Agency are under tremendous pressure from the military to sign peace deals with the Taliban who fled to Kunar province in Afghanistan. Bajaur is one of the seven tribal agencies bordering Afghanistan. To the South of Bajaur is the Mohmand Agency while to the North it is connected with District Dir.

During the war with the Taliban the Pakistan army provided arms, ammunition and training to the tribal leaders and elders to fight against Terrorists. For that initiative the Aman Committees (Peace Committees) were formed and they fought valiantly, sacrificing their lives and property to save the country from attacks from the northern areas.

According to the details available from the scribe of this article in the interviews conducted with the Malaks, they were invited for a Jarga three months ago at the Political Agent’s office in the agency headquarter, Khaar. In that meeting the Malaks were asked to sign a peace deal with Taliban from Bajaur Agency and also to send a delegation to Kunar in order to bring them back.

The Jargas in the tribal areas are the official meetings conducted under the political agent of the FATA and grand Jargas are conducted by the provincial governor of Khyber Pakhtoonkha.

When the Malaks resisted this initiative, another Jarga was called on February 8, 2013 which was addressed by Brigadier Ghulam Haider who is the commander of the military in the agency. In this Jarga, Brigadier Haider pressed the elders to agree to a peace deal with the Taliban.

The ‘demand’ from the military was not merely limited to a peace deal with the Taliban. Each Malak was also asked to host 30 Talibani until the political agent built houses for them.

“We were shocked and could not believe what we were told by the Brigadier. We thought the military came to uproot  the terrorists from our area but now it is asking us to sign a deal with the murderers of our sons, brothers and children”, a shaken and incensed Malak shared with this scribe in Bajaur.

The resilience to this proposal-cum-dictate came from the elders of Salarzai tribe which was the first tribe to launch a tribal Lakhkar (a collective tribal force) under the leadership of its Khan, the Khan of Pashat, Shahabuddin Khan to fight Taliban in 2007-08. This was before the military entered Bajaur. Instead of appreciating the struggle of the Salarzai tribe and its elders, it has now become a casualty of the State policy.

“We are accused of taking money from the USA, Afghanistan, Europe and India for launching our Lakhkar. And when we refused to succumb to the pressure of the military to have peace with Taliban, a 1000-strong Taliban outfit attacked our area from the Baatwar side, a mountainous village on the Pak-Afghan border. Our valiant tribesmen deterred their attack and pushed them back to the Afghan side”, a Malak told me on the condition of anonymity. We were sitting in the shadow of those tall snowy mountains from where Taliban entered some four months back.

“We do not know what the military and the government want from us. We sacrificed so much in this war. There is not a single family that did not lose a member in this fight. But we are befuddled that why after so much sufferings, the military wants us to welcome those murderers. If this was going to be the conclusion of our fight, we would not have wanted the sacrifices of our children, fathers and brothers”, an elderly man belonging to the Salarzai tribe voiced, the sorrow and subjection was clearly printed on his wrinkled face.

“The military should tell us in clear terms what it wants from us? If it wants us to leave this place, so we shall. If it wants us to attack Afghanistan, we will do it. My kids are out of school for five years; they can’t go to school even in Peshawar or roam there unreservedly. They cannot go out of this compound and I myself cannot sit here”, (he was referring to his Hujra where the guests were sitting), another Malak told the scribe in Khaar, the headquarters of Bajaur Agency.

The scribe then asked, “But will you be able to handle Taliban if the military left Bajaur. He replied, “We want the military out as we are sick of its double game and we have arrived at this conclusion that military and Taliban are the same. And as far as the Taliban are concerned, we will slice them into small pieces and throw them to this dog”. He signalled to the dog lying near the kut (the traditional bed) enjoying a sound sleep and not the least concerned with the Malak’s anguish and my curiosity.

“The military is forcing Malaks to agree to a peace deal with the Taliban and for that it exploits different tactics”, divulged a local journalist on the condition of anonymity. “If you are a Malak and you resist negotiations with the Taliban, a stranger would use some IEDs in your area and stay there until the military sniping dogs spot him there. This gives the military an opportunity to confront the Malak and accuse him of harbouring the Taliban himself. He is left with no option but to accept peace deal”. He laughed, probably noticing the expression of surprise on the face of this scribe. “This is FATA my dear, away from human civilization”, he added.

The recent appointment of the governor of KPK, Shaukatullah Khan could be linked to this new strategy of the Pakistan army to bring back their assets from Afghanistan, rest them and get them ready for a new battle in Afghanistan after the US forces withdraw. Shaukatullah Khan was an elected member of the National Assembly from Bajaur Agency.

When the scribe contacted the Military Commander in Bajaur, Brigadier Ghulam Haider, to get his view on the allegations levelled against the military by the Malaks he said, “I might have been misquoted by some Malaks as the purpose of the military in Bajaur is to clear the area of all sorts of militants. We are strictly concentrating on our job and as for negotiations with the Taliban are concerned it’s a political decision that needs to be taken by the political forces in the country”.

The entire tribal area is now in a state of confusion, not knowing whether to side with the Taliban or the army. Regardless of which way to go, there is no doubt in their minds that they will be at the mercy of both the Taliban and the army. This is not the first time in recent history that there has been a policy change regarding the Taliban and it appears that this is more a matter of convenience rather than being in the interest of the security of the country.

If, in fact, the peace deals are signed with the Taliban this will be a licence for them to kill the innocent citizens in the name of their version of Islam.

The Ideology of Pakistan

by Baseer Naveed

The most popular slogan during the movement for the creation of Pakistan was, “Haath main lota munh main paan — laiker rahain gay Pakistan”, believe it that this was the ideology of Pakistan

It was on March 25, 1969, when General Yahya Khan imposed another period of Martial Law by sending General Ayub Khan home after he had ruled the country for almost eleven years. I was among those (young) students who were released after serving a jail term of four months on the charge of offending the ‘Defence of Pakistan Rules’ (DPR). General Yahya announced that general elections would be held in October 1970 but this was postponed to December 7 because of flooding in former East Pakistan. We were not voters in those days but very active in the students movement and had launched a country-wide movement against the military regime of General Ayub.

As the elections were announced, suddenly Pakistanis heard the phrase, the “Ideology of Pakistan”. Everybody was surprised with this terminology. In those days many leaders were still alive who had been in the forefront of the Pakistan movement in both East and West Pakistan. All the leadership denied this terminology but later on when Bangladesh was formed and those who preferred to live in West Pakistan used this phrase to justify the killings of innocent Bengalis for the punishment of disassociating with Pakistan.

The true story behind the Ideology of Pakistan was that General Yahya Khan had a Minister of Information by the name of Nawabzada Sher Ali Khan. He was short of stature and liked to be called Bonapart. Indeed, he had a statue of himself at his house and took great delight in showing it to his visitors. One leader from Jamat-e-Islami (JI), Mian Tufail Mohammad, was very close to Nawabzada and treated him as a true Muslim or ‘Islam Pasand’. The JI and its leader, Abul Aala Maudoodi, invented the term Islam Pasand for the Islamic religious parties but generally people said that the religious parties were not, in fact, Islamic but only paid Islam lip service. So, Jamat-e-Islami was, in those days, declared as Islam Pasand.

Nawabzada and Mian Tufail started campaigning for the new-born Ideology of Pakistan. This was the first time the phrase was introduced and more than 70 percent of the population was not considered as Islam Pasand. A strong propaganda campaign was initiated by the state about the Ideology of Islam by using the Ministry of Information which was virtually under control of the Jamat-e-Islami. Then May 31 was declared as the day of “Shoukat-e-Isam”, the supremacy of Islam. Hence, the Jamat-e-Islami started at country level under the patronage of the Martial Law government.

To impose the slogan of the Ideology of Pakistan many student groups, trade unions, professional associations such as the Pakistan Medical Association, Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists, bar associations and several civil society groups were declared non Islamic. Again we (the young) students were arrested in 1969 with hundreds of ‘infidels’ and tried by military courts. I was sentenced by the military court to one year of rigorous imprisonment and was incarcerated in Bahawalpur Central Prison with hardened prisoners. The prison was used for under-trial prisoners of murders and it was just next to Phansi Ghat (the place where executions took place by hanging). We were also booked under section 124A of the Pakistan Penal Code on charges of hatching a criminal conspiracy against Pakistan. This charge was framed against us because we were very much vocal against the Islamic Ideology.

The General and his favourite party, the JI, failed to convince the people on the Ideology of Pakistan and Jamat-e-Islami only got four out of the 300 seats. The Ideology could not take off at the initial stage and it crashed. The JI leader, Maudoodi cursed the people calling them donkeys and not true Muslims. The JI created two militant organizations, the Al-Shams and Al-Badr, who were given the task of punishing the anti Ideology of Pakistan elements and extending full support to the Pakistan army for cleansing the anti Pakistan element from former East Pakistan, present day Bangladesh. Over 30,000 women were raped and killed and millions of people were killed in East Pakistan in the name of this ‘Ideology’.

Whenever there is the chance of free and fair elections in Pakistan this Ideology stupidity resurfaces to call the supra constitutional forces to safeguard the ideological boundaries of the country. This is an intentional initiative from these forces and now the judiciary is also involved in the attempt to stop the Pakistan becoming a ‘nation state’. It looks very much as if Pakistan is not a country but an ideology. The judicial officers at the helm of the elections are asking questions about the personal behavior of the candidates and then associating it with the Ideology of Pakistan.

The real back ground of the Ideology of Pakistan was that it has never existed during the movement for the creation of the country. There was only the two nation theory; the Hindu nation and the Muslim nation and this was the basis of the creation of Pakistan which within a period of 24 years proved to be foolishness as another Muslim state was created from the womb of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. It was claimed that religion cannot be a bonding element for the different nationalities.

The Bengalis were more Muslim than the people of West Pakistan but they had to prove themselves before the ordinary soldiers of Pakistan by opening their sarongs (Lungi) or trousers to prove that they were circumcised. One can find these photographs on the Google engine.

All these absurdities were created to turn a country into a theocratic state but it has always failed. One example of this was General Muhammad Zia ul Haq’s attempt to create an Islamic state and he added articles to the Constitution for the election of righteous and pure people. However, despite the fact that he had the full support of the military he failed. He wanted Pakistan to be an Islamic state based on 1400 years of Islamic teachings and the result was that the most corrupt people from the society of the day were elected to his parliament.

Today, only state run institutions practice this Islamification order to provide protection for their corruption, nepotism and undemocratic way of governance. The founding fathers have never used these words in their speeches or manifestos. But the most popular slogan of the movement of Pakistan was “Hath main lota munh main paan—laker rahain gay Pakistan”. Lota means a spherical water vessel of brass, copper or plastic used in parts of South Asia for self cleaning. The meaning of this slogan is that by holding the lota in one hand and beetle nuts in the mouth we will ultimately get the Pakistan we want. However many poets and writers tried to develop many slogans including some religious ones but those never gained in popularity among the Muslim population of the Sub Continent of India.

The proponents of the Ideology of Pakistan want to snatch the fundamental rights of the people by refusing them the possibility of individual liberty, freedom of expression and opinion and the choice to elect the representatives they want in government. They want a rigid and theocratic society based on their version of Islam so that they can negate the concept of a modern state.

If the persons elected were, in fact, pure Muslim according to the so-called Ideology of Pakistan then this means that Pakistan will become a pure Islamic and theocratic country where there would be no room for democracy. Religion and democracy cannot coexist as democracy is essentially a secular phenomenon. In a secular system all sections of a society are treated equally. The sole purpose of the Ideology of Pakistan is to deny the people of the country their sovereignty, equal rights, prosperity and the rule of law.

 

Taliban Have Reached Karachi

Karachi is no stranger to gangland violence, driven for years by a motley collection of armed groups who battle over money, turf and votes.

But there is a new gang in town. Hundreds of miles from their homeland in the mountainous northwest, Pakistani Taliban fighters have started to flex their muscles more forcefully in parts of this vast city, and they are openly taking ground.

Taliban gunmen have mounted guerrilla assaults on police stations, killing scores of officers. They have stepped up extortion rackets that target rich businessmen and traders, and shot dead public health workers engaged in polio vaccination efforts. In some neighborhoods, Taliban clerics have started to mediate disputes through a parallel judicial system.

The grab for influence and power in Karachi shows that the Taliban have been able to extend their reach across Pakistan, even here in the country’s most populous city, with about 20 million inhabitants. No longer can they be written off as endemic only to the country’s frontier regions.

In joining Karachi’s street wars, the Taliban are upending a long-established network of competing criminal, ethnic and political armed groups in this combustible city. The difference is that the Taliban’s agenda is more expansive — it seeks to overthrow the Pakistani state — and their operations are run by remote control from the tribal belt along the Afghan border.

Already, the militants have reshaped the city’s political balance by squeezing one of the most prominent political machines, the Pashtun-dominated Awami National Party, off its home turf. They have scared Awami operatives out of town and destroyed offices, gravely undercutting the party’s chances in national elections scheduled for May.

“We are the Taliban’s first enemy,” said Shahi Syed, the party’s provincial head, at his newly fortified office. “They burn my offices, they tear down my flags and they kill our people.”

The Taliban drift into Karachi actually began years ago, though much more quietly. Many fled here after a concerted Pakistani military operation in the Swat Valley in 2009. The influx has gradually continued, officials here say, with Taliban fighters able to easily melt into the city’s population of fellow ethnic Pashtuns, estimated to number at least five million people.

Until recently, the militants saw Karachi as a kind of rear base, using the city to lie low or seek medical treatment, and limiting their armed activities to criminal fund-raising, like kidnapping and bank robberies.

But for at least six months now, there have been signs that their timidity is disappearing. The Taliban have become a force on the street, aggressively exerting their influence in the ethnic Pashtun quarters of the city.

Taliban tactics are most evident in Manghopir, an impoverished neighborhood of rough, cinder-block houses clustered around marble quarries on the northern edge of the city, where illegal housing settlements spill into the surrounding desert.

In recent months, Taliban militants have attacked the Manghopir police station three times, killing eight officers, said Muhammad Aadil Khan, a local member of Parliament.

In interviews, residents describe Taliban militants who roam on motorbikes or in jeeps with tinted windows, delivering extortion demands in the shape of two bullets wrapped in a piece of paper.

A factory owner in Manghopir, speaking on the condition of anonymity out of fear for his safety, said that several Pashtun businessmen had received demands for $10,000 to $50,000. The figure was negotiable, he said, but payment was not: resistance could result in an assault on the victim’s house or, in the worst case, a bullet to the head.

Mr. Khan said he had not dared to visit his constituency in months. “There is a personal threat against me,” he said, speaking at the headquarters of his party, the Muttahida Qaumi Movement, which represents ethnic Mohajirs, in the city center.

The militant drive has even distressed Manghopir’s most revered residents: the dozens of crocodiles who inhabit a pool near a Sufi shrine here.

The Muslim pilgrims who come here to pay homage to the shrine’s saint have long also brought scraps of meat for his reptile charges.

But lately, as visitor numbers have dwindled from hundreds per day to barely a few dozen, the roughly 120 crocodiles here have grown hungry, according to the animals’ elderly caretaker.

Police officials, militant sources and Pashtun residents say that three major Taliban factions operate in Karachi — the most powerful one, which is rooted in South Waziristan and dominated by the Mehsud tribe, and two others from the Swat and Mohmand areas.

A senior city police officer, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said that militant commanders with those factions send operational orders to Karachi from the tribal belt; while some captured militants have tried to justify their activities by citing the authorization of religious clerics in the northwest.

In cases, he added, regular criminal groups have posed as Taliban fighters in a bid to increase their power of intimidation.

Just why the Taliban are adopting such an aggressive profile in Karachi right now is unclear. Some cite the greater number of militants fleeing Pakistani military operations in the northwest; others say it may be the product of dwindling funds, as jihadi donors in the Persian Gulf states turn to the Middle East.

In any event, it has shaken the city’s bloody ethnic politics.

Since the 1980s, armed supporters of the Mohajir-dominated Muttahida Qaumi Movement have engaged in tit-for-tat violence with those of the Pashtun-dominated Awami National Party. In the worst periods, dozens of people have died in a day. Now, faced with a common enemy, figures in both parties say they have declared an uneasy, unofficial truce.

As well as the attack on the Awami party — which have seen it close 44 of its district offices across the city — the Pakistan Taliban claimed responsibility for two attacks on the Muttahida Qaumi Movement — first, a bombing that killed four people, then the assassination of a party parliamentarian.

In a recent interview with The New York Times in North Waziristan, the Taliban spokesman Ehsanullah Ehsan said the group was targeting both parties — as well as President Zardari’s PPP — for their “liberal” policies.

The security forces, shaken out of complacency, have begun a number of major anti-Taliban operations. The latest of those occurred on March 23 when hundreds of paramilitary Rangers raided a residential area in Manghopir, near the crocodile shrine, confiscating a cache of more than 50 weapons and rounding up 200 people, 16 of whom were later identified as militants and detained.

“I don’t think the Taliban would like to set Karachi aflame, because they fear the reaction against them,” said Ikram Seghal, a security consultant in Karachi. “The police and intelligence agencies have very good information about them.”

Other factors limit the Pakistani Taliban’s ingress into Karachi. One of the more provocative ones is that allied militants — particularly the Afghan Taliban — might not like the added publicity. The Afghan wing has long used the city as place to rest and resupply. There are longstanding rumors that the movement’s leader, Mullah Muhammad Omar, is taking shelter here, and that his leadership council, known as the Quetta Shura, has met in Karachi.

In such a vast and turbulent city, the Taliban may become just another turf-driven gang. But without a determined response from the security forces, experts say, they could also seek to become much more.

What Was This Asshole Doing When Posted in Pakistan?

Pakistan’s Precipitous Decline

By William Milam

NYT/ April 4, 2013

Pakistanis are celebrating the accomplishment of an elected government — for the first time in the country’s history — serving in office for the full five years of its constitutional term.

Never mind that this is the only accomplishment of that government, or that the news is drowned out by the horror stories that continue to emanate from Pakistan. These only serve to solidify the impression of an increasingly dysfunctional, fragmented, very troubled state, on which much depends, but in which fragility and instability continue to mount.

Atrocity builds on atrocity. Minorities are targeted and murdered — with seeming impunity — by extremists who brag publicly about doing so. And the violence is not limited to minorities. Anyone who does not meet a narrow and exclusive definition of “Muslim,” as defined by religious fundamentalists, has come under increasing attack. The ubiquitous Sufi shrines, revered by perhaps half of the Sunni population, are assaulted by extremists who regard them as apostate. Humanitarians delivering social and medical services to the poor are gunned down in cold blood — witness the murder of polio vaccine and other health workers, and that of Parveen Rehman, the head of Pakistan’s celebrated urban social service NGO, the Orangi project of Karachi. And now we learn that, with an election coming, the political parties are wooing the perpetrators, rather than pledging to defeat them.

Predictions about Pakistan, a growth industry today but one that has kept scholars and pundits busy for decades, has often produced insightful and unsettling analyses. Almost all observers come to the same conclusion — Pakistan will muddle through for the foreseeable future. We view Pakistan either through “a glass half full,” meaning that there is hope that someday, in some way, the country will turn around, or through “a glass half empty,” meaning that its long-term trajectory is toward failure, but that it will hold together during our lifetime (glued by the army).

But the increasingly grim news out of Pakistan forcefully reminds me of what my dear friend, the late Sir Hilary Synnott, former British high commissioner to Pakistan, argued a few years ago. The half-full or half-empty glass was not, he said, the appropriate metaphor. Analysts should, he insisted, look at Pakistan through the image of “a glass too large,” by which he meant a country constantly overreaching.

I think Sir Hilary was on to something. Pakistan has historically tried to punch above its weight. This derives mainly from its historic regard of India as its existential threat. This elevated the army, gave it a public imprimatur above the politicians, and allowed it to take — almost as its right — most of the state’s resources to maintain an imagined parity with India. To add to its arsenal, the army recruited religious militants to fight as proxies against India and in Afghanistan. The irony is that the army has lost control of these proxies, and it is they who are now carrying out the attacks against the state and its citizens.

In addition to the army, Pakistan inherited its other political and economic institutions from the British (and to some extent the Moguls) and, as in almost all ex-colonial countries, these were taken over by indigenous elites and the state, for the benefit of those elites and the state. This suited the army just fine, as these institutions were soon dwarfed vis-à-vis the army, and remain so. Had its society remained so structured, over time those political and economic institutions might have become stronger and more independent, and Pakistan more modern. Sometimes that happens, but infrequently. The addition of these now-autonomous militant proxies to an already unpromising mix made that mix even more toxic, and modernization much less likely.

Before our eyes, the Pakistani state, which seems to have given in without a murmur to the exclusionist narrative of the fundamentalists, may have begun to unravel. Sir Hilary’s metaphor of “a glass too large” may have even wider application and meaning. How can a state continue to muddle through when it has lost the fundamental requisite of a state, its monopoly on the use and definition of legitimate violence? How much longer before Pakistanis conclude that the basic protection their state is supposed to provide its citizens — of life and property — is absent.

The feeling comes that the inflection point of the “muddle through” curve is being reached, that in effect, the too-large glass we should look through has now filled to overflowing with problems that Pakistan cannot handle — a weak state under attack from the monsters it created, with mostly dysfunctional political and economic institutions, going in a vicious circle, and showing no promise or hope of transformation. The West, as well as Pakistan’s regional neighbors, should be thinking about the political and strategic implications of an accelerated decline toward state failure in this key, nuclear-armed country.

William Milam is a former U.S. ambassador to Pakistan and a scholar at the Woodrow Wilson Center.

 

Iqbal: ‘India is the Greatest Muslim Country in the World’

Mohammed Iqbal was arguably the finest poet of his time.

But the man who wrote the immortal Saare Jaan Se Accha Hindustan Hamara is often reviled in India for championing the cause of Pakistan.

In this fascinating extract from his much acclaimed biography of the poet, Iqbal Singh explores Iqbal’s association with the genesis of Pakistan.

Before 1930 Pakistan was not even a name or, if it was, nobody had heard of it in public. In that year Iqbal presided at the annual session of the All-India Muslim League held in Allahabad. As is customary on such occasion, he read a lengthy address at the opening session in which he made a tour de horizon of the general political situation in the country with specific attention to the problem of Muslim interests.

His address is somewhat different from the usual generalities and platitudes which are the stock-in-trade of presidential addresses. It has seriousness, an intellectual gravity, and a dignity which never failed him when he really directed his mind to any particular problem. There is good deal in that is parochial and polemical, but it also has passage of remarkably lucid prose.

He begins by denying that he has any special political axe to grind:

“I lead no party; I follow no leader. I have given the best part of my life to a careful study of Islam, its law and polity, its culture, its history and literature. This constant contact with the Spirit of Islam, as it unfolds itself in time, has, I think, given me a kind of insight into its significance as a world-fact. It is in the light of this insight, whatever its value, that, while assuming that the Muslims of India are determined to remain true to the Spirit of Islam, I propose, not to guide you in your decisions, but to attempt the humbler task of bringing clearly to your consciousness the main principle which, in my opinion, should determine the general character of those decisions.”

He then proceeds to develop the argument so dear to his heart regarding the true nature of Islam. It is not, he contends just another religion among many religions, but a unique world-view embracing the whole sphere of human activity; a total philosophy if you like, which cannot be reconciled with narrow nationalistic ideals.

It differs, moreover, from other religions like Christianity, for example, in that it is not other-worldly, but accepts the world of time and space and believes in a Kingdom that is of the earth. As the whole argument is fundamental to Iqbal’s position and is here stated with greater clarity than anywhere else by him, it deserves to be quoted at some length:

“It cannot be denied that Islam, regarded as an ethical ideal plus a certain kind of polity by which expression I mean a social structure, regulated by a legal system and animated by a specific ethical ideal — has been the chief formative factor in the life-history of the Muslims of India. It has furnished those basic emotions and loyalties which gradually unify scattered individuals and groups, and finally transform them into a well-defined people, possessing a moral consciousness of their own. Indeed it is no exaggeration to suggest that India is perhaps the only country where Islam, as a people building force, has worked at its best. In India, as elsewhere, the structure of Islam as a society is almost entirely due to the working of Islam as a culture inspired by a specific ethical ideal. What I mean to say is that Muslim society, with its remarkable homogeneity and inner unity, has grown to be what it is, under the pressure of the laws and institutions associated with the culture of Islam.

“The ideals set free by European political thinking, however, are now rapidly changing the outlook of the present generation of Muslims both in India and outside India. Our younger men inspired by these ideas, are anxious to see them as living force in their own countries, without any critical appreciation of the facts which have determined their evolution in Europe. In Europe Christianity was understood to be a purely monastic order which gradually developed into a church-organisation. The protest of Luther was directed against the church-organisation, not against any system of polity of a secular nature, for the obvious reason that there was no such polity associated with Christianity. And Luther was perfectly justified in rising in revolt against this organisation, though, I think, he did not realise that in the peculiar condition which obtained in Europe, his revolt would eventually mean the displacement of the universal ethics of Jesus by the growth of a plurality of national and hence narrower systems of ethics. Thus the upshot of the intellectual movement initiated by such men as Luther and Rousseau was the break-up of the One into a mutually ill-adjusted many, the transformation of a human into a national outlook, requiring a more realistic foundation, such as the notion of country, and finding expression through varying systems of polity evolved on national lines, on lines which recognise territory as the only principle of political solidarity.

“…The universal ethics of Jesus is displaced by national systems of polity and ethics. The conclusion to which Europe is consequently driven is that religion is a private affair of the individual and has nothing to do with, what is called man’s temporal life. Islam does not bifurcate the unity of man into an irreconcilable duality of spirit and matter. In Islam God and the universe, spirit and matter, church and state, are organic to each other. Man is not the citizen of a profane world to be renounced in the interests of a world of spirit situated elsewhere. To Islam matter is spirit realising itself in space and time… A Luther in the world of Islam is an impossible phenomenon; for here there is no church-organisation, similar to that of Christianity in the Middle Ages, inviting a destroyer. In the world of Islam we have a universal polity whose fundamentals are believed to have been revealed, but whose structure, owing to our legist’ want of contact with the modern world, stands today indeed of renewed power by fresh adjustments. I do not know what will be the final fate of the national idea in the world of Islam. Whether Islam will assimilate and transform it, as it has transformed and assimilated before many ideas expressive of a different spirit, or allow a radical transformation of its own structure by the force of this idea, is hard to predict… At the preset moment the national idea is reclaiming the outlook of Muslims, and thus materially counteracting the humanising task of Islam… I hope you will pardon me for this apparently academic discussion. To address this session of the All India Muslim League you have selected a man who has not despaired of Islam as a living force for freeing the outlook of men from its geographical limitations, who believes that religion is a power of the utmost importance in the life of individuals as well as states, and finally who believes that Islam is itself Destiny and will not suffer a destiny…”

After this bold declaration, Iqbal descends to more mundane regions — to the problem of reconciling the various groups and their interest in India. He repeats the unexceptionable platitude that ‘the unity of an Indian nation, therefore, must be sought, not in the negation, but in the mutual harmony and co-operation of the many… And it is one the discovery of Indian unity in this direction that the fate of India as well as of Asia really depends….’

But why has it been impossible to discover this principle of harmony and co-operation?

Iqbal has his diagnosis; not a very brilliant diagnosis, but certainly a revealing one. We have failed because, he observes, ‘we suspect each other’s intentions and inwardly aim at dominating each other. Perhaps in the higher interest of mutual co-operation we cannot afford to part with monopolies which circumstances have placed in our hands…’

The passage is significant. After the sublime flight into the sphere of the ideals of Islam which is ‘a Destiny and will not suffer a destiny’ we are pulled down by the force of gravity into the not so heroic realm of economic exigencies. The real reason why Indian unity has been impossible to achieve, according to Iqbal, is because certain groups (presumably, the Hindus) having established monopolies in various economic fields are not prepared to share them with their Muslim counterparts.

This is not a very original analysis of the origin of Hindu-Muslim conflict in India, thought it happens within limits, to be a correct analysis. It might have been furnished by any mediocre middle class politician. But coming from the Poet of Islam it has a unique significance.

Excerpted from The Ardent Pilgrim, An Introduction to the Life and Works of Mohammed Iqbal by Iqbal Singh, Oxford University Press, 1997, Rs 295, with the publisher’s permission. Readers in the US may secure a copy of the book from Oxford University Press Inc USA, 198, Madison Avenue, New York, New York 10016, USA. Tel: 212-726-6000. Fax: 212-726-6440.

 

Kidnappings in Karachi

I received a call from someone claiming that he was from my mobile service provider and he asked me to shutdown my phone for 2 hours for 3G update to take place. As I was rushing for a meeting, I did not question and shutdown my cell phone.

After 45 minutes I felt very suspicious since the caller did not even introduce his name. I quickly turned on my cell phone and I saw several missed calls from my family members and the others were from the number that had called me earlier.

I called my parents and I was shocked that they sounded very worried asking me whether I am safe.

My parents told me that they had received a call from someone claiming that they had me with them and asking for money to let me free. The call was so real and my parents even heard ‘my voice’ crying out loud asking for help. My parent was at the bank waiting for
next call to proceed for money transfer. I told my parents that I am safe and asked them to lodge a police report.

Right after that I received another call from the guy asking me to shutdown my cell phone for another 1 hour which I refused to do and hung up.

They keep calling my cell phone until the battery had run down. I myself lodged a police report and I was informed by the officer that there were many such scams reported.

Most of the cases reported that the victim had already transferred the money! And it is impossible to get back the money.

Be careful as this kind of scam might happen to any of us!!! Those guys are so professional and very convincing during calls.

Asian Human Rights’ Baseer Naveed Criticizes Gen Kayani’s Speech

Why is General Kiyani dictating Islamic ideology as the basis of the country?

by Baseer Naveed

Just twenty days before the general elections the Chief of Army Staff (COAS), General Ashfaq Pervez Kiyani, has come out with a policy statement which gives the political views of the Army.

The statement was delivered with the express intention of getting elections results in favour of the fundamentalists, Jihadis and their supporting parties. While addressing the assembled troops at the passing out parade of 127th PMA Long Course, 46th Integrated Course and the first Mujahid Course at the Pakistan Military Academy in Kakul, he said that since Islam was the basis of Pakistan’s creation, it can never be separated from the body politic. He categorically emphasised this point when he said:

“Let me remind you that Pakistan was created in the name of Islam and Islam can never be taken out of Pakistan. However, Islam should always remain a unifying force. I assure you that regardless of the odds, the Pakistan Army will keep on doing its best towards our common dream for a truly Islamic Republic of Pakistan”.

Kiyani also made an about face when he changed the ‘new doctrine about operational priorities’, (the Green Book), which was issued on January 2, 2013. In it the Army described the Taliban and other terrorists as the biggest threat to the country.  For decades the Army has always considered India as its No 1 enemy but growing extremism in the country compelled the military authorities to review its strategy. A new chapter, ‘Sub-conventional warfare’ has been included in the Green Book for the first time.

Kiyani’s statement is alarming in that the strongest institution of the country is once again revealing its intentions to enforce the non-secular and extremist forces in the elections. The majority of the political parties, who have always won the confidence of the people through free and fair votes, are secular in their politics and they have different opinions about the ‘Ideology of Pakistan’. In fact, most of them do not consider that Pakistan was created for any particular ideology but was rather created to be a homeland for the Muslims of the subcontinent. The Islamic religious parties have started saying that Pakistan was created on the basis of Islam 24 years after the creation of the country in 1970 which resulted in the division of the nation.

This is not the first time that whenever general elections are held, the Army comes out with the enforcement of the ‘Ideology of Pakistan’, which they relate with Islamic ideology. In 1969 when General Yahya Khan took over the country after a people’s uprising against the previous dictator he invented the Ideology of Pakistan based on Islamic ideology to patronise the anti-democratic and religious forces who were very much against Pakistan and its founder, Mr. Jinnah, whom they then called an infidel. Interestingly, the General was known to be a lover of strong drink and a rampant womanizer. At that time the country had never seen such a ‘pious’ man and he was very dear to the religious parties. However, all his efforts failed. The secular political parties won with a thumping majority and the religious parties were only able to get 15 out of more than 300 seats.

Another General, Zia-ul-Haq, came into power after throwing out and imprisoning Prime Minister Bhutto in the name of Islam, who he later hung. In the 1985 elections General Zia introduced articles 62 and 63 in the hopes of getting pious and hard line Muslim candidates. In the end all he got were the most corrupt members of his Islamic assemblies. During 1991, the then Chief of Army Staff, General Nawaz Janjua, repeated the same words of Islamic ideology as the basis for the Ideology of Pakistan. The engineered elections were held in which the notorious intelligence agency, the ISI, distributed huge amounts of money and obtained the required election results after expending a huge amount of public funds.

In Kiyani’s speech to the troops he again came out with the threatening call that: “Let it suffice to say that Pakistan is fully capable of responding effectively to any threat, the army chief said, without naming India or any other country. Despite our current focus on internal security, we remain fully prepared to defeat an external direct threat”. (As reported by the Daily Dawn). This was seen as a provocation to the neighbouring countries and nothing less than warmongering particularly at the time of the elections.

It was a clear indication that what Kiyani says for the Ideology of Islam as the basis of Pakistan means that religious minority groups do not have any space in the country as the country was created only for the Muslims. Therefore in the opinion of the military there is nothing available for the different religions.

Another alarming thing for the people of Pakistan was the inclusion of the ‘first Mujahid (holy warriors or Jihadis) course’ at the Pakistan Military Academy. The handouts by the military did not clarify or define the purpose behind the course. Does this now mean that the Army wants to create Mujahideen so that Jihad can be introduced through the soldiers as its old policy of the Cold War era? With whom will these Mujahideen fight? Prior to 2001 the army and military government made it a policy to combat the terrorist who were fighting to enforce Islam through violence to achieve their results. Thousands of people were killed, including 40 thousand soldiers from the forces and allied organizations.

With Islamic ideology as the basis of the country the military must have a hidden agenda for the time when the American forces leave Afghanistan in 2014. Is the intention to have a pro-Pakistan government, like the Taliban of 1994, and is this possible through the creation of the Jihadis? For this reason the military has started a campaign on the Ideology of Pakistan to re-enforce the extremist and fundamentalists and their friends who are contesting the coming elections so that a government can be formed which can always remain under the dictates of the army in the name of the protection of the Ideology of Pakistan?

If the religious-based parties do not win the next elections and do not form the government the only conclusion to be drawn is that the Army will not accept the election results. Either that or the Army would force the caretaker government to run the country until the parties inclined towards the Ideology of Pakistan come to power.

The other aspect of declaring Islamic ideology as the basis of Pakistan is to strangle the freedom of expression. For the last five to six years society has enjoyed freedom of expression to a great extent which, of course, would not be a good omen for those institutions who have always enjoyed unfettered power and who might now have to be accountable to a secular parliament.

It is not the function of the Pakistan Army or its commanding officer to dictate to the country as to what the basis of Pakistan is and who has the right to remind the people of it. It is better for democracy and a democratic set up that the politicians should decide the Ideology of Pakistan rather than the military. It is only the people of Pakistan that have the right to choose any person or political group which may or may not follow the Ideology of Pakistan. General Kiyani should concentrate on his sworn duty of defending the country rather than poking his nose into political issues.

Pakistan’s Medical Schools – Where The Women Rule

by Rebecca Santana

In a lecture hall of one of Pakistan’s most prestigious medical schools, a handful of male students sits in the far top corner, clearly outnumbered by the rows and rows of female students listening intently to the doctor lecturing about insulin.

In a country better known for honor killings of women and low literacy rates for girls, Pakistan’s medical schools are a reflection of how women’s roles are evolving.

Women now make up the vast majority of students studying medicine, a gradual change that’s come about after a quota favoring male admittance into medical school was lifted in 1991.

The trend is a step forward for women in Pakistan, a largely conservative Muslim country. But there remain obstacles. Many women graduates don’t go on to work as doctors, largely because of pressure from family and society to get married and stop working – so much so that there are now concerns over the impact on the country’s health care system.

In Dow Medical College in Karachi, the female students said they are adamant they will work.

Standing in the school’s courtyard as fellow students – almost all of them women – gathered between classes, Ayesha Sultan described why she wants to become a doctor.

“I wanted to serve humanity, and I believe that I was born for this,” said Sultan, who is in her first year. “The women here are really striving hard to get a position, especially in this country where women’s discrimination is to the zenith, so I think that’s why you find a lot of women here.”

For years, a government-imposed quota mandated that 80 percent of the seats at medical schools went to men and 20 percent to women. Then the Supreme Court ruled that the quota was unconstitutional and that admission should be based solely on merit.

Now about 80 to 85 percent of Pakistan’s medical students are women, said the secretary general of the Pakistan Medical Association. Statistics show that at medical schools in some deeply conservative areas of the country such as Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, men still outnumber women.

But in Punjab and Sindh provinces, which turn out the vast bulk of medical students, the women dominate. At Dow, it is currently about 70 percent women to 30 percent men.

In comparison, about 47 percent of medical students in the U.S. are women, according to the Association of American Medical Colleges.

There are a number of different reasons why men don’t make the cut.

Medical school takes too long and is too difficult.

Boys have more freedom to leave the house than girls, so they have more distractions. Boys want a career path in business or IT that will make them more money and faster, in part because they need to earn money to raise families.

“In our society, girls are working harder. They are just more concentrated on their studies,” said Azhar. Boys also see how hard doctors have to work even after they get their degree. “They do not like to work hard as a matter of fact.”

Ammara Khan is fully prepared for the years that it will take to fulfill her dream of becoming a neurosurgeon. She decided she wanted to pursue neurosurgery after watching an operation while volunteering at the Aga Khan University Hospital in Karachi.

“It’s like an adrenaline rush, and I knew I wanted to be that and nothing else,” she said.

Still, medical officials and students acknowledge many women don’t go on to practice medicine.

At Dow, for example, just about all the male graduates work as doctors, but only an estimated half the women do, says Dr. Umar Farooq, the school’s pro-vice chancellor. Nationwide figures on how many women graduates forgo actual practice don’t exist, but despite years of increased women’s enrollment, the gender breakdown of doctors remains lopsided.

Of the 132,988 doctors registered with the Pakistan Medical and Dental Council, 58,789 are women. The number of female specialists is even smaller: 7,524 out of 28,686.

The pressure on women to get married, have kids and stay home to raise them is powerful.

The prestige of a medical degree gives a woman a boost in marriage prospects, so many parents push their daughters to enroll, many students and faculty said. Prospective in-laws like the idea of having a doctor in the family and want their sons to have an educated wife to ensure the grandchildren are educated as well.

But that doesn’t mean they want the woman to actually use her degree and take away from child-raising time.

“They want a doctor label but they don’t want it to go anywhere. They don’t think you’re a real person who might want to specialize or work on it,” said Beenish Ehsan, a student at Dow.

Her own family supports her completing the initial five years of medical college. But when she started talking about further studies for a specialization, they worried it would take away from her future family life.

“They’re like, `No, but you’ll take care of the house, won’t you?’” Ehsan said.

“You have to convince them,” she said, adding that too many women don’t push back against their families. “Sometimes girls give up too soon, I feel.”

There are also cultural impediments. Women who do work often don’t want to do so in rural areas far from their families or don’t want night shifts, given the country’s deteriorating law and order. Some male patients only want to be treated by men because they don’t want women touching them or because they perceive the men to be smarter and more qualified.

During the 2010 floods that devastated Pakistan, Dow wanted to send medical students to Sindh province to treat victims but were hindered by the school’s overwhelmingly female enrollment, admissions director said. The boys could go on their own for long stretches. The girls were also lobbying heavily to go, but the school decided to send them in teams on buses with chaperones out of concern for their safety. They would return home each evening, thus limiting how far they could travel.

“We are responsible for these girls. How can we send them out to these hard-hit areas?” she said. “These are the ground realities in our society.”

Amid concerns over the number of the doctors in the future, proposals are being touted to rebalance the student body. Masood said she would support some sort of gender bias in admissions to bring in more male students. The PMA has floated the idea of building a number of medical schools just for boys. Already there are five medical schools for women.

Among the students, some said a new quota was necessary. Others said it would be unfair.

“That would be injustice. Girls are studying harder,” said one male student, Aleem Uddin Khan, who said it took him two tries to get into Dow. “If we want the seats, we should study hard.”

The debate here echoes the “mommy wars” in the U.S., where women have been trying to figure out the balance between work and home life for years.

Midhat Lakhani, a Dow student, has only to look to her mother, who’s a doctor, to know it’s possible to pursue a career and have a family. Her mom took her postgraduate exams 15 days after giving birth to Midhat’s sister.

“You have to be supermom, obviously,” she said.